Communication FUNdamentals

It’s Friday Funnies time here on Communication FUNdamentals!  I found a really fun video for you this week.  I have no idea what show this is but they had a few really funny videos.  This one really caught  my attention.  I think you’ll know why.

Know anybody who has troubles in these areas?  LOL

For more creative fun learning communication skills, visit Art of Eloquence.com!

Communication FUNdamentals: 10 Fun Ways To Teach Children Effective Communication Skills
By JoJo Tabares

“A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.” Proverbs 25:11

Communication skills are vital -especially in the information age. Studies show that effective communicators are happier, do better in school, are more successful and make more money than their less eloquent counterparts. So how do you teach your children to express themselves better? The FUN way!

The best way to teach children anything is to make it fun and involve as many of their five senses as possible. Here are a list of 10 games/activities that will foster effective communication skills in your children.

1. Play Telephone. The more the merrier. This old elementary school game is a delightfully fun way to develop your child’s listening skills. This game is perfect for any age. Begin with a simpler message for the younger children and gradually increase the size and complexity as they get older.

2. Directions to Fun. Have your older child write out directions from your house to somewhere fun; for example, the ice cream shop. Preferably give the directions to a third party who is unfamiliar with the area, and have him follow the directions precisely. Did you get there? If so, have an ice cream cone! If not, talk about what went wrong in the communication. What could be changed that would help get you there the next time. This is a wonderful exercise to help children from 4th through 12th grade learn to give better directions. But it also is a lesson in itself about communication. In order to effectively communicate what you want, you must learn to say what you mean so that others can fully understand.

3. Dress for Success. Go to the store or any other public place dressed in your Sunday best. Notice how you are treated. Next go to the same store or a similar location dressed shabbily or inappropriately for the occasion. (Ex: to a Mercedes dealership in old jeans and a worn out T-shirt) Notice how differently you are treated. This illustrates that their nonverbal communication has consequences. You will want to point out that strange person walking on the street and do a little of what I call “brain washing”. Paint them a picture of the consequences of the communication that is sent when people wear skimpy clothes or dress like hoodlums. Tell them what their choice of clothes is saying to the average person…to a prospective employer. Give them the facts on how this will impact their lives a year…two years…ten years down the line. Tell them what could happen tomorrow if someone draws a conclusion based on those clothes that puts them in harms way.

4. Talk n Listen. Have your child sing Yankee Doodle while another person recites the Pledge of Allegiance. See how long they can go without flubbing it up. If your child can do this too easily, have each one read from a different book. Tell them to each take turns relating what the other had read. This helps illustrate that old saying that God gave us two ears and one mouth in order that we listen twice as much as we talk.

5. Um Contest. Have your child talk about a familiar topic. Any topic. For example, his/her favorite activity or book. See how long he/she can keep from uttering “um”, “er”, “uh”, “like”, or “ya’ know”. This develops the child’s confidence as well as eloquence. Eliminating these “words” in your child’s vocabulary will cause the him to focus on becoming more articulate and increasing his vocabulary.

6. Feed Me Applesauce. Blindfold someone and have that person feed applesauce to another blindfolded person. Have a third person who is not blindfolded giving the directions to both parties. This teaches students to give directions more effectively.

*NOTE* This is messy! Fun, but messy! You will want to make sure that your children are not wearing their good clothes and that this activity takes place on a bare floor and not carpet.

7. Presentation. Have your child give a presentation of sorts to a local retirement home. This can include giving a craft demonstration, playing piano for them as in a short recital, singing or reciting a poem. This teaches your child how to present him/herself. This can be done with children of all ages. The sooner you get your child comfortable talking in public, the better. It will become like second nature to them and they may be able to avoid the biggest fear that most people have: PUBLIC SPEAKING. Studies show that people who enjoy speaking in public are more successful than those who do not. So get them out there showing off the talents God gave them!

8. What’s Going on in the Picture? This one is great for the little ones. Have your child tell you what he sees in a picture. Encourage him to describe the scenery, the people, the colors…anything he sees. For older children, have them talk about what they think might have just happened before this scene and what they think will happen after. This gives them practice in formulating ideas in a logical manner that others can easily understand.

9. Finish a Story. This one is also very good for different age groups. Kids love stories! You start off a story and have your child finish it. For very young children, you can tell them a nursery rhyme and have them make up an alternate ending or add on to the story. This exercise is great for teaching beginning verbal communication skills.

10. Impromptu Speech. This exercise is wonderful for children of all ages. Pick a topic that your child is familiar with or just loves and ask him/her to speak for about 2 minutes on that topic. After a while, have your student graduate to speaking on more difficult topics and/or for longer periods of time. You can start them off by talking about their favorite movie and eventually graduate them to controversial topics like prayer in school.

“You can have brilliant ideas, but if you can’t get them across, they won’t get you anywhere.” Lee Iacocca The more your children practice communication skills, the more effective they will be in communicating their needs and ideas. The more fun you can make it, the more they will want to practice these essential skills.

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JoJo Tabares holds a degree in Speech Communication, but it is her humorous approach to communication skills which has made her a highly sought-after Christian speaker and writer.  Her articles appear in homeschool publications, such as Homeschool Enrichment Magazine and The Old Schoolhouse Magazine, which also endorses her Say What You Mean curricula.  You can also find JoJo on web sites such as Crosswalk.com and Dr.Laura.com.  For more information on communication FUNdamentals and Christian-based communication skills for the whole family, please visit http://www.ArtofEloquence.com

It’s preschool week here at Communiation FUNdamentals as we get ready for our weekly podcast on the Communication Comedy Network!  This week we are asking the question if it’s too early to begin teaching our preschoolers to communicate effectively.

Preschoolers have a natural curiosity and a hankering for learning.  Preschoolers are the most teachable students and it can be a blessing to begin teaching them these vital skills.  To illustrate just how much young children feel the need to communicate with us, I give you this video:

Tune in to tomorrow’s Talk Talk Show: The Talk Show About Talking on the Communication Comedy Network and find out how and what we should teach our preschoolers about communication skills!  Each Thursday morning: 8am PST/ 11am EST!

OMGosh!  This is our biggest contest yet!  And the easiest one to enter!  Art of Eloquence will reach a milestone next month of being in business for 7 years!  Each year we have had a fun contest for our customers but this one is by far the BEST EVER!

All you need to do is post a link to the Art of Eloquence website and tell people to check us out and that qualifies you to enter our contest to win a prize package worth well over $350!  You can check out our Contest Page for more details and to see the HUGE package of prizes you could win if you are the one who posts the most before December 31st, 2009!   But …here is the Reader’s Digest Condensed Version:

What Art of Eloquence Page to Link to:

You can link to our homepage: http://www.ArtofEloquence.com , any of our product pages (see our Online Catalog),  our newsletter page: http://artofeloquence.com/pages/newsletters.php or even to our contest page: http://artofeloquence.com/pages/Contest.php

Where to Post Our Link:

Post to your email friends, your blog, your newsletter, Yahoo group, website, Facebook, My Space or Twitter page… anywhere you have a following.

What to Say:

You can tell them to check out Art of Eloquence and that we have the most creative and fun speech communication studies around!  You can tell them about a particular product you like or want to purchase and link to that product page.  You can tell them to sign up for our newsletter to get exclusive offers and freebies just for subscribers.  Or you could tell them about our contest!

In the last seven years, Art of Eloquence has helped hundreds and hundreds of students improve their communication skills with their parents, their friends, their employees, their businesses and even those they minister the Word of God to!  With your help, we can reach even more and help them prepare for their futures as they follow the Lord’s leading in their lives! And you can win a huge prize package in the process!

But there’s more!  Art of Eloquence is giving away 10 MORE PRIZES in this contest!  Our winner will get a $350 prize package of awesome donated gifts from some fabulous Christian companies!  BUT we will also select 10 random contest entries to win a free gift from Art of Eloquence!  The more you enter, the better your chances of winning any of our prizes so enter early and enter often!! LOL

As they used to say on those Bartles and James commercials: “Thanks again for your support!”

Check out our contest page for all the details and to see the fabulous gifts so many have donated toward our contest!

We received some interesting comments and questions this month and I wanted to share them with you.  First here is a small sampling of the comments we received this month:

“Your communication article in TOS made me laugh. I am a talker. The first thing the Lord told me to do while I was just hours old in the faith was silence…That silence intrigued my hubby who followed me to church and was soon saved himself. LOL You are right on keep up the good work!” -Heather W.

“Hi, JoJo! Loved your article in The Old Schoolhouse magazine!:)  Good stuff!” -Kimberly E.

“I can’t wait to listen to this week’s show!” -Leslie V.

“This issue with the different type of conversationalists was an absolute SCREAM!  I laughed so much!  Thank you for this, JoJo!” -Beth J.

Thanks ladies!  I am always excited to hear from our customers and subscribers with feedback on what we offer.  Thanks for taking the time to write in!

Two questions that were asked this month were things I thought many of our customers may be wondering so I chose them as the questions I would answer this month on Mailbag Monday.  Here they are:

1. “I just ordered and received the Teen Bonus Pack and Defending The Faith. Do you recommend completing them in any specific order? Thank you!” -Judy K.

The Teen Bonus Pack was designed to be done in the order it is listed on the product page: Say What You Mean for Teens, Know Your Audience and Say What You Mean: A Creative Speech Course.  SWM for Teens is a general communication study that will teach basic communication skills as well as a speech that is done in small bites which is perfect for beginners or shy students.  Know Your Audience is a listening and persuasion course teaching students to tailor their message to different audiences.  SWM: A Creative Speech Course is an actual speech course that makes it fun and easy for students to learn both impromptu and prepared speeches.

However, Art of Eloquence eStudies are designed to be flexible.  Each study is a complete and separate course and may be used on their own and in any order.  Further, most of our studies are easily adaptable to a co op setting where you may not have a full 18 week (semester) to deliver your class.  I have personally done co op classes using Art of Eloquence studies that were 8 or 10 or 16 weeks.  Most lessons are also complete and may be used separately.  If you look at the makeup of your class (or the needs of the individual student), you can pick and choose which lessons to include in your abbreviated class.

If you would like more information for your particular student or class, I am always available via email for a short consult.

2. I received a call from a customer asking what age to start teaching her children communication skills.  It’s funny she should ask this month  as one of my podcasts on the Communication Comedy Network is this week’s show on how early we should begin to teach our children communication skills.

Art of Eloquence has several studies and fun things for kids as young as preschool to enjoy and learn these vital skills.  We do so not just to capture a larger market, but because in my experience with my own children, it is far better for them to begin their study of communication skills at this age than to wait until fear or bad habits or rejection sets in.

You see, I was an incredibly shy child and grew up without the benefit of having these social skills.  It hindered almost everything I did until I learned that my shyness wasn’t a personality trait.  It was a lack of social communication skills. And once that issue was address, I became the outgoing gregarious goofball God intended me to be.  The problem?  It took MANY years to undo all I had learned with respect to how I related and communicated with others.  I made a vow that I would not allow that to happen to my children and so I began their communication skills training when they were quite young because that’s when they have fun learning and soak it up as a sponge!

The result?  My dd never went through that awkward age in latter elementary school where she was afraid to voice her ideas.  She went on to learn to express herself so well that she was able to successfully debate her learned grandfather on creation vs evolution.  She is now a sophomore at Vanderbilt University involved in ministry and just recently came back from a missions trip during her Fall Break from school.

I’ll be sharing much more on this topic on Thursday’s show.  Join me for the Talk Talk Show: The Talk Show about Talking on the Communication Comedy Network live or listen in to the audio recording that will be available just after the live show.

The Communication Comedy Network airs Thursdays at 8am PST /11am EST!

http://www.talkshoe.com/tc/19736

It’s free, it’s fun and it’s informative!

I have a standing joke with my kidlings who used to ask for stories all the time. Sometimes I was in a hurry for the story to be over so I’d make up stories that were really short.  One day I began to tell the world’s shortest story.  I goes like this:

Once upon a time…The end!

I got to thinking about Twitter this week and how we strive to communicate succinctly.  Since it’s Defending the Faith SONday today I thought I’d try to do the same thing with Twitter’s 140 character rule.

Here’s the Old Testament in 140 Characters or less:

GenExLev#DeutJoshJudgeRuthSamsKingsChronsEzNehEsthrJobPsalmsProv

EccSolIsJerLamEzekDanHoseaJoelAmosObJonahMicHahHabZephHagZechMal

Here’s the New Testament in 140 Characters or less:

MathMarkLukeJohnActsRom1Cor2CorGalEphPhilColThes1Tim2TimTitus

PhilippiansHebJames1Pete2Pete1John2John3JohnJudeRev

Have a blessed SONday from the folks at Art of Eloquence.com!

Roses r red, violets r blue.Sorry 2 say I’ve unfollowed u!Your bio is empty.Your tweets make no sense& r frequently over the word limit fenc

For more fun with language and communication, visit Art of Eloquence.com!

Since it’s Twitter Week on Communication FUNdamentals…

This is a fun video. A parody on Twitter that they called Flutter.

For more communication fun, visit Art of Eloquence.com!

This is Twitter Week here at Communication FUNdamentals because I’m talking about how we communicate on Twitter on my podcast on Thursday.  So here is some Twitter Communication FUN that are warning signs that you just might be addicted to Twitter…IF:

*Something happens in real life and you think to yourself… I can’t wait to get home and tweet about it!
*You meet a friend at the grocery store and tell her you don’t have time to talk now, but to contact you on

*You’ve tweeted about you dinner plans six times but it’s 7pm and you have yet to go down to the kitchen!
*Your “To Do” list has six things on it and they are all things you want to tweet about.

*You leave the pot boiling on the stove because you’re waiting for a Twitter reply!

Whether or not you are addicted, connect with me on Twitter here!

NOTE: Sorry, but due to an amazing amount of SPAM, I have had to close the comments on this post.