Things to Do when Listening

How is your listening skill? Does it get any better? Do you listen to English conversations every day? Or, do you listen to English stories every day?

I want to share something related to listening skill to you. It’s about “things you should do and what you should not do when listening”. 

1. Listen Optimistically

Try to listen optimistically. Always think that you can do this, you will be able to understand them. Be confident with your skill. Otherwise, you won’t be able to catch anything, because you’re worried about whether you’ll understand or not. Having optimistic mindset when you’re listening will help you a lot to understand the conversations or what other people are talking about.

2. Listen to Ideas

This is an important aspect. When you listen to other people or conversations, try to get the ideas. What are they talking about, here? DO NOT try to get all the words. I know that it’s important to know the words, but as you listen and trying to get the ideas, you’ll become better and better on getting their words. Soon, you’ll be able to catch both the ideas and words. Trust me, it works!

3. Listen Longer

What does “listen longer” mean? It means that you have to let the speakers finish their sentences. DO NOT get too rushed to think about what should you reply next? Or to think about what’s the next response going to be? Just take it easy, listen until the very end, so that you can easily get the ideas, and understand what the speakers are talking about. It’s pretty easy, isn’t it?

4. Listen with an Open Mind

When you’re talking with other people, and listening to what they are saying to you, listen with an open mind. Ignore emotional triggers that would likely to appear. For example, when they’re talking about sensitive subjects such as religion, race, etc. It’s better for you to ignore the triggers, and try to get the ideas. Yes, this is important to do, if you want to get the ideas. If you get offended or give priority to your emotion, you will never get the ideas. This will cause misunderstandings, and you know what’ll happen next. Instead, listen with open mind so that you can listen longer to get their main ideas in the conversation.

5. Judge the Content. Not Delivery

You must be aware that not all people are good speakers. Some people need to think longer, some talk fast, some talk slowly. Now, if you are annoyed of how they deliver their message to you, how can you listen with your open mind? How can you listen longer? How can you get their ideas? That will not happen. What you should do is to judge the content, the ideas, things that they talk about. NOT how they deliver them to you. If you succeed with this one, you will be able to comprehend better.

6. Listen Opportunistically

When people are talking to you (or when you’re listening to conversations), there must be something you can get out of it. So, when you listen, think about “what’s in it for me?”. There must be something that you will get. And who knows whether it will be important to you or not.

Now, you can see that all of them are connected. So, when you realize that you’ll get something out of it, you will listen opportunistically. After that, you will try to listen longer to get the ideas. You’ll ignore all the emotional triggers that might appear, and you will judge the content after the speakers have done with their sentences. If you succeed with all of those things, you will be better at listening very soon.

Try to do these things everytime you listen to other people you’re talking to. Also, when you listen to English conversations to train your listening skill.

So, how do you think? Can you do this? I believe that all of you can do this as long as you have intention on improving your English skills, especially the listening skill. Don’t forget, think optimistically when you’re learning English. There’s nothing that you can’t do, and you have to realize that. Be confident! Keep exploring to get more!

sources:
http://g4.psychcentral.com/lib/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/listening_skills.jpg
http://image.slidesharecdn.com/activelistening-140418082402-phpapp02/95/active-listening-3-638.jpg?cb=1397827599
http://sd.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk/i/keep-calm-and-listen-to-ideas.png
http://fscomps.fotosearch.com/printcomp.aspx?filepath=CSP/CSP891/k8911115.jpg&papersize=24x36&paperstyle=crop&paperborder=0
http://www.sarahnamulondo.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/open-mind.jpg
http://image.slidesharecdn.com/listeningisatenpartskill-100601220046-phpapp01/95/listening-is-a-ten-part-skill-3-728.jpg?cb=1275447716
http://memecrunch.com/meme/50M0C/what-s-in-it-for-me/image.jpg