Margin Notes

“Explicitly Teaching Listening in the ELA Curriculum: Why and How” (The English Journal, 2020)

“We may assume that listening comes naturally from the process of learning other things. However, research suggests that ‘the better one can listen, the more educated one can become, and the more educated one becomes, the better one can listen…Listening leads to education and education leads to listening’ (Rice and Burbules 2740). Unfortunately, we have not focused enough attention on listening as a distinct skill to be taught, learned, practiced, and assessed (Parker 2816). This skill develops and grows more complex as our thinking and learning become more complex—that is, we do not stop developing as listeners just as we never stop growing as writers and readers. Instruction must be ongoing and develop more complexity as students’ skills in this area increase.”

Summary

According to the author, “listening is the foundation of the other language arts and is fundamental to all learning” and is directly linked to reading comprehension and overall school success. As such, we should be explicitly teaching listening in the ELA classroom.

Alford identifies three realities that have led to a diminished focus on listening as part of the ELA curriculum:

• Teaching the act of listening has been an ignored area of research.
• ELA standards prioritize reading and writing.
• These is a lack of resources available to support teaching listening.

Good listeners demonstrate three essential skills that we can teach, model, and practice as part of our ELA curriculum:

1. They can summarize what they have heard and identify the most relevant information.
2. They connect what they have heard to themselves, their prior learning, and other texts.
3. They are able to visualize, which deepens their listening in a multimodal way.

Takeaways For the Classroom

There are several ways teachers can embed active listening and build communities that values listening:

• Teach, assign, assess, and provide feedback on listening explicitly.
• Make listening an active process.
• Use wait time.
• Avoid restating what your students say, which reduces their responsibility to listen to one another.
• Encourage students to respond to one another’s ideas.
• Establish listening guidelines early in the year and practice them frequently.
• Model good listening.
• Teach notetaking.
• Create more opportunities for group and partner work.
• Invite students to talk about what they see effective listeners doing.
• Provide models for what positive discussions look like.
• Check for understanding by asking students to rephrase what you have said.

Conclusion

“Listening is a skill to be explicitly taught, practiced, and assessed. It is a political act that, if done well, can foster a sense of agency in our students. When they know how to listen well, they can engage more richly in public debate, and it builds a conscious awareness of all they hear and see in our world. We have focused too narrowly on giving voice to our students, and we have forgotten to provide them with a listening ear.”