Hola y comostas!
Thank you for popping in and being here with me today!
For this post I need you! Yes, you my dear reader...
For this post I need you! Yes, you my dear reader...
In the past months I have been working through a project with the incredible MIT ( Manaiakalani Innovative Teachers) team to investigate how to actively teach the 'act of deliberate listening' in the classroom.
This first starts with data.
To begin my prototype and understand the data I needed to gather I started to break down what listening looked like for me. What had I seen others do? What did people do when they showed they were listening? What did the research have to say?
I categorised the physical 'symptoms' of listening into three categories, physical, verbal and social and emotional.
When considering the minute interactions of a listener and a speaker, I observed that the listener. If the listener was fully engaged in the idea presented by the speaker, he/she would initiate a continued interaction.
This lead to grouping all the symptoms into responses ( of acknowledgement) and responses that involved an initiation of extending an idea or conversation further.
Here are the 'symptoms' which I gleaned:
Responses of Acknowledgement
Physical
• Looks at person who is speaking.
• Follows different speakers with eyes.
• Facial response present.
• Leans forward or moves to attend.
Verbal
• Responds with talking stems
• Repeats ideas spoken by someone else
• Asks for clarification
• Extends someones idea
• Questions someones idea
Responses with Initiation
Physical
• Uses facial expression to indicate a response or statement.
• Uses a hand or body motion to indicate an idea.
• Follows different speakers and waits for a pause before motioning to speak.
• Pauses after presenting an idea in order for others to respond.
• Pauses when other speakers initiate simultaneously.
• Uses body language or manners to encourage others to speak first.
• Notices when others initiate a response or initiation with body language.
Verbal
• Responds to questions with a full sentence answers.
• Uses talking stems to present an idea or response to a question.
• Speaks in full sentences presenting one idea at a time.
• Speaks to the group.
• Responds to a current idea before presenting a new idea.
• Extends own and others ideas with justification.
• Invites others to respond to the idea they have presented.
Social and Emotional
• Shows patience, includes and recognises those who haven't presented and makes space for them to participate.
The rubric prototype is HERE and is the basis on which I hope to gather data along with using the FORM from the previous post to gather student and teacher voice.
And yes, this is where you come in!
Your experiences and understanding are valuable. Are these symptoms correct? Is this what you notice in conversations? Is this a fair assessment of behaviours? If you were using this as a teacher, colleague or researcher, what would you question or change?
I look forward to your feedback and the exciting challenge of adapting this prototype to your responses.
I hope to see you here again soon!
Kia ora Alethea, I have been engaged by your prototype listener/speaker rubric that adopts an 'Initiate' and 'Respond' framing. I am interested in the parallels with dialogic theeory more generally and with dialogic talk more specifically (although I recognise that you foreground the emphasis on listening in your design for learning. I wonder in the next stage of your journey whether a dialogic theory might support, and bring further insight, to your innovative inquiry and the resulting tool. The languaging of dialogic perspectives certainly under-girds your thinking and I'm wondering if it would help situate your work in a broader, but very topical field of educational research at the moment. I see that Rene Brown features strongly in informing aspects of social-emotional and well-being (and as necessary intra-and inter-personal components). You also mention Hattie and one other (that escapes me now!), but I also notice that explicit reference to the dialogic may be a missing piece that could complement and stretch your thinking even further. More specifically I am thinking of the work of Sarah Hennessey, Neil Mercer and Robin Alexander (Cambridge) which Susan Sandretto is now involved in at the University of Otago. These were just thoughts as I think you capture the progressions in receptive and productive interaction really well (taking account of gesture and eye contact as other complementary modes). I do wonder, for 'true listening' whether there needs to be a critical thinking representation at the top end of the rubric. If one is authentically engaged in listening one is also evaluating what one's hearing. The Hennessey work could help with this. Lastly, just one technical issue. I found it quite difficult to engage with the rubric embedded as it is because its hard to see as a whole sheet. Do you think you could replace with a link to an entire Google sheet or whole table? Thank you again for this opportunity to engage with your work. I think it is a very worthwhile topic and the precursor to some deep learning by your students. All the best, Naomi (Woolf Fisher Research Centre)
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