Review of The book “Understanding Communication Review”

I am a long-term user of Douglas Hoehn’s “Understanding Communication” (Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt) through each of its four editions. Its popularity among my students is what led me to make it one of the pivotal textbooks in my courses, which have spanned communication thorough entry-level English courses in a college setting. In final course evaluations, students frequently remarked that the topics covered were very readable, clear, and interesting, and therefore added to their knowledge of the subject. It was not uncommon to hear from students that “Understanding Communication” was their favorite textbook among the many they had experienced.

The format of the book is clear not only for students but for instructors to incorporate into their various curricula. For example, I would usually begin the semester with the chapters on “Listening” and “Understanding Your Listeners” as not only are these topics foundational for students’ success in a course, but because the information and formatting met my requirements for a study-reading system called Survey-Question-Read-Recite-Review, which was often one of the first strategies I invited students to try in order to achieve success across courses. Strengthened by an approach to successfully comprehending the key points of this (or most) texts, my communication and composition students, especially, were able to profit on how to put their ideas into words and thus communicate more effectively verbally and nonverbally, not only in the classroom and in small groups but in other social encounters both in-and-out of an academic context. Four of “Understanding Communication’s” chapters explore these competencies.

However, this one text also enables students to have more detailed procedures to research their ideas and both to prepare and present a speech, if those competencies are required in a course, as they were in mine. In addition, “Understanding Communication” examines how issues such as gender might affect communication. Perhaps having the most impact, this is an interactive and practical guide that includes individual and group tasks and exercises that help students interact with memorable experiences within and out of the classroom experience.

I would highly recommend this textbook to meet the goals of multiple courses.

Dr. Patricia Kelly,

Assistant Professor

Community College of Philadelpha