Day 1 Can you listen?

Today was the first day my students and I worked on our project. I discuss with the student that we were going to make a comparison poster. Using a Venn diagram, the students will interview a classmate to identify how they are alike and different. I explain that we must first do a couple of things to help us prepare for the making of the poster. We must first learn how to get along and work together. I decided to discuss with them the importance of getting along with one another. Trying to explain that the classroom is a training room for the real world was exciting. They did not realize that people who work and even live together must learn how to get along and work together just like that have too. First, I asked my students what people have to do in order to cooperate with one another. I had so many interesting answers from liking the same things to even being in the same class more than once. I wrote the word communication on the board. Their eyes looked as if they were trying to understand. I continue to ask what the word communication means. Some said that communication means to talk. So I wrote talk under the word communication. Then they took the discussion to another topic. They stated talking about the different ways people talk. The said people talk when they use sign language, text using a cell phone, write a letter, or even when they email someone. So I wrote all of those responses on the board as well. I encouraged students to continue to think about how people talk, but I ask them what do the other person does when someone is talking to them. One student said, “They think.” I told the student that you are absolutely right. And another student shouted, “They got to listen!” I had to calm the students down because they started yelling out responses. After I gain control of the students, I explained that the most important step in getting along and working together is knowing how to communicate. I explained that people who don’t get along do not because they don’t know the correct way to communicate. I also told my students that some people don’t know how to talk or listen. So today we are going to do a listening activity that will help prepare us for our project. First, I gave students a sheet of notebook paper. Then I asked who knows how to listen. Of course every hand went up. I encourage students to wait until after the activity is over to answer that question. I read through tens steps that they had to demonstrate with their paper. I had to laugh to myself because not one got the activity right. I then pulled out an oversize piece of paper so I could demonstrate each step. I explained that when they were “listening” they did not think about what I was saying. The goal of the activity today was to think and listen. All of my students changed their minds about knowing how to listen. So at the end of the lesson I ask them to go home and listen to a T.V. show and just think about what is being said.