27English teachers learn that the best lessons require students to read, write,
speak, and listen. A good English teacher tries to incorporate all four skills
into each lesson. After several years of teaching, most English teachers will
notice that they use many strategies to teach students how to read, write,
and speak, but few on how to listen. There is a tendency to assume students
know how to do this. Of course, this is a mistake. Teaching students how
to listen—to a teacher, to peers, to the media—is as important as the other
three skills and requires the use of definite teaching strategies.
When Mr. Thelen was a fledgling English teacher, a more experienced
colleague, Ms. Henna, received administrative approval for an English
elective in linguistics. She invited Mr. Thelen to teach a section of the
course with her. A theme of the course was that miscommunication leads
to misunderstanding which leads to confrontation. The importance of
listening and understanding what others say was stressed. Both teachers
learned to better incorporate teaching strategies for listening into instruc-
tion in all their classes.
A new chairperson or assistant principal will notice that many teach-
ers lack this skill of listening. When he observes classes, he will see that
teacher responses to student questions are often non sequiturs; the teacher
has not really listened to nor understood the question. Sometimes teachers
accept student responses that are inappropriate to the discussion. Again,
they are not really listening to what the students say.
This school leader will find that he needs to teach listening skills to the
teachers he supervises. It is important for them to listen carefully to what
their students say, as some students, particularly those for whom English is
Chapter Three