Listening Strategies

POWER Listening Strategy
Knowledge is power, but to learn, you have to listen. Help your students be the best listeners they can be with POWER Listening!
POWER Listeners actively participate in the listening process. When listening to reading material, POWER Listeners:
P – PREVIEW and think about the material O – ORGANIZE their note taking materials W – WONDER – What is it all about? Listen and summarize E – EVALUATE their understanding by answering the questions R – REVIEW any missed questions
Before you begin teaching the POWER Listening strategy, ensure that students are comfortable using the available digital technology. Having mastery of the playback or software will enable students to better concentrate on acquiring the steps of the POWER Listening strategy.
One of the skills that the POWER Listening Strategy focuses on is summarizing. Summarzing can be a challenge for students with learning disabilities. For tips on teaching students summarizing skills, download these documents:
Why Teach Listening?


Students spend a large portion of the school day listening. They listen to announcements, to classroom instruction, to peers and to various school personnel. Students with good listening skills are generally more successful than their peers who are passive listeners. All students, however, can be taught to be better listeners and reap the benefits below:
Successful Time Management
Students with good listening skills generally follow directions correctly the first time they are given. This means they spend more time on task. Active listening skills enable students to use their time more wisely. They don’t have to spend as much time asking questions, clarifying information or fixing mistakes made as a result of passive listening.
Educational Success
Students who are active listeners use new information more productively. They are better equipped to access their prior knowledge, which allows them to make connections with new information. It also enables them to decide how to use this information. By activating their schema, they have a framework for understanding new content and whether or not the content is relevant. As a result, they are much better at sifting through all of the information they receive and determining what the main points are and what are extraneous details. Because good listeners tap into their prior knowledge when hearing new information, they can more readily integrate new ideas into their schemas. Students who use active listening strategies also exhibit better concentration and memory. Active listeners filter information, connect to what is important, use it and store it in a meaningful way. Consequently, they often seem to have a better grasp on academic content than their peers who listen more passively.
Interpersonal Success
Active listeners tend to have more successful interpersonal relationships. Their active attention supports the speaker and helps build his confidence. Because speakers know they are really being listened to, they feel valued. This promotes feelings of trust and respect which in turn, makes the speaker more likely to cooperate. By encouraging feelings of respect, active listeners have the ability to persuade and successfully negotiate.
Students who use active listening skills are better able to determine when miscommunications have occurred. They are also more successful at gleaning additional information from the speaker. Therefore, good listeners are able to initiate a resolution to the misunderstanding more readily. And because active listeners engender respect, the speaker is more likely to accept the suggested solution.
How do we teach students to be active listeners?FPRIVATE "TYPE=PICT;ALT=Teacher reading over studen
Early childhood educators weave listening skills into their daily curriculum. They know that young children need to be taught to listen and pay attention. So, they integrate listening into almost everything they do. Teachers prompt children to attend to them by getting down on the floor and making eye contact. They gain group attention through rhyming phrases such as “1,2,3, eyes on me.” During circle time, children sing songs that require turn-taking and group interaction. Songs like B-I-N-G-O require students to listen for the silent pauses. They play rhythm games that involve listening to a clapping pattern and then repeating it. They play games where they dance until they hear music stop, and then they freeze. Teachers read books to the class and elicit comments and reactions. When resolving conflicts between children, teachers ask each child how they are feeling and then repeat what the child said or have the other child repeat how his friend is feeling. Although this is just a sample of what occurs in a preschool classroom, these activities clearly illustrate how listening is an integral part of the early childhood experience.
As children get older, these listening activities begin to fall by the wayside as curriculum demands increase. At the same time, oral language in the classroom gets increasingly complex. Children are expected to listen to this information without direct instruction in how to process this information. If there was unlimited time, teachers could adapt early childhood listening activities to be more age-appropriate. But the reality of most classrooms is that there is barely enough time to cover the mandated curriculum. Since active listening skills can increase your students overall success, finding ways to integrate these skills into your classroom would benefit everyone. How can you fit explicit listening