“Listening is one such skill, found in every great leader or major success. Listening is silent, yet it builds a bond between two people, opens up the other person’s worldview, offers clues about what direction your relationship should take, and expands your viewpoint beyond your own restricted perspective.” - Deepak Chopra
Most international schools’ mission and core values are rooted in building a caring, respectful, and responsible community – a community where everyone thrives and excels and can be proud of who they are, regardless of their cultural, economic, and linguistic backgrounds. So, how do we build such a community? We can build such a community through meaningful connections, and these connections can be forged through deep listening.
Listening as an Educator:
As educators, we must strive to listen to our students. We spend so much time talking to students that we often forget how important it is to talk with students. Listening to students paves the way for understanding them beyond their nationality, academic strengths, and learning differences. It communicates to students that we are truly interested in them as human beings and that each student brings unique talents and passions that are acknowledged. It allows students to share their perspectives and be seen, heard, and valued for who they are.
While it’s important for educators to listen to their learners, it is equally important that we also teach students the value of listening as a way to foster meaningful connections.
Listening as a Colleague:
As coworkers or colleagues, listening helps us connect at much deeper levels beyond our workplace roles and responsibilities. As the workforce in schools and other organizations becomes more diverse, it’s imperative that we intentionally carve out time to get to know one another because every human being has a story to tell. Through listening to these conversations and stories of human experiences, we as colleagues can build true understanding and even appreciation and empathy towards one another.
Listening as a Leader:
As a leader of any team, both at micro and macro levels, it’s important to cultivate trust and respect. Listening, with our hearts and minds, makes a leader move beyond limited perspectives, opens channels of honest communication, creates a safe space for team members to voice different opinions, and eventually leads to mutual understanding, and a culture of respect and trust. Deep listening, especially as a leader, is hard. It requires putting aside our perceptions of self and others. It requires creating a safe space through words and actions, a space in which others feel comfortable about honest communication. It also requires courage and kindness.
Fostering Deep Listening:
Deep listening leads to communication which in turn leads to meaningful connections. Thich Nhat Hanh, the Zen Master, said, “When communication is cut off, we all suffer. When no one listens to us or understands us, we become like a bomb ready to explode. Restoring communication is an urgent task. Sometimes only ten minutes of deep listening can transform us and bring a smile back to our lips.”
So how do we intentionally foster deep listening? What opportunities might we create that promote deep listening? Dana Miller-Kitch, the middle school French teacher at the American Embassy School, is passionate about restorative practices and recommends Circles, a versatile restorative practice that fosters deep listening. According to the International Institute for Restorative Practices, Circles allow people to speak and listen to one another in an atmosphere of safety and decorum. Circles are powerful shapes because they equalize all participants, can be used in many different cultures and contexts, and are non-threatening.
At Megan’s school, facilitators from the National Center for Restorative Justice (NCRJ) came to lead a workshop on Circles. They shared a resource on Relationship Building Circles that explains how Circles can be used to intentionally build community. Circles "create a special or sacred space where everyone comes together to share in ways we ordinarily don't have the opportunity to do." In Circles, a talking piece is passed around. The NCRJ says, “The person holding the talking piece is the only one who may speak. Everyone else in the circle is actively listening and trying not to spend time thinking about what they are going to say.”
Another way to foster deep listening is to engage students in classroom discussions, ask them to share their ideas about how the learning environment should be set up, or enlist student opinions when planning schoolwide events. Explicit modeling and highly structured speaking and listening tasks pave the way for reflection and deep listening. For example, instead of just telling students to “turn and talk,” the teacher can set expectations to explain what active listening looks like with instructions such as:
These physical movements signal that a person is willing and ready to listen.
Additionally, the roles of speaker and listener can be clearly defined and time-bound so that both partners get equal chances to speak and to listen. Protocols, such as The Microlab Protocol from the National School Reform Faculty (NSRF), promote deep listening because “each person has equal time to talk, and the listener(s) should not interrupt, interpret, paraphrase, analyze, give advice or break in with a personal story while the speaker is talking."
Yet another way to foster deep listening is through Story Circles. In a Story Circle, students take turns sharing their personal experiences and connections to a topic of study. According to Darla Deardorff in her Manual for Developing Intercultural Competencies: Story Circles, Story Circles create positive and healing spaces. She writes, “Every person has personal experience that can be shared, we all have something to learn from others, and listening for understanding is transformational” (unesdoc). Read more about Story Circles for Impactful Community Engagement.
Conclusion:
In a world that is rife with conflict, both internal and external, deep listening has the power to transform beliefs and build a caring, respectful, and responsible community that we as educators and human beings strive to cultivate. According to Thich Nhat Hanh, “Our communication is our continuation.” So, let’s listen, understand, and connect!
Megan Vosk teaches the middle years program Individuals & Societies and English Language Acquisition at Vientiane International School. She is also the chair of the Association for Middle Level Education (AMLE) teacher leaders committee.
Shafali is a multilingual learner specialist at the American Embassy School, in New Delhi, India.
