Stephen F. Austin State University SFA ScholarWorks Faculty Publications Business Communication and Legal Studies 2-2014 Reading for Work: Reviving a Neglected Communication Skill Clive Muir Stephen F Austin State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/businesscom_facultypubs Part of the Business and Corporate Communications Commons Tell us how this article helped you. Repository Citation Muir, Clive, "Reading for Work: Reviving a Neglected Communication Skill" (2014). Faculty Publications. 29. https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/businesscom_facultypubs/29 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Business Communication and Legal Studies at SFA ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of SFA ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. COMMUNICATION Reading for Work: Reviving a Neglected Communication Skill BY CLIVE Mum ollege instructors often complain most 17-year-old U.S. students can analyze textual, graphic, and other that students do not read understand basic information, less symbols. In the school and workplace, Ctextbooks and instead prefer to than 10 percent of them can perform readers use a variety of forms of use their own cryptic PowerPoint notes advanced, critical-level reading tasks. information, including books, reports, from class for completing assignments If they attend college, low-performing periodicals, memos, letters, Web sites, and tests. Yet, reading does not seem to readers often arrive or are placed in and e-mail. get the time and attention that writing noncredit, developmental reading and speaking do and reading may classes with the hope of transferring Reading as a Communication Skill be taken for granted. In other words, into degree programs. Yet, even higher- Despite its clear relevance to students write reports and memos, create performing readers in college often lack the communication process, reading visual aids, and deliver presentations the ability to answer more analytical pedagogy receives far less attention that are graded; whereas instructors give and critical questions about what than other communication skills. For most reading tasks as homework that they read. This predicament has led example, a cursory search of the archives are not directly assessed, although they employers to express concerns about of two leading business communication do affect students' success in the course. a growing illiteracy problem among journals produced far fewer articles Compounding the problem, as students their employees and to suggest that this focused on reading and literacy skills experience an "information deluge," they issue could jeopardize their companies' compared with writing, speaking, are less inclined to read carefully and productivity and competitiveness in the technology, and even listening, another critically. For all these reasons, business global economy. A glaring headline in neglected communication skill. Some instructors should integrate critical the business press compared illiteracy business instructors have expended reading into class activities. This article with a "time-bomb" (Bernstein, 2002, efforts in the past four decades to describes a reading regimen that applies p. 122) that hinders workers' ability increase attention on reading as an a familiar learning taxonomy to everyday to acquire skills and knowledge and important business skill (McKeown, business news. diminishes their sense of achievement 1974; Sumner, 1979; Horning, 2007; The reading problems that students and ownership of their job performance Corus and Ozanne, 2011) and to experience in high school and college and career development (Corus & encourage reading skills across the have direct repercussions on their Ozanne, 2011). For purposes of this curriculum similar to initiatives for performance in the workplace. Data article, the author defines reading as writing; however, reading pedagogy is from the National Center for Education using one's cognitive, cultural, and stymied by the increasing and extensive Statistics (2009) show that, although psychological abilities to interpret and use of computers as a teaching tool 28 Business Education Forum February 2014 COMMUNICATION and source of information, which gives Figure 1. Domains of Learning in Bloom's Taxonomy students the false notion that close, critical reading is no longer necessary (Horning, 2007). Another problem is that most business instructors are not Analyze •• Evaluate •• Create trained to teach reading, which raises T the question of how instructors can best Apply integrate reading skills into business courses. High school business teachers T agreed overwhelmingly (89.1%) that Understand their courses should incorporate some reading instruction but were less enthu- t siastic (41.3%) about being required by Remember institutional assessments to measure reading outcomes (Polkinghorne, 2010). Horning (2007) posited that the practice Source: Anderson & Krathwohl (2001). and development of reading skills should not be relegated to homework the concepts and ideas found in such things, and designing new products. assignments but explicitly targeted as a information: The upper three domains (analyze, learning outcome. Level 1: Remember. At the evaluate, and create) require deeper lowest level of learning, one recalls or thinking about the information read. Bloom's Learning Taxonomy memorizes basic concepts, facts, terms, The reader must answer questions Teaching reading does not require and answers. This level typically involves whose answers are not obvious, make specialized training beyond using an the most tasks and asks students factual decisions, solve problems, and create acceptable tool; for example, Bloom's questions (what, when, where, why, and new knowledge. A learning activity may Learning Taxonomy has been used how). The answers to such questions culminate with questions or tasks in all for more than 50 years to develop and are explicitly stated in the text. An or any of the three upper-level domains. measure teaching and learning goals example of a recall task might be to list Business communication courses, for and objectives for many subjects. three functional areas or divisions in a example, should engage students in Psychologist Benjamin Bloom (1956) business organization. learning tasks in the upper domains to and his colleagues developed this Level 2: Understand. At this level, prepare them for similar tasks when taxonomy as a then-revolutionary one comprehends or understands the they enter the workforce. classification of learning into several meaning of information and organizes Level 4: Analyze. At this level, domains, starting with the ability to and compares elements of the informa- one breaks information into separate recall information and culminating tion. Students will understand some elements to examine each element and with the ability to evaluate information. of the concepts based on common its relationship with other elements. An Anderson and Krathwohl (2001) later knowledge or previous lessons, and they example of an analytical task might be to revised Bloom's Taxonomy, as it is may also have to consult a reference compare accounting tasks that require known, to also recognize the ability book (dictionary, thesaurus, etc.) the most computer automation with to create new ideas and points of view for other meanings. An example of a those that require the least, and then from existing information—skills that comprehension task might be to explain decide how each set of tasks affects the are highly valued in contemporary the difference between the marketing accounting cycle. workplaces. In other words, a creative and accounting functions in a business. Level 5: Evaluate. At the evaluation learner will combine information Level 3: Apply. Here, one applies stage, one judges the quality and worth gleaned from diverse sources to form facts, rules, and techniques contained of the elements and relationships using new knowledge. Figure 1 shows the in a set of information to other familiar external criteria. An example of an relationship among the domains of the situations in order to show relationships evaluation task might be to justify the revised learning taxonomy followed by (similarities, differences, congruencies, proposal to automate customer orders a brief explanation of each domain. etc.). This inferential task shows the stu- and product deliveries as a cost-effective The lower three domains (remem- dent's ability to cross-reference the infor- measure for a business. ber, understand, and apply) are con- mation. An example of an application Level 6: Create. At the creation sidered the basic levels at which the task might be to describe the functional level, one forms new ideas and processes learner manipulates information to area of marketing to a job applicant using findings at the previous levels. An show familiarity and flexibility with who enjoys meeting people, trying new example of a creation task might be to February 2014 Business Education Forum 29 COMMUNICATION Figure 2. Action Verbs for Creating Learning Outcomes (Based on Bloom's Revised Taxonomy) Remember Understand Apply Analyze Evaluate Create Choose Associate Apply Analyze Appraise Choose Describe Classify Choose Categorize Judge Combine Define Compute Dramatize Classify Criticize Compose Identify Convert Explain Compare Defend Construct Label Defend Generalize Differentiate Compare Create