As we begin to understand mindful listening, let’s apply this chapter in an interactive way where you will engage a friend, family member, neighbor, coworker, or any other person to help you with this assignment. This interactive assignment is meant to display the power of the listening process and how easy obstacles play a part in listening. First, follow these steps:
Begin with a blank 8.5 x 11-inch sheet of paper. Draw (as best as you can) two figures talking. This does not have to be fine art, but do offer some small details on the figures like basic clothing and either sitting or standing. At this point this drawing is for your eyes only. Do not show this to anyone.
Now, ask a friend, family member, neighbor, coworker, etc. to help you with a listening assignment. Give this person 2 blank 8.5 x 11-inch sheets of paper and a sharpened pencil.
Sit back-to-back with this person, preferably with the person at a table so he or she has a hard surface to write on.
Now, here is the hard part. You may now pull out the picture you drew of the two figures talking, but do not let the person see the drawing.
Instruct your person to draw the same picture you drew with verbal cues. You may not look at them, please stay back-to-back. They can ask questions, but they must keep their back to you and use their listening skills only.
Once you feel you have answered all their questions and explained all that needs to be explained, you may turn toward each other and show each other the pictures to compare the outcome.
Keep the drawings as you will post them to this discussion so the class can all see and comment on your results!
In your initial post, label, scan, and upload the pictures that you drew and that your partner drew. (You can scan the pictures and load to your computer, or even take a photo of the drawings and then post the images as an attachment to your initial post.)
In your initial posting, keep these questions in mind: Do the pictures match? Or not? What parts are different? Why?
Please interview your person 2 and ask the questions below to post on the discussion board. You may need to offer more detail to your person 2 about each question below to help him or her understand the information you are trying to gather for the discussion.
Then in your initial posting relate the story to your classmates about your experience. Tell us who you chose to help you with this listening experiment and explain what happened.
Where there any external listening obstacles? Message overload? Message complexity? Physical noises?
Where they any internal listening obstacles? Preoccupation? Pre-judgement? Emotionally loaded language? Lack of effort or focus?
Please offer two (or more!) reply posts to your fellow classmates. In your reply posts, focus on offering insightful comments to your classmates clearly related to the content of their initial post, incorporating key terms used in the chapter. Also, focus on inviting further discussion by providing new ideas and key terms regarding this topic and the comments.