On Mon, 11 Sep 1995 DHurst1046@aol.com wrote:
> BTW has anyone used extended periods of silence as a way to open a
> meeting? What were the contexts and what were the outcomes?
Here's another example (almost):
Way long ago, when my daughter was in nursery school, we enjoyed a
particularly skilled teacher.
One of her tricks was to avoid raising her voice above the general din
that a group of 3-year olds can make. She said, "I speak quietly; they
have to slow down and quiet down themselves to hear me." This was
wonderfully effective.
Thinking about this now, there's a dynamic loop, the level of one voice
affects the level of another. It's easy for this to be reinforcing, when
several people are struggling to break into a stream of talk. I think a
similar thing happens with pacing of speech; fast speech --> more fast
speech. As a facilitator, I purposely modulate my loudless and pacing to
affect the group; louder and faster is seldom better.
The ending of the nursery school story: She was so good at handling the
kids (and us) that I hired her when she decided to change careers.
--
Richard Karash ("Rick") | <http://world.std.com/~rkarash>
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