The Value of Listening

Listening is a fundamental aspect of developing strong interpersonal relationships as well as a meaningful understanding of the world around us. We often find ourselves distracted or overwhelmed which can impede our ability to truly listen and understand one another and purposefully process the experience of learning and life. 

As we work toward developing the key skills, competencies, and dispositions that learners need in order to achieve success in school and in life, we took some time this week to focus on the value of active listening. To promote the value of this important skill, students were partnered with a classmate and engaged in a dialogical interview. Dialogical interviews focus less on making the interviewer's opinions and ideas heard and more on the thoughts and ideas of the interviewee. The purpose of this exercise was to offer students a meaningful opportunity to practice and develop their active listening skills, as well as to continue their important work in developing trusting and caring relationships within our classroom community and bolstering a mutual understanding of one another. Though at times the experience proved to be a challenge for some our learners, they were eventually able to successfully redirect their thinking and engage in meaningful moments of understanding and empathy. 

Listening exercises like this will be an essential part of the work we're engaging in as they help to develop skills that promote empathy, effective collaboration, that allow learners to absorb knowledge, be curious, develop a deep understanding about what they are learning about and experiencing, foster critical thinking, better communicate their ideas, support meaningful discussions about text, and allow learners to see and experience the value of diverse perspectives and creative approaches to problem-solving.

This week's guest bloggers reflect on their listening experience. Enjoy.

Listening is a really important skill in life because you have to really listen to others if you don't want there to be a lot of conflict in the world.  - Lonnie

I think 6 out of 10 kids are distracted listeners. - Cheeto111

When you listen, you just need to turn your mute button on and listen and learn from the person you are with.  - PickleKitty

Listening is about empathy, understanding, and digging deeper. When you listen to someone, you understand more about them and it opens up your own ideas about things.  - TheBeeGuy101

Listening is sometimes hard for people because some people want things their way. In life, people sometimes have their hearts set on what they want to say and not about listening to the other person. A wise man is a man that listens to others.  - Lightning24

It's important to learn to be an active listener and not a distracted listener. It's important to listen to other people's ideas and thoughts and not just your own.  - EarthySmurfy

Listening is important because you can learn a lot of things about someone if you just listen. If you have a great idea, you don't want to focus on your own idea, but you should listen to the ideas of others. Who knows, they could have a really good idea and your project could be even better.  - Kiwi222

Listening is important because you are giving other people a chance to share their ideas. Listening is also about respect.  - Strawberry

When you listen to someone, they will know if you are really listening.  - Dream

Listening is an important skill to have in life. Listening shows that you are being respectful and that you care. Even if listening is something that you struggle with, you should work at it.   - Galaxy

Listening is an important skill and it can be hard. You can learn a lot of new things from listening to someone and you can understand someone better.   - Ham

You can learn a lot about other people when you listen.  - Koala333