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Communication is key

Communication+is+key
Graphic by Olivia Crosby ’15

Communication Time is one of the simple pleasures in life. It’s a well-needed break in the day. It’s salvation when a free gets dropped. It’s a chance to relax and connect with something other than a PowerPoint presentation. It’s 15 minutes, but hey, it’s something.

Sure Communication Time sounds insignificant, but for students it can have a big impact. Beneath our sometimes automatonic, grade-grubbing exteriors, we are human beings hard-wired for some non-academic interaction, if only 45 minutes a week.

So when teachers choose to forgo this short break in the game for an 80-minute stretch of lesson time–even for what we’re sure is always a highly stimulating and well-planned class– our cold metal hearts sink just a little bit. How are we to analyze the meter of a Dickinson poem to start off the class when our ears are piqued by Good Morning Staples’ opening notes playing in the hallway?

There is obviously inherent value in any and all class time, but this doesn’t cancel out the value of a little communication time. While we are not learning academically during this time, we are still learning: about current events, about each other, about our teachers and their lives and experiences outside of how they graded the midterm.

And we aren’t just trying to get out of a lesson plan. We like being prepared for the next test or graded discussion. We like knowing that we learned all of the necessary material. But we think we can cover all of it and have Communication Time, too.

Getting a 15-minute break allows us to release energy and makes the remaining 65 minutes of the period more productive. Sitting through an 80-minute period can be hard, and glances at the clock or the MyStaples app become much more frequent.

If teachers prioritize communication time while planning their classes, everyone benefits.

Teachers have a focused class, and students are better able to pay attention. But more importantly, students can establish a comfortable relationship and an open line of communication with their teachers and peers.

With the current push by the school system to improve school climate and in light of the attention being paid to mental health in schools after incidents like Sandy Hook, Communication Time feels like an invaluable opportunity to make progress in these goals.

Communication Time provides a rare opportunity for students who may not sit at the same end of the cafeteria to interact with each other on common ground. Similarly, it is undoubtedly difficult to establish a meaningful student-teacher relationship within the confines of a lecture, but communication allows a short block of time where it’s ok to get off topic and where nothing students say will be held against them in a quarter average.

These sorts of interactions characterize the kind of healthy and welcoming school community we all want.

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