The End (of COMM107) is Near!

The past semester I took COMM107, and compared to my other courses (which was super-saturated with science classes and their corresponding labs) it was a lot more fun and interactive. Out of all of the communication topics we learned about, however, intrapersonal communication was my favorite chapter. Not because I have the extremely unsettling habit of talking to myself, but because intrapersonal communication is often overlooked as a mode of communication. You can’t expect to communicate with others if you can’t communicate with yourself! Through that chapter, I also realized how impactful (and sometimes detrimental) your own communication can be to yourself. I began to notice psychological vultures that seemed to be looming over my every mistake, and I began to stop myself from saying those things to myself. My least favorite part of the course was probably the group work. While I understand the value of working in groups, I thought that this particular project made more sense as an individual project. My group, specifically, had a lot of unrelated topics that we had to force to become related, and it didn’t really work for us. I love working in groups, so I would say keep the group work but choose a different a project.

Andi, our TA, took a really unique approach to the class. Since she is an activist for using modern social network outlets for educational purposes, we used this blog and a Facebook thread to communicate as a class. I had never been a blogger before this class, but I liked learning how to write a concise blog post and being able to read others’ posts as well. Because of the blog, all of the documents (syllabus, assignments sheets, etc) were in one place. Also, unlike Blackboard, the blog was very easily accessible and never under maintenance. I really appreciated that power point presentations being online. Those were really helpful to have for studying and referencing in general. One thing I would recommend doing differently with the blog is to send out an e-mail (or Facebook message) if there is an assignment posted on the blog—especially if the assignment is not on the syllabus. I know that I didn’t check the blog everyday and was not-so-pleasantly surprised a couple of times with new assignments. I would also recommend more specific requirements for the blog post. I know there is the pie chart that breaks down what the expectations are for the posts in general, but I personally thought it was a little vague, and I was never really sure if I had all the requirements for every post. The Facebook thread was also a really resource for the class. Since I (and probably the rest of the class) check my Facebook much more frequently than I check my e-mail, the Facebook thread really helped me keep up to date with class cancelations and project updates.

In addition to our class blog and Facebook thread, Andi switched things up a bit with guest speakers (live and through TED). I really enjoyed the guest speakers. They were professionals and specialists in each of the topics on which they spoke, and they really applied what we were learning in class to real life situations. I never realized how big social networking sites were in the corporate world nor how many people are using these networks for their jobs not just for socializing. I really enjoyed the TED videos because they were great examples of great speakers, speeches, devices, and techniques. They helped me understand concepts that I couldn’t quite grasp before.

Thanks, everyone!