The piece of evidence which best demonstrates my ability to achieve the fifth learning

objective of the communication discipline at Bryant University, to critically analyze messages, is

the discussion board thread from my Senior Seminar in Communication Theory course, which
was in response to reading Chapter 9 about organizational communication in the textbook,
Applying Communication Theory for Professional Life: A Practical Introduction, by Marianne
Dainton and Elaine D. Zelley. In this discussion board, the professor broke the class up into four
groups and each student was required to post four times throughout the course of several days in
order to demonstrate our knowledge and understanding of the material presented in the chapter,
as well as our ability to discuss it with our classmates through mediated messages online. In
order to create the discussion posts, it was imperative to not only form discussion questions to
facilitate further discussion, but respond to the messages of other classmates based on the
information presented in the reading of the chapter. Responses to discussion questions were
generally written in the form of agreeing or disagreeing with the writer of the question, stating
your beliefs and thoughts about the topic to respond to the question, stating information brought
up in the chapter which specifically answers the question, drawing conclusions from this
information to answer the question or providing examples of real-life or potential real-life
situations that could provide an answer to the question. In my responses
The discussion board thread from my Senior Seminar in Communication Theory course,
which was in response to reading Chapter 9 about organizational communication in the textbook,
was chosen to demonstrate my ability to achieve the fifth learning objective because of the
nature of my responses to the discussion questions and posts of my classmates. I used examples
of my past working experiences, along with conclusions drawn from the information presented in
the reading of the chapter in order to provide a thoughtful answer in the first response. In writing

this response, it had led me to the thought of a discussion question, which I included at the end of
the post in order to facilitate further discussion in response to it, instead of simply stating my
experiences and conclusions drawn from the textbook. In the second response, I built upon one
of my classmates responses to another classmates discussion question by presenting
conclusions I had drawn from the reading of the chapter as well. Finally, the third response
provides an answer to a discussion question proposed by a classmate that touches on the
variability in individuals abilities to assimilate to organizational cultures based on conclusions
drawn from the reading of the chapter, as well as a hypothetical example of individuals
attempting to assimilate into an organization. Each of these responses demonstrates the ability to
engage in active listening and enact mindful responding to messages. By presenting the
conclusions I had drawn from the reading of the chapter, I was able to identify meanings
embedded in messages in order to present my answers to the various discussion questions
proposed by my classmates. The achievement of these main goals of the fifth learning objective
demonstrate my ability to critically analyze messages.