Peer Review

Diversity and Difference in Communication

Material Detail page

Reviewed:: Apr 12, 2019 by Sociology

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Ratings

Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:

"Interpersonal communication in health and social care services is by its nature diverse. As a consequence, achieving good or effective communication – whether between service providers and service users, or among those working in a service – means taking account of diversity, rather than assuming that every interaction will be the same. This unit explores the ways in which difference and diversity impact on the nature of communication in health and social care services."

Type of Material:

This is a free sample unit of a broader online course (Health and Social Care level 2) through OpenLearn/The Open University.

Recommended Uses:

This can be a self-paced course or used to supplement instructional materials in sociology, anthropology, communication, cultural studies, psychology. The instructor can adapt exercises from the course for his or her own courses or have students read a particular section prior to a discussion.

Technical Requirements:

A variety of formats are available for students to download the course: WORD, PDF, Kindle, ePub among others. Students need to create an account to access all the course activities and to get a statement of participation.

Identify Major Learning Goals:

According to the author, after studying this course, you should be able to:

demonstrate an understanding of competing perspectives on issues of communication, difference and diversity,
demonstrate an understanding of the ways in which issues of ethnicity, gender and disability impact interpersonal communication in care services,
apply ideas about communication and difference to everyday interactions in health and social care contexts,
analyse the ways in which ideas about difference can both reflect and reproduce inequalities between groups in the context of care services, and
identify strategies for working with difference and diversity in the context of challenging discrimination in health and social care contexts.

Target Student Population:

College General Ed, College Lower Division, College Upper Division, Graduate School. Some underprepared students would have difficulty with the content -- reading comprehension.

Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:

Basic browser, with frames, probably works on smaller devices,

Content Quality

Rating:

Strengths:

The organization of the course is excellent and allows for easy navigation to relevent material. For students completing the course, the topics flow in a logical manner and address the stated learning outcomes. It provides learners with an estimate of the time to complete the course.

The course content accurately reflect issues related to intercultural communication in the health care/social service settings -- ethnicity, gender and disability.

It includes reflective activities and provides examples from other students (modelling). For example, there is a series of case studies students are asked to analyze based on ethnic considerations.

This material can be used as a stand alone course or as supplemental material in other courses in sociology.

Concerns:

The level of the writing is appropriate for a college-level audience. However, under-prepared students with a lack of reading comprehension would stuggle with the course content. The is not a deficiency of the quality of the content.

The content is written for a British audience. Communication issues in the UK may be different from those in other countries. For example, ethnic groups vary by country.

You need to pay for the next course.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool

Rating:

Strengths:

The content is broken into smaller, less intimidating sections that address key concepts and theories. It provides reflective activities and allows students to view past student's work. Each topical area is summarized for easy note taking.

Concerns:

General concepts and theories can be relevant for any student. However, the examples are more relevant to a British health care or social service organization. Instructors using the text in the USA should consider modifying the examples.

It is designed to be used as an entire unit and it might be difficult to use only parts of it, or repurpose the material, because latter sections refer to earlier material covered.

Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty

Rating:
Strengths:: The website was very responsive and the organization of the website made navigating simple (expanding menu buttons; previous/next buttons). It also provided student multiple formats to download the course or make an account to track progress. Downloadable on multiple platforms.
Concerns:: Some layout problems with the website, the social media icons covered a banner title. Advertisments for paid courses are distracting.

Other Issues and Comments:: It was difficult to assess when the material was last updated. Some of the examples were using 2001 Britain census information.
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