Explore key mindsets and practical techniques to sharpen your listening and engage in thoughtful, intentional dialogue.
Essential Questions
- Why is listening such a challenging skill to master?
- How can your mindset strengthen your listening skills and deepen your understanding of information and the people around you?
- What techniques can help someone become a better listener, and how might those skills deepen their understanding of the world around them?
Big Ideas
- Multiple Levels: Listening requires one to develop an understanding on multiple levels including both verbal and nonverbal cues.
- Developing a Mindset: Listening begins with the development of a curious and empathetic mindset to elicit productive listening experiences.
- Honing Technique: Listening is like any life or academic skill and requires a technique and process to succeed.
PART 1
Understanding the Art of Listening
Video (0:00-03:50)
PART 2
Mindsets for Listening
Video (03:51-06:15)
PART 3
Techniques for Listening
Video (06:16-14:18)
PART 4
Listener Toolkit
Video (14:19-15:16)
Listening skills are essential for learning, forming relationships, and interacting with the world. This guide, designed to accompany our listening skills video, will help students develop strong listening skills and understand the importance of applying these skills in different situations. Educators may utilize this guide to establish techniques for their students to practice and to grow as better listeners in the future.
Very few people take the time to learn, practice, and develop proper listening skills. Yet, these skills are an integral tool in our learning environment. By engaging students in this practice, they will become more active and more capable listeners who are better able to navigate the media-filled society that we live in today. Listening is more than just hearing what someone else is saying. This guide will open students up to the complexities of listening skills and develop the foundations of becoming an active and productive listener in any context.
How to use this guide
This guide is designed to enhance your students’ engagement with the video. You can pause at the suggested “Stop/Do/Discuss” points to explore key concepts through discussion and reflection questions provided for each section. Alternatively, you may prefer to show the entire video without breaks and use the discussion questions and activities at the end of this guide (“Summative Activities & Reflection”) for a comprehensive post-viewing discussion.
You can also utilize a flipped classroom approach, assigning the video (in full or in segments) for students to watch at home, then using class time to unpack ideas together through reflection, discussion, or hands-on activities. Choose the approach that best fits your students and classroom setting, whether it’s real-time engagement or a deeper dive after the video.
Discussion Questions
- Building Mindset: What is a mindset? How does our mindset shape the way we listen and engage? What kinds of things can impact the development of our mindset?
- Reflective Listening: How might reflective listening help to improve one’s understanding as well as provide validation for the person sharing their opinions or thoughts?
Learning Activities
- Question Everything: Show students a clip from the Whitehouse Press Secretary regarding a briefing on the events of the day. Stop the briefing before the question period from the press. Ask students to write three questions that they would ask the press secretary regarding the briefing. For each question, the students should also write down why that particular question is important to ask in order to elicit a stronger understanding of the briefing.
Extension: Have students share the questions and try to answer them as if they were the press secretary. - Developing Perspective: Divide students into groups of four and have them each read one of the perspective documents on the Vietnam War. They should then analyze the source in terms of its support for the war by answering two questions:
- Is this author in support of or against the Vietnam War?
- How does this author’s perspective impact their support for the war?
Students should share their documents with their group and discuss the similarities and differences.
Perspective Documents:
- Video: The Harvard Business Review, The Art of Active Listening
- Video: Talks at Google, The Art of Generous Listening Krista Tippett
- Article: Psychology Today, “The Power and Impact of Good Listening”
- Article: Reflection Point, “Listening with Humility is the Foundation of Better Teams”
- Article: Mudita Nisker & Dan Clurman, “Can You Listen When You’re Upset?”
- Podcast: The Learning Leader Show, “Tap into the Hidden Wisdom of People Around You for Unexpected Breakthroughs in Leadership and Life (ASK) with Jeff Wetzler”
- Podcast: Ten Percent Happier, “A Holiday Survival Guide for Difficult Conversations with Bill Doherty”
- Book: Celeste Headlee, We Need to Talk: How to Have Conversations That Matter Chapter 15: “Listen!”
- Book: Joseph Grenny, et al, Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High, Chapter 9: “Explore Others’ Paths—How to Listen When Others Blow Up or Clam Up”
- Book: Charles Duhigg, Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection, Chapter 3: “The Listening Cure”, Chapter 5: “Connecting Amid Conflict”