Using my Ears Twice as Much as my Mouth

On reflecting on my own listening skills and completing this Interactive Listening Self-assessment Tool, it is fair to say I have a few things to work on in the area of listening.

At the moment I would classify myself as a poor listener, as you can see from the list below I have highlighted some actions I am guilty of during conversations.

The poor listener will often;

• Look away 
• Interrupt
• Finishes other's sentences
• Offer solutions without asking
• Look bored or fidget
• Looks at their watch
• Ask too many questions
• Do most of the talking
• Give their opinion without asking

A focus for me will be to turn off my inner dialogue, so I am focussed on the speaker. By not having this dialogue running should also reduce the desire for me to interrupt or finish sentences, This will occur as I will not be biasing the conversation with my own thoughts.  I think increasing the use of questioning will stop me offering solutions or opinions. These questions need to be effective and not too numerous, and this will evolve as I work my way through this module especially looking at Joan Dalton's work again. I already have some critical questions from my previous blog post to use in upcoming work.

There are three different layers of listening:

• surface listening

• directed listening

• listening for learning. 

The key skills of listening for learning are:
Switching off your own inner dialogue
Sending out the right signals through non-verbal signals
Summarising
Suspending your own judgment
Showing empathy

A key for me to work towards listening for learning is working on summarising and paraphrasing, this is a focus from the last blog post as well.

How to Listen: Autobiographical Listening

Autobiographical Listening is where you ask a question to start a conversation that is in an area where you want to share something of your own. I am guilty of this at times and think I do it to build relationships with others by sharing my personal experiences to create connections with them. This enables me to then build trust and supports my work with them professionally.


Listening to the video and reflecting on its content I can see how this really shuts quiet people down and possibly creates a barrier to forming relationships and engagement in the work I do with teachers.

The suggestion form the video was to attempt to enter the other person's space and explore with their experiences with them. 

For example, when someone responds to the question of “how are you?” with "I am busy, rushed off my feet.", instead of saying "me too" and start telling them all about it, try asking a question, “What's keeping you busy?” and enter their world.


Asking an appropriate question opens up the possibility for discussion, and then listening creates the opportunity for dialogue and builds better relationships.

The importance of Non-Verbal Communication

Non-verbals communicate 90% of understanding of the message
Facial Expression
Eye contact
Physical appearance
Spatial Behaviour
Paralinguistics - Pitch and tone
Kinesics - posture and gestures

Reflecting on non-verbal communication, I think I read these well in other people, however possibly due to my poor listening skills I get mixed messages from the verbal message and the non-verbal cues not always matching up. Focussing on my listening should really support my practice. I will also take more note of non-verbal cues of others and try subtly reflecting these gestures.