SCSK 552 Improvisation for Communication Skills

Ed Sperr, MLIS Barbara Landon, PsyD

This selective is designed to assist students with their communication skills through the discipline of improvisational theater (or “improv”). Indeed, improv is a great way to cultivate concrete communication skills, as it is based upon the art of actively listening to a collaborator and taking a conversation forward. Students will work with their peers in a number of hands-on exercises designed to help them focus on a conversational partner, attend to new information, and gain a greater awareness of how self-presentation impacts interactions. By the course’s end, students will have better learned how to clearly communicate to an audience and think quickly on their feet—skills that are as vital for the clinician as the performer.