Productive Listening — Looney Math

“Robust teacher listening cultivates a space where students can engage in productive struggle and think critically about their own and each others’ ideas”

— Hintz, Tyosn, and English

We all know that classroom dialogue is important. We encourage number talks, we post talk move posters in classrooms, and we spend a lot of time in classrooms thinking about how we generate productive discourse. I’d like to shift the focus to fostering productive listening.

Productive listening is that kind of listening that invites others to share more with you while furthering your understanding of their ideas.

This is the way in which all of us hope to be listened to when we are talking. We all seek to be understood and to feel value.The question that I would like us to think about is how well do we listen? And what might interfere with our listening productively?Lucy West tells us “Accountable talk among students requires accountable listening by teachers.” How do we hold ourselves accountable for listening well? West presents a list of listening stumbling blocks that can help us to be reflective. Take a moment now to read through her handout where she explains these stumbling blocks such as Me too, distractor, nitpicker, sifter, peacekeeper, judger. Which of these stumbling blocks have gotten in your way of listening well? Can you recall a time when one of those stumbling blocks interfered with someone else’s learning? Or your own learning? How might you have listened differently? The first step towards productive listening is to take an honest look at how well we listen. Reading this list is very humbling for me. I am guilty of almost everything on that list at one time or another. You can view West's talk on this subject by scrolling to the bottom of this link for her video. You can also learn more about changing culture in her latest book, Agents of Change, which I highly recommend.

Allison Hintz, Kersti Tyson and Andrea English are also studying the role of listening in teaching, and they brought this idea forth at the NCTM conference in Boston last month. In their article, the Role of Pedagogical Listening, they write, “this work (of listening) takes place in a vulnerable space—a space of sometimes not knowing, not being sure, or not yet understanding another person’s ideas. Such vulnerability can be fruitful if it arises from teachers’ attempts to actualize all learners’ rights, and this, for us, must include learning to listen in deep, pedagogical ways, which help transform thinking and practice to support all learners’ mathematical and social development…Teachers who are especially good at this work are insatiably curious about how their students make sense of a topic. They acknowledge students for having the courage to take a risk and share their thinking. These teachers listen to students in the same way that they themselves want to be heard.”

Hintz, et al. call this kind of listening pedagogical listening, which is defined as, “robust teacher listening that cultivates a space where students can engage in productive struggle and think critically about their own and each others’ ideas. When teachers listen pedagogically they attend to students’ academic and social emotional learning.” When we listen in this way, amazing things happen.

Here is a video example that I have used frequently to explore talk moves. Hitnz, et all. Suggest we use this video to explore pedagogical listening.

As you view, consider the following:

How does the way in which this teacher listens impacts student learning?

How does the teacher makes it clear to all students in the class that she is listening? What does she say? What is her body language?

How do we put this idea of pedagogical listening into practice? This teaching channel article presents ways in which we nurture listening in the classroom, including using statements such as:

I am hearing you say ____. Am I understanding you?
Let’s listen to ____ tell us about his idea.
You’re building on ____’s idea.
Let’s think about ___’s answer. What questions do we have for her?
I’m curious, can you tell me about how you are thinking this through?
Tell me more. You're really challenging me to think about this in an important new way.

We make our listening habits public when we ask questions and make statements like those above that indicate that we heard what was said. A focus on productive listening connects many important ideas. This speaks to the relational aspect of teaching, to the need for equity and emotional security in our schools - for both students and faculty - and it speaks to the absolute necessity for vulnerability in order to move learning forward. So, what can you do with this information? How can you shift school habits towards more productive listening?

Call to Action:

Journaling
- Become curious about your listening habits. When and how do you listen really well? When and how do you not listen well? What do those moments look like?
- Notice moments of productive or pedagogical listening. In what ways did that impact the interaction?
- Create a list of classroom practices that encourage productive listening.
Meetings
- Watch Lucy West's 8-minute video on stumbling blocks to listening and discuss. How can we work as a group to notice our own stumbling blocks to listening?
- Purchase Agents of Change and create a book study in your school.
- Read the resources on pedagogical listening. Consider the impact of their research on your classrooms. with these links: Role of Pedagogical Listening The teaching channel article
- Watch the video of Mrs. Sampson’s teaching or other examples of teaching and look for evidence of pedagogical listening.