Communication Skills and Disaster Preparedness of Junior High School Students

Aims: To correlate the communication skills and disaster preparedness of Grade 7 – 10 students Study Design: Descriptive correlation Place and Duration of Study: Maria Cleta R. Delos Cientos National High School, Padada, Davao del Sur, Philippines. The municipality of Padada was badly struck by series of earthquakes in 2019; magnitude 5.9 on July 16; 6.3 on October 16; 6.6 on October 29; 6.5 on October 31; and 6.9 on December 15. The collection of data from students was conducted almost two years after the incidents, particularly on 22nd of May to 1st of June 2021.     Methodology: Two instruments were used to obtain the data. First was the researcher-made validated flashcards. It was used to measure the students’ communication skills particularly general comprehension of disaster situations. The second instrument was a questionnaire adapted from the study of Tuladhar et al. 24 which was used to determine the students’ knowledge, readiness, awareness, adaptation, and perception of disaster. The study included 204 students who were at grades 7-10.  Results: Findings of the study disclosed that learners had high level of communication skills in general comprehension. The overall rating on the learners’ disaster preparedness was also high. The indicators for disaster preparedness was rated average and high in terms of knowledge, readiness, adaptation, awareness, and perception. There was no significant difference on the level of learners’ communication skills and disaster preparedness. However, a significant difference was found in indicator adaption on disaster preparedness. Conclusion: It was noted in the results that the students’ communication skills based on general comprehension and disaster preparedness are high and evidently high respectively. However, those results also reveal no significant difference.  It only implies that an individual’s communication abilities do not determine their disaster preparedness. Conversely, it is worthy to note that adaptation is linked to communication skills. This means that continues input or supply of information to individuals, making those information form part of their schema may increase their disaster preparedness.  Thus, academic institutions need to intensify their disaster risk reduction promotion so that students can adapt to them. Disaster preparedness may become part of the curriculum and school system. Disaster preparedness should not be put in isolation.