CHAPTER

1 COMMUNICATION
SKILLS-i
Ways of Expression is a characteristics that differentiate living things from non-living things.
All living being need to express to fulfil the basic needs of life. Human expresses in many
ways. The expression ability of Human is far ahead as it expresses with the most important
tool of communication i.e. language.
The word ‘Communication’ comes from the Latin word ‘Communicare’, means ‘to share’.
We perform various activities in our daily life in which we share or exchange our thoughts,
ideas, information, knowledge etc. In simple words communication is a process by which
we can express our views, emotions, information and ideas. It is a way of transferring our
messages to another person or to a group. “Communication is the ‘sharing’ of information,
facts, ideas, opinions or emotions between two or more individuals”.
Importance of Communication Skill
Communication is an important tool of life. It let us share our thoughts, emotions and ideas
in an understandable, clear and efficient way. It enable us to inform, share knowledge,
express feelings and to influence others.
‘Humans’ ability to communicate (through a language) has provided great benefits in all-
round development of mankind, if communication is done skilfully. A simple conversation
might be considered as a mere transfer of information but an influencing conversation can
help you in achieving your academic or your career goals. Hence, there is a difference
between to ‘inform’ about something and to ‘influence’ about something.
Elements of Communication Cycle
Communication involves a two-way exchange of information, i.e., giving and receiving of
information. Speaking & Writing are modus of giving information and Listening & Reading
are modus of receiving information.

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There are different elements of communication cycle which can be considered in following
categories:
Sender: In case of a written message the person who introduces or sends the message is
known as a sender.
Ideas: An idea is a plan or thought generated in mind which may be presented as an opinion.
Communication Channel: It refers to a medium or channel (like air, water, satellite etc.)
through which the message is transmitted to the person or an audience.
Receiver: It might be a person or a group of people who is the reader, listener or the observer
of the message.
Feedback: When a receiver communicates his/her response back to the sender, the process
is called feedback.

ACTIVITY: Changing of communication methods from old to new.

Make a list of communicating methods that you have seen, used or acquainted with.
Ask your parents the same, and note down the information provided by them.
After gathering all information ask your grandparents that what were the medium of
communication at their time/old age of civilization.
Categorize & compare the modus of communication of old age medieval times with
Modern Age (Electronic Era).

METHODS OF COMMUNICATION
You might have used different methods of Communication in your daily life. There must be
some method while playing with your friends as showing gestures, giving indications or
waving, or may be sometimes with drawing images, portrayal or a sketch to depict a
particular situation. Such different methods of communication, can be classified as:
Verbal Communication
It is the common method of communication that enables direct understanding and intact
interpretation. It is of two types:
Oral or Spoken Communication: When communication is established through telephonic
conversation, face to face talking etc.

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Written Communication: When communication is made using written or typed messages
in the form of an e-Mail, SMS or by using any other format including photos, videos, music etc.

Advantages of Verbal Communication

< It is a fast method of communication.
< It provides you to get the quick response.
< It enables to understand the mood of the other person.
< It looks more reliable than other conventional methods of communication.
< The speaker and the listener may keep changing reply one after another, as they
communicate in real-time.
Disadvantages of Verbal Communication
< It fails to fill the gap of cultural differences between the sender and receiver if there is
language barrier.
< The different languages spoken all over the world have different accents and uses
different colloquial phrases which causes confusion in the receiver’s mind.
< As there is not much of time, the delivery may be misinterpreted if the receiver does not
understand instantly.
Public Speaking
Public Speaking is another method of communication in which a speaker delivers idea or
content to a group of audience. It is generally one sided communication in which one
speaker says. It helps to overcome fear, nervousness and scepticism. The 3Ps method is a
very helpful thing to mould yourself as an effective speaker.
Prepare: It begins with thinking about your topic and thinking about the points which
everybody would love to listen.
Practice: Try to practice reading the content before a mirror and make sure to maintain a
proper pace while reading it.
Perform: Before speaking on stage make yourself comfortable and stay relaxed, take deep
breaths and start speaking.
Non-Verbal Communication
As we know all living things communicate, the animals communicate through different

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types of sound, smell, sign etc. In a non-verbal communication words are not used to
communicate as sender’s message is conveyed without using words. Non-verbal
communication include symbols, gestures, eye contact, handshake, facial expressions, body
language etc. For example:
Hand Movements (Gestures): Raising a hand to greet, pointing your finger on anger.
Expressions: We smile when happy, make a sad face when we are upset.

A non-verbal way of communication can make our message stronger and it may also help to
adjust our behaviour according to the listener’s reaction. It mostly helps in a situation when
we are unable to send a proper message verbally, suppose you are in a room full of noise in
this case you may easily opt to send a non-verbal message by using your hand movements.

Our speech also has non verbal elements, such as voice quality, speaking style, emotion, intonation, Do You
Know?
rhythm and stress known as “Paralanguage”.

We don’t realise the importance of non-verbal communication but we spend about 75% of our waking hours
communicating of which 80% is non-verbal in which our expressions and movements are used.
Types of Non-Verbal Communication
How to effectively use non-verbal
TYPE WHAT IS IMPLIES?
communication?
Facial expression It shows the feeling of a person. For * Keep your face relaxed.
example, we smile to express our * Match your facial expression with
happiness. your words.
* Nod while listening.

Posture It shows your confidence and * Keep your body always straight.
feelings. * While standing, keep hands by
your side and stay relaxed.

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 How to effectively use non-verbal
TYPE WHAT IS IMPLIES?
communication?
Gestures or Body Language It is movement of body, hands or * Avoid pointing at people with your
head to express an idea or meaning. finger.
* Don't stand with hands crossed.
* Pay attention to the speaker.

Touch It includes shaking hands and patting * Shake hands confidently.

on the back. For example, a firm * Avoid using other touch gestures
handshake shows confidence. as scratching, tugging on your
clothes.

Space A proper space should be maintained * Maintaining a proper space may

while talking to a person, it vary from person to person,
generally depends on your closeness whether your meeting is formal or
and intimacy with that person. informal.

Paralanguage It is the tone of our voice, volume * Maintain a proper pace, proper
a n d spe e d, wh ich ma k e s a tone and volume while speaking.
difference in communication.

ACTIVITY: Non-Verbal Acting

Separate your friends into groups of two.
Ask one person from each group to come out one by one.
Give him a word or a title which also can be a movie name.
Ask him to non-verbally enact the given word, so that their partners can guess it.

Visual Communication
‘Visual Communication’ is another method in which ideas are conveyed in the visual form
which can be seen in the form of images or pictures. In such communication there is no use of
language. It is also considered as the oldest form of communication. Visual communication
uses images, drawings, signs, graphics, typography etc. It is an easier method of
communication.

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PERSPECTIVES IN COMMUNICATION
Perspective means having a pre-fixed idea about someone, in terms of behaviour. It is a way
of thinking in which people develop their own views regarding a person which affects in
maintaining a perfect communication between them. For example: Communication
between teacher and student.
Factors Affecting Perspective in Communication
There are certain barriers which stop us from communicating clearly such as hesitation to
share a message. These factors affect the perspective in communication:

FACTORS HOW THE FACTOR CAN BECOME A BARRIER?

Sometimes a conveyor do not find correct or suitable words to convey his

message, in this way he remains incapable of expressing the true sense of
Language
his views, such problems occur when there is a difference in the language
of two different person.
It is about having a prejudice thought about someone that doesn't change,
Visual Perceptions even after noticing a change in behaviour. It refers to pre-notion of brain to
sense what we see through our eyes.
The experiences from a past event sometimes blocks our mind to take
Past Experience decisions or make our mind fixed with prejudice of thought process. Our
earlier experience doesn't allow us to understand or communicate clearly.

It is a kind of pre-conceived opinion or pre-notion which stops us from

Prejudice
understanding or communicating.

Feelings includes emotions which sometimes causes lack of interest or not

Feelings
trusting the other person, which also affect our communication.

Sometimes the hindrances in the environment makes communication

Environment
difficult, it is because of noise or disturbance.

Sometimes communicating or willing to begin a conversation also depends

Personal Factor
on our mood, fear or low confidence which makes it difficult.

Sometimes one sign can depict different meanings in different cultures,

Culture such as showing a thumb may mean 'good job' done for some people but
may be insulting for others.

WRITING SKILLS
When we talk about writing a content for a particular topic, ideas start generating in our
consciousness. This sudden reaction of our mind results in formation of sentences, which
communicates the thought. There are certain aspects through which we can improve our
writing skills, like:

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Phrases
It can be a short or a long sentence and gives a complete meaning when attached to a
principal clause or an independent sentence. Hence, a phrase may also be explained as a
dependent sentence, for example- ‘after the class’- is a phrase and ‘I will meet you’- is a
principal clause, by joining together these sentences we get, “I will meet you after the class”.
Active & Passive Voice
We speak many sentences in our day to day life but we don’t realise the diversity of
sentences that we use while speaking. It can be seen through the following examples:
1. I taught you.
2. You are taught by me.
We notice that there is a difference between both the sentences, in the first sentence the
subject ‘I’ is the doer of the action “taught” while on the second sentence subject ‘You’ is
receiver of the action “taught.” In this way the first sentence is in ‘Active Voice’ while the
second sentence is in ‘Passive Voice’.
1. I taught you (Active voice).
2. You are taught by me (Passive voice).
In ‘Active Voice’, the subject performs the action stated by the verb. In ‘Passive Voice’, the
subject is acted upon by the verb.
Read the following Active & Passive statements:
ACTIVE VOICE PASSIVE VOICE

Shreya (subject) read the novel (object) in The novel (subject) was read by Shreya
one day. (object) in one day.

I (subject) will clean the house (object) every The house (subject) would be cleaned by me
Saturday. (object) every Saturday.

My sister (subject) painted the entire house The entire house (subject) was painted by
(object). my sister (object).

Notice the difference between the sentences in each set of examples given above. The places
of subject and the object change in the above set of sentences. The subject is the person or
thing that the sentences talk about. The object is the person or thing that is affected by the
action of the verb.
So, in the first sentence of the first set, Shreya is the (subject). She becomes the object of the
second sentence of the set. The object of the first sentence (novel) becomes the subject of the
second sentence. The first sentence shows the direct expressions (Active Voice), whereas;

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the second sentence expresses the indirect voice combined with “by”(Passive Voice).
Generally, the first types of sentence construction are preferred.
Consider some examples of Active and Passive Voice:
Active I : She faxed her application for a new job.
Passive I : The application for a new job was faxed by her.
Active II : The two kings are signing the treaty.
Passive II : The treaty is being signed by the two kings.
Active III : The wedding planner is making all the reservations.
Passive III: All the reservations are being made by the wedding planner.
In Active Voice, the action expressed in the verb is performed by the subject.
Examples:
< He ate an apple.
< Ravi is playing football.
< Prisha is reading the book.
In Passive Voice, the action expressed in the verb is received by the subject.
Examples:
< An apple was eaten by him.
< Football is being played by Ravi.
< The book is being read by Prisha.
Kinds of Sentences (According To Their Purpose)
If you notice the sentences which you speak during a conversation with your friend, you will
find it is not always the same kind of sentence, sometimes it is in the form of a question or in
the form of an assertion, order, request or sudden reaction, for example;
< What are you doing? (Question)
< You are a nice boy. (Assertion)
< Get out of the class. (Order)
< Please switch off the fan. (Request)
< Alas, I am ruined! (Reaction)
Such sentences can be divided in different categories:
< Assertive or Declarative sentences
< Interrogative sentences
< Exclamatory sentences
< Imperative sentences

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< What are you doing? (Interrogative sentence)
< You are a nice boy. (Assertive/Declarative sentence)
< Get out of the class. (Imperative sentence)
< Please switch off the fan. (Imperative sentence)
< Alas, I am ruined! (Exclamatory sentence)

ASSERTIVE/DECLARATIVE INTERROGATIVE EXCLAMATORY IMPERATIVE

SENTENCES SENTENCES SENTENCES SENTENCES

These sentences present These are the questioning Exclamatory sentences These type of sentences
t h e e x i s t i n g t r u t h , sentences & always ends expresses strong emotion show an order, command,
provides information or with a 'question mark' '?'. or sudden reaction, such advice or request. It may
fact. as joy, sorrow, excitement end with a full stop or an
It always ends using a 'Full wonder. It ends with an exclamation mark ('.' or
Stop' ('.') exclamation mark (!) '!')

I take tea. What would you like to Hurrah, we won the Keep your mouth shut.
take? match! Could you please get me
He is a fool. Did you bring vegetables Bravo, you did a fantastic this medicine?
from market? job!

Parts of Sentence
A sentence may be described as a group of words that has a subject and a predicate. The
construction of a basic sentence uses elements, such as Subject, Verb and Object. ‘Subject’ is
a person or thing which does an action, while a ‘Verb’ describes the action done by the
subject, which is received by an ‘Object’.

SENTENCES SUBJECT VERB OBJECT

I play guitar. I play Guitar

She teaches english. She teaches English

You bought a phone. You bought a phone

They killed the beast. They killed the beast

Types of Object
There are two types of object in a sentence, direct or indirect. The objects which are directly
‘acted on’ by the verb are called direct objects. A direct object always answers the question
‘what’, for example, if the question is ‘what do you eat’ then the answer will be ‘bread’, here
bread is the direct object because it answers the question ‘what’.
The indirect object answers the question ‘to whom’ and ‘for whom’, for example, ‘My father
gave money to my brother’, here my brother is the indirect object.

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Parts of Speech
The necessary elements or words which join together to form a sentence are known as Parts
of Speech, such as Noun, Pronoun, Verb, Adjective, Adverb, Preposition, Conjunction and
Interjection. It indicates the function of each element within the sentence.

PARTS OF SPEECH WHAT THEY DO? EXAMPLE SENTENCES EXAMPLE WORDS

In the sentence, “Rahul

It refers to a person,
Noun bought a bike.” Both House, Clock and Ravi.
place, thing or idea.
Rahul and Bike are nouns.

Rahul bought a bike and

It is used instead of a he is happy. In this
Pronoun He, She, They and You.
noun. sentence 'he' is used in
place of noun 'Rahul.’

Rahul bought a beautiful

These are the type of bike. In this sentence
Adjectives words which describe the 'beautiful' is an adjective Big, Small, Heavy or Red.
noun. that describes the noun
‘bike’.

Rahul rides the bike.

The doing words which In this sentence the verb
Verbs Go, Eat, Write and Laugh.
shows an action. 'rides' tell what action
'Rahul' did.

Rahul rides the bike

It adds meaning to verbs Fastly, Before, Smoothly
Adverbs slowly. In this sentence
or adjectives. and Neatly.
'slowly' is an adverb.

There remained a few words such as wow, to, and, the which are known as supporting
words which helps joining the main parts of speech.
SUPPORTING PARTS
USE EXAMPLES
OF SPEECH
Articles These words are generally used The flower smells nice.
before nouns: Kid likes seeing an aeroplane in the
An is used before a word with a sky.
vowel (a,e,i,o,u). Let me take a small nap.
A is used before the words that start
with consonant (other than Vowels).
The is used before specific or
particular words.

Conjunctions It joins two nouns, phrases or Instead, Ravi read the book. I read
sentences. Some of them are, ‘and’, the book.
‘or’ and ‘but’. Ravi and I read the book.

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 SUPPORTING PARTS
USE EXAMPLES
OF SPEECH
Preposition It connects one word with another The book is on the table.
word to show the relation. They The ball fell into the well.
usually answer the question,
‘where’, ‘when’ and ‘how’.

Interjections It expresses strong emotion or Hurrah!, wow!, oh no! and thanks!

sudden reactions, such as happiness,
surprise, excitement and anger.

Construction of Paragraph
We have learnt that a group of words forms a sentence, similarly a group of sentences form a
paragraph. The sentences used in writing a paragraph contributes to convey a common idea,
as each sentence is framed accordingly to the topic. The ideas while writing a paragraph may
differ according to the required details.

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1. Choose the correct article (a/an/the):
(a) What is .............................. price of book?
(b) I need .............................. glass of water.
(c) I went to see .............................. Red Fort.
(d) I want .............................. apple.
2. Convert the following sentences from Active to Passive:
(a) We will read a book tonight.
(b) The teacher will give you instructions for science project.
(c) People are cutting a lot of trees.
(d) I gave him a novel for his birthday.
(e) A dangerous dog attacked Rahul.
3. Convert the following sentences from Passive to Active:
(a) The pyramids were built nearly 5000 years ago by ancient Egyptians.
(b) A stone was being thrown by the kid into the river.
(c) The fish is eaten by the cat.
(d) A letter was written by Rachna to her brother.
(e) Shreya is waiting for her friend.
4. Fill in the Blanks:
(a) Communication involves ........................... & ........................... of information.
(b) ........................... is a medium through which the message is transmitted to the audience.
(c) Hand movements and expressions are ........................... communication.
(d) Communication in which language is not used is said as ............................
(e) Public speaking requires ..........................., ........................... & ............................
5. Write Short Notes on:
(a) Communication
(b) Public Speaking
(c) Visual communication
6. Answer the following Questions:
(a) Explain the elements in communication cycle?
(b) What is verbal communication? What are its advantages and disadvantages?
(c) What are the types of non-verbal communication? Explain them.
(d) Justify the statement: Visual communication is an easier method of communication.
(e) List the factors affecting communication.

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