Text : Stephen E. Lucas, The Art of Public Speaking, McGraw Hill
Hearing: The vibration of sound waves on the eardrums and the firing of electrochemical impulses in the brain.
Listening: Paying close attention to, and making sense of, what we hear.
Listening is important
- Top-flight business executives, successful politicians, brilliant teachers nearly all are excellent listeners.
- In most working places, effective listeners hold higher positions and are promoted more often than people who are ineffective listeners.
- According to business managers number one communication skill is “listening”.
- Mostly everyone depends on listening than speaking.
- As a speaker listening is always important to get information and ideas.
- Best speakers are always best listeners.
Listening and critical thinking
Types of Listening
1.Appreciative listening: Listening for pleasure / enjoyment (Listen to music, comedy,)
2. Empathetic listening:Listening to provide emotional support for the speaker (Friend’s distress story)
3.Comprehensive listening: Listening to understand the message of a speaker. (Attending for a lecture)
4.Critical listening: Listening to evaluate a message for purpose of accepting or rejecting it.( Ex: Campaign speech of a political candidate )
Comprehensive thinking skills
- Summarizing information.
- Recalling facts.
- Distinguish main points from minor points, are central to comprehensive listening.
Critical thinking Skills
- Separating facts from opinion
- Spotting weakness in reasoning
- judging the soundness of evidence
Four causes of Poor Listening
1.Not concentrating: 120-150 words a minute – we talk, 400-800 brain can process.
Spare brain time: The difference between the rate at which most people talk (120 to 150 words a minute) and the rate at which the brain can process language (400-800 words a minute).
Though, we have enough spare time/ brain time we just interrupt our listening by thinking about other things.Ex: Student union meeting-one has lost his/her listening
2.Listening too hard:
Sometimes we try to catch speaker's each and every word.Try to remember all the data (names, places, dates, information), therefore we often miss the speaker's main points.
- Efficient listeners usually concentrate on main ideas evidence rather than trying to remember everything a speaker says.
3.Jumping to conclusion:
Before the speaker’s message we just jump into conclusion.
-Putting words into a speaker's mouth, we are so sure we know what they mean, we don't listen to what they actually say.
-Jumping to conclusion is prematurely rejecting a speaker's ideas as boring or misguided.
4. Focusing on delivery and personal appearance:
We tend to judge people by the way they look or speak and therefore do not listen what they say.
Speaker’s accent, personal appearance, vocal mannerism, dress, etc
How to become a better listener
1.Take listening seriously:
- Learn how to listen effectively
- Practice and self-discipline
- Doing self-evaluation on Listening
2.Be an active listener:
- Avoid passive listening ( listen to a song while studying, parents listen to their children while preparing meal, students listen a lecture while doing another subject’s work)
- “Giving undivided attention to a speaker in a genuine effort to understand the speaker’s point of view.
- In a conversation, active listeners do not interrupt the speaker or finish his/her sentence.
- When listening to a speech, they do not allow themselves to be distracted by internal or external interference.
- They do not prejudge the speaker.
- They will focus the speaker's message only.
