Effective Communication Role Model

Choosing just one person that I think is a competent communicator was quite difficult.  There are several people that I have worked with in early childhood that stand out.  I choose my friend, co-worker, and education coordinator, Sheri.  I met her a few years ago when we worked together as Early Reading First support teachers.  When she walked into the classroom the children almost always listened to what she had to say.  She seemed to be able to hold their attention with little effort while I always feel like I have to work hard to do what just came naturally to her.  She then moved into a more administrative role in the program and worked more with the staff.  Again, they seemed to respond to her with their attention and worked hard to please her.  She is always friendly and very approachable.  I have always felt like I could talk to her about anything and I have heard the same from other staff that have worked with her.  She put together various presentations and trainings in her new role and came to classrooms to present.  She had handouts and visuals and even shared movie clips that supported what she was presenting to us.  We had a training with NAEYC's code of ethical conduct and walked away feeling like I had better tools to use when communicating with staff and families as well as the children.  Later she became an education coordinator and fought hard to get a new curriculum implemented.  Through a lot of hard work, she was able to convince the other management staff that the change was a good one and would support our children's learning.  She then took on the task of getting the new curriculum to classrooms and providing training to us.  She was so excited about this new curriculum that we could not help but get excited as well.  The one thing that I still struggle with is not really knowing how she does what she does.  As I said earlier, it just seems to come naturally to her, but she is a very effective communicator.  I would certainly like to model some of my own communication behaviors after this person.  I would like to move into a more administrative position and Sheri has been an excellent role model for me and also a great resource to help me reach that goal.