A researcher named Benjamin Bloom developed a taxonomy of learning (here's a modern day version http://www.odu.edu/educ/roverbau/Bloom/blooms_taxonomy.htm). The ides was to order cognitive activity from easiest--rote--to hardest or most sophisticated, from Lower Order Thinking Skills to Higher Order Thinking Skills. The link will give you some idea of what Bloom had in mind. Learning, he suggested, proceeded from the lower level to the upper level. Don't know about you but I memorized multiplication tables as the first step toward long division.
Well, I came across an ordered set of communication skills that I thought was of interest. In order, from easiest to most sophisticated, mentally:
Texting
Instant messaging
Twittering
Emailing
Chatting
Contributing
Networking
Posting & blogging
Replying
Questioning
Reviewing
Video conferencing/Skyping/Net meeting
Debating
Negotiating
Moderating
Collaborating
Do you have a theory as to why the more popular communication types are among the lowest in cognitive effort?
I wonder, where is your comfort zone? Are you looking forward to moving up the ladder to some of the higher-order skills we will use in this class?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
My comfort zone would be at video conferencing. I have attended on-line meetings via sametime. I am comfortable with net meetings. I would surely like to advance in the use of collaboration tools. I am familiar with some but not all. Skype is something I did not know about till now. I am very excited to use the tool and learn as much as possible.
ReplyDeleteWhatever gets your point or idea across the fastest and with least effort is what is most popular today. Who finds the time for anything anymore? Phone calls and personal interaction are a thing of the past. Why waste time making small talk when you can just text your question or statement and get a quick and equally short response?
ReplyDeleteI find this pretty sad, truthfully. I am a fan of change when its purpose is to improve upon an existing process, but we are becoming stupid-"er" and antisocial in the process, even with all this e-social activity.
Yes I am a fan of using such tools to move up the corporate ladder, but also I believe in personal followup by phone call or other humanly gesture to put a voice with the text.
Just as Jane mentioned above people now days don't have time to make a phone call or write a well thought out email so they use these tech tools to quickly get their point/question across and hope to get a quick response back. The issue with using the tech tools is that you may not get your point across quickly as you would like as it can be misread or misinterpreted. You may end up putting in a lot more effort answering or explaining things going back and forth before you can actually get an answer. I still believe that personal communication is the best way to avoid these issues and still maintain the people skills.
ReplyDelete