The Function of Communication in our Service Learning at Bledsoe

There are 5 functions of communication:
1. We communicate to meet our social needs.
2. We communicate to develop and maintain our sense of self.
3. We communicate to develop relationships.
4. We communicate to exchange information.
5. We communicate to influence others.

Our service learning project mostly requires communication for the purpose of exchanging information to complete the task at hand, but keep in mind too that before this project, not many of us students in this class knew each other previously. So, while we are communicating to get this task done, we are socially interacting, adapting our sense of self from the interaction, building friendships, and we are influencing each other even if it is only combining and influencing each others' ideas about the project.

However, we must be careful about this last one because we want to develop our own critical thinking while still collaborating all of our individual thoughts to make SUPER THOUGHTS! Otherwise, we would end up with a bandwagon affect.