Hello! My name is Kelly Vaca and I am a student at Miami Dade College. One of my classes for the spring semester of 2022 is SPC 1017, also known as Introduction to Communication, taught by Professor Sherri Sinkoff. This group project, for being my first-ever college presentation, went better than I expected. We were given a lot of creative freedom which was overwhelming at first but ultimately each group was assigned a chapter from the textbook to explain to the class through our presentations. One point that Sherri mentioned was to not include too many words on the slide itself. It made me think about what I wanted to say and how I wanted to show it. I believe that really helped make the presentations more visually engaging.
Group One started us off with Chapter Three, “Intercultural Communication”. They had a little under two days to prepare the presentation but they sure did deliver. Group One divided the chapter by headings and even included slides with important vocabulary to tie everything together. I found it very helpful that at the beginning of the presentation they expounded on what exactly a culture is made up of and how people identify with dominant culture and co-cultures as well. To be honest, before this I only linked culture to tradition and didn’t realize you can identify with more than one culture that in the end affects your behavior, values, and lifestyle. After that, it was thought-provoking to learn about the cultural distinctions highlighted by the different dimensions of culture. Understanding these key differences will allow us to be open-minded and develop respect for people of cultures different than our own. Group One, unfortunately, had a person absent that was going to cover the "competent communication strategies" mentioned in the book and I think that really would have brought home the communication aspect of the chapter. But one of our class leaders added a great conclusion that made the things we had just learned more relatable to us. This presentation brought to light the intangible aspects behind cultures that can influence our communication with one another far beyond a language barrier. I am looking forward to Group One’s next presentation.
Group Two was the group I was assigned to along with eleven other classmates. We covered Chapter Nine, “Communicating in Groups”. In the breakout room after receiving our assignment, we immediately discussed how we were going to distribute the load of work and created a group chat on WhatsApp to facilitate communication. It took some time to get everyone on the same page but that was expected from a big group. To be transparent, coming from a virtual high school it had been about four years since I last did a group project, and at first, I was frustrated. Funny enough the chapter we were working on helped me refocus on the task at hand. We had about a week to develop our presentation and everyone contributed what was asked of them. Since MacBooks were having issues with sound sharing on Blackboard, I decided to volunteer to be in charge of screen sharing the presentation even though I knew I was going to be very nervous that day. We were supposed to hold a practice the night before but it didn’t work out. However, I still wanted to make sure everything worked well on my end so I asked our class leader to give me moderator access and I went into Blackboard and tested everything. Since I don’t have a second monitor, I also double-checked that I could have everything I needed (Blackboard, our presentation, and my script) open at once when splitting my screen. Once I had everything down to a science, I felt more prepared.
Then came Tuesday. We began the presentation by first discussing the different types of groups, and there were quite a few of them. I was intrigued by how the concept of family was defined as a group. I also liked the clip that was included from Fast and Furious to show an unrelated family. Work groups and teams was also an informative section and it was cool to make the connection to our project. The presenter for those slides could not be in class that day so they prepared a video and it worked out great, as did some other people who were not going to make it. The slides for virtual groups were also very fun with all the gifs that were included, it really brought the slides to life. The slides that went more in-depth about virtual group communication were very timely and informative considering this is the environment we have been using a lot more. Overall, everyone did a great job explaining the types of groups. The next section in the chapter, 9-2 Characteristics of Healthy Groups, was straight to the point and helped me distinguish what we should strive for when we are part of a group. Next up, we covered Tuckman’s model of the group development stages. After the first two stages, I came in to tie up “storming” by discussing “groupthink” and then talk about the next two stages which were “norming” and “performing”. I enjoyed putting my slides together and finding videos to fit what I wanted to share and I was very satisfied with my final product…especially with the Avengers clip. Lastly, our presentation came to an end with the final section about conflict in groups and then the class leader’s conclusion. In the end, I am proud of how our presentation turned out (click here to view our slides). I am confident we can keep making great projects together.
Last but not least, Group Three was assigned Chapter Ten, “Group Leadership and Problem Solving”. This presentation was similar to our structure by how they presented the information through keywords. They started with the meaning of effective group leadership and how every group member can help achieve that with key shared leadership responsibilities. Right off the bat, there was a very thought-provoking video on what it means to be a leader that helped me see leadership from a different point of view. Then they took us through the before, during, and after guidelines for leaders and participants that can help us ensure everything runs smoothly for an effective meeting. My favorite part of the presentation was the systematic problem-solving section, the speakers were easy to follow and I appreciated the bullet points many of them included. After that, they went on to discuss a variety of formats (written, oral, and virtual) to communicate group solutions. Those slides had great videos explaining the different options. Lastly, they briefly went over evaluating group effectiveness with the group leader summarizing the chapter at the end. One thing that visually caught my attention was that each person had different colors and backgrounds instead of having uniform slides and it really brought personality to the presentation. This presentation was sweet and to the point and I look forward to seeing them present again.
Overall, I feel this experience was a good ice breaker for the class and I can not wait to see how I progress with my communication skills within my group and through my presentations.