Barriers To Communication In School (Top 11)

In this article, we will look at the barriers to communication in schools and the classroom in particular. This article also looks at a few effective ways to teach communication skills to students in school.

What Are Barriers To Communication In School?

At school and in the classroom, a variety of factors can become barriers to effective communication. Some of these barriers are listed below:

• Anxiety
• Verbalism
• Language
• Boredom
• Expression
• Lack of Perception
• Daydreaming
• Physical comfort
• Semantic confusion
• Cultural Differences
• Distance Barriers

Anxiety

Anxiety is among the most common emotional triggers of communication barriers among students. Students who are tense and nervous are less likely to speak up in class. And when a student doesn’t grasp what the instructor is trying to say and needs explaining, this is even more accurate.

Verbalism

Unnecessary verbalism is no longer socially acceptable, especially in the contemporary age of communication, where other forms of expression are much more efficient alternatives. Efficient classroom communication is severely hampered by such verbalism.

Since they don’t want to become the center of attraction and are fearful of other people’s views of them, anxiety prevents such students from engaging in group conversations.

Language

Language is the primary means of exchanging thoughts and opinions. When the students and the teachers don’t share a common language, it can be difficult to communicate. There would be communication issues if the teacher speaks English and the pupils are mainly English as Second Language students, therefore the students may not be able to grasp everything that teacher says.

Boredom

Boredom is often not even considered in educational settings. It is mostly disregarded completely and not even considered a barrier to communication in school as it is. Owing to a lack of available instructional resources, a poor teaching method, and an ineffective teacher in the classroom, students become disinterested. To eliminate boredom, certain feature films, videos, modems, artifacts, video clips, maps, graphs, and other relevant aids should be included.

Expression

Communication isn’t always accurate. The initiator attempts to bring his thoughts into words, and the receiver must decipher those words in order to comprehend the meaning. Whenever a teacher or student lacks the ability to use the appropriate terms to express the concepts they really want to communicate, a communication barrier arises in the classroom.

A qualified and professional mathematician who is an unsuccessful math teacher because the only way she can relay concepts is to use complex math terminology that the students fail to grasp is a perfect example of this.

Lack Of Perception

If students have a medical condition, they would be unable to comprehend the teacher’s relevant class lecture. In this scenario, psychological function is useless. As a result, students can only gain a shallow understanding of material in class, and communication suffers as a result.

Daydreaming

Daydreaming and fantasizing are extremely common among students. It’s like a form of escapism and hence renders the student mentally absent in the classroom, creating a barrier to communication. 

Daydreaming, or withdrawing from the process of classroom communication and dwelling on their own personally remembered perception and memories, which are more preoccupying than those associated with classroom activity. This is a frequent but preventable barrier to effective communication.

If students keep dwelling on the movie they watched the night before, they would be unable to pay full attention in the classroom. As a consequence, they are unable to pay full attention to the lectures of key teachers, resulting in a significant barrier in classroom communication.

This barrier can be weakened or overcome. Using powerful audio and visual classroom strategies to improve the comprehensiveness and effectiveness of classroom communication.

Physical comfort

Students can experience discomfort as a result of a lack of adequate internal or external facilities in the classroom, such as heat, lighting, or ventilation. As a result, they may end up losing interest in listening to their teachers’ lectures. For proper communication among students and teachers, this kind of barrier must also be looked out for in the classroom.

Semantic confusion

Since each student’s context differs, varying explanations and applications of the same term express different meanings to them, influencing their perception and interpretation of the reference.

As a result, effective communication among teachers and students is impossible. In reading, it’s normal to get confused in the references. One of the greatest risks in our classrooms is the willingness of two individuals to use the same words and come to entirely different conclusions. Reference confusion is caused by a variety of factors such as awareness, background, and context.

Cultural Differences

Cultural differences can make it difficult to communicate effectively in the classroom. It’s natural for both a teacher and a student to have preconceived notions about actions based on cultural differences. 

When messages are conveyed in a manner that is foreign to the student’s culture, they may be misunderstood. In a school, it is essential to eradicate stereotypes or misconceptions based on cultural differences.

Distance Barriers

While speaking in a classroom, this communication barrier is extremely noteworthy. If the students interpret you as being distant from them, staring down at them, or generally being inaccessible, they will be less open to the message you are aiming to convey. If you’re up on a stage but never walk into the crowd, for instance, the distance or physical gap itself can send out a message that isn’t what you’re aiming for.

Communication Skills Framework 

Before you teach communication skills, it’s helpful to build a framework for your students.

This useful framework comes from Alice Stott at Edutopia (2018):

• Physical: How a speaker uses their body language, facial expressions, and voice.
• Linguistic: The speaker’s use of language, including their understanding of formality and rhetorical devices.
• Cognitive: The content of what a speaker says and their ability to build on, challenge, question, and summarize others’ ideas.
• Social and emotional: How well a speaker listens, includes others, and responds to their audience (Stott, 2018).

From Positive Psychology

8 Strategies For Teaching Students Effective Communication

Once you’ve established a solid foundation for understanding communication, try these eight strategies to help your children or students communicate effectively:

• Teach empathy to your children so that they can understand what the other person is feeling and thinking.
• Use methods like puppets and video modelling to teach your children conversation skills, which they can then incorporate in lessons and events.
• Teach the students appropriate vocabulary and inform them that being “cold” (passive) or “hot” (angry) will likely lead to very little understanding and more friction.
• Teach them the value of pausing, for example, allow them to pause, reflect, and pose questions like “What do you really mean?” and “Why?”.
• Allow your children to practise speaking and listening in natural environments, such as outside the home and in school.
• Motivate students to reflect; it will help them better understand themselves and others around them.
• With a talking stick or a ball, practise taking turns, showing your students that they can talk once they have the object, but they must listen when someone else is speaking.

Conclusion

In this article, we looked at the barriers to communication in schools and the classroom in particular. This article also looked at a few effective ways to teach communication skills to students in school.

Frequently Asked Questions: Barriers To Communication In School

References

Barriers of classroom communication

49 Communication Activities, Exercises, and Games