Libby Hill from Smart Talkers discusses the decline of listening skills
We take the development of communication for granted but it is actually the best achievement of our lifetime. There, is however, a very alarming national decline in speech, language and communication skills which means that at least 40,000 children started school in 2009 without adequate spoken language ability (Wright, J., 2009) and a Government report in 2008 showed that this can be as high as 50% of children in some areas (Bercow, J.). The Government’s Communication Tsar Jean Gross, reported that ‘at least’ 1 in every 6 three year olds has a recognised difficulty while many, many more were undetected. Today’s demands of the reception class teacher are tremendous yet the children are starting school without the necessary pre-requisite skills. Spoken language skills are the building blocks for written language and almost every educational task pre-supposes a certain level of ability.
I carried out a study recently involving 100 schools across the country, which showed 100 % Primary Head Teachers were extremely concerned about declining speech, language and communication skills. The main problem they believed was a lack of listening skills.
We live in a very visual, fast- paced age and often the first time a child is required to do any formal listening is when they start school. Many, many children have to be taught to attend and listen before they can begin the demands of the national curriculum. I started my Small Talker groups to try to address this issue. We work on ‘active listening’.
A lot of parents and staff will repeatedly say “Listen!” But what does that mean to a 3 year old? Listening is not a passive skill, it’s an active one and therefore one that needs to be learned. We tend to get quite poor results if we say “Behave!” to our little ones. It means very little, whereas if we describe the behaviour we want, they are more likely to understand what we require of them and then we might have some chance of them doing what we’ve asked. For example, if we want them to be quiet, sit still and not run around in the GP waiting room it better to tell them that than ask them to ‘Behave!’ Many parents and lots of teachers know this and act accordingly. We need to treat listening the same way.
Active listening can be broken down in to:
•good sitting
•good looking
•good waiting
•good thinking
You wouldn’t expect good thinking until school age and it’s very hard to do good waiting as a 3 or 4 year old (it’s hard enough for this 47 year old to wait if she’s got something to say!) Which is why they find it hard to wait for their turn or to let others answer a question to which they know the answer.
Our Small Talker groups (for 3 and 4 year olds) work on the first 3 components of active listening. We use a puppet to demonstrate ‘not good’ sitting so that he actually mirrors some of their behaviours e.g. picking the carpet to picking their noses. They are asked to help the puppet ‘because he’s not naughty, he’s just got to learn’. They have to look for the ‘un-desired’ behaviour and say ‘stop, do good sitting’. They are usually excellent at identifying the behaviour in the puppet although they may still be doing the same themselves for a while. Afterwards, I put the puppet where he can ‘watch’ them do good sitting so he can learn by example. I then monitor the behaviour in a very positive way so that I praise good sitting (and the wriggly ones usually sit up in an aim to please) or if that doesn’t work I ask the wriggly ones to help the puppet by showing him ‘good sitting’. If they are constantly nagged to sit still or to listen, they will switch off. It’s amazing how well they respond to this approach. I have had a few run-ins with TA’s and parents who have been completely peed off with my approach because they are itching to dictate ‘Will you sit still, now!’ However, I’ve asked them to trust me and watch what happens even if I am irritating them…. we’ve had some great results!
www.smarttalkers.org.uk or www.smalltalk-ltd.co.uk
or visit our blog: smarttalkers.blogspot.com
About Me:
I’m Libby Hill, single parent to 2 young boys. I’m a specialist speech and language therapist with Small Talk Independent Speech and Language Therapy, which I set up in 2007. We’re now a team of Therapists and assistants that covers Staffordshire. We also run Smart Talkers Pre-School Communication Groups, which is a series of pre-school classes concentrating on communication, which are available to franchise across the country.
Wednesday, September 8th, 2010, 19:55 | 
Education and Learning, Pre-School, Toddlers | 
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September 8, 2010 at 20:15
Really good article, but don’t you think that as parents we also need to set an example and listen to what our children have to say? A friend of mine used to almost dismiss her daughter when she was babbling as a toddler, fobbing her off with ‘Yes, absolutely, dear’, whereas we’ve always tried to listen to what our children were saying, and as a result we have eloquent, communicative children who like to have 2 way conversations. We have dinner together most evenings, and usually everyone takes a turn in choosing 3 good things from that day. We listen to and comment on each other’s choices, and take it in turns to speak, and to listen.
Our eldest son is 14, and although he can have teenage tantrums, he still listens to what we have to say (often ignoring it, but only after he’s heard what we have to say), but we listen to what he has to say too. Our youngest is nearly 6, and he struggles to sit still, but he listens. We overcome his wriggling by keeping eye contact and engaging him in two way conversations. I think so many parents, and teachers, expect the children to listen, but don’t always listen back.
September 9, 2010 at 12:16
You’re so right Emma. Its a general decline. I wrote http://smarttalkers.blogspot.com/2010/09/grumpy-old-woman-sad-observations.html for my own blog and I bet you’d agree!