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Listening

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Reema Gupta
HMXP 102­022
Ms. Ferguson
28 September 2015
Listening is Important
According to dictionary.com the meaning of listening is giving attention with the ear or attending closely for the purpose of hearing. In social gatherings, we hear what other people have to say, but we do not listen to what they have to say because we cannot distinguish between the concepts of hearing and listening. s a society, we seem to have lost the important skill of
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listening. ith practice, we can begin to become better listeners.
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Good listening is demonstrated by the ability to receive, appreciate, summarize, and ask questions in a conversation. The first manifestation of listening is receiving, which refers to paying attention to the speaker. The main way in which this attention is shown is focus—giving the other person your full attention and not zoning out while they are talking. Another important factor of listening is appreciation. This is displayed when the listener makes little noises like
“oh” and “okay” to let the speaker know that they are understood. Summarizing what has been said is another way to show that one has been listening and can briefly repeat what they have been told. This lets the speaker know not only that are they being heard, but also that their opinion makes sense. A good listener should be able to summarize the conversation. The final important part of listening is asking questions afterwards to clarify what has been said. If the listener can ask questions, the speaker knows that they have truly been heard, and that the listener is genuinely interested in what they have been told. By asking questions, one displays

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thoughtful insight into the subject being discussed, and this quality is greatly appreciated by the speaker We(
Grohol)
. When asking questions of the speaker, the listener should keep his/her tone nonjudgmental, as this lets the speaker know that their thoughts are not being subjected to immediate disregard for simply not fitting with the listener’s opinions. By following these four tips, one can quickly become a great listener.
In order to become a good listener, the first thing to put into practice is being silent. A good exercise to develop this ability is taking a few minutes out of one’s daily life to sit in silence and reset the brain and ears. Silence when listening to someone is important because it allows for one to receive the message and use only facial expressions to acknowledge what is being said, as opposed to interrupting the speaker to insert one’s own opinions. It also conveys to the speaker that the listener is completely focused and is thinking about what is being said rather than just waiting for a turn to talk. Another thing to practice is sitting in a noisy environment and picking out different noises, trying to pinpoint and identify each one. This exercise can improve the quality of a person’s listening. By practicing this, one will more easily be able to tune out any other sounds and conversations going on in the vicinity when having a one­on­one conversation.
The third thing to put into practice is appreciating the dull sound because if you learn to pay attention to dull sound, you can listen to anything or anyone(Treasure). For example, if you pay close attention to a jackhammer while it is running, you can hear the hidden choir of the jack hammer. During a conversation, if on is only thinking of oneself and things that pertain to him/her, one will miss most of the other person’s conversation. True listening requires complete focus, and the other person can usually tell if the person they are talking to is not paying attention. After

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doing the assignment where I had to sit with my partner for 15 minutes and listen, I learned that it was hard for me to listen. Every time the speaker said something that I could relate to, I had to stop myself from interjecting. Rather than attempting to relate to everything the speaker says, the listener would be better served by trying to understand what is being said from the point of view of the speaker. After doing the assignment, I realized that I do listen well to my friends, but that I do not listen well when I am talking to my peers. As all people are different and view almost everything in a different light, taking the time to listen to other people without forcing all of their thoughts through the mesh of one’s own opinions can be very beneficial in feeling a deeper connection with the other person. This connection is necessary to fully understand the other person’s standpoint because once one finds out how another person sees the world, one can more easily appreciate the opinions being expressed.
Listening is especially crucial in class. If one does not pay attention in class, he or she will not understand the content presented. Teachers often give answers to future test questions and tips for exam topics during their lectures, and students who do not listen will miss these hints and are likely to miss obvious questions. For example, if a teacher focuses strongly on a topic during a lecture, it will, most likely, be on a future test. If students give only minimal attention to the lecture, they will miss this emphasis and might end up studying everything but the most important topics. I personally do not listen to every minute of the lecture given in class because I am too busy checking my phone or looking at the clock. By doing this, I am missing lot of information during class, and I plan on doing my best to change my habits, though it will take some time and hard practice.

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In today’s society, too many people think only of themselves and fail to see that other viewpoints might also be valid ­ they will hear nothing if they do not agree with it. They have lost the ability to tolerate opposition, no matter how proven or researched it might be; if the information contrasts with what an individual believes, it is immediately thrown aside and berated. They are so caught up in their own opinions and attempts to validate themselves that they refuse to even tolerate an opposing view. By practicing the art of listening, people will be able to see a broader spectrum of opinions and will actually learn how to defend their opinions instead of just forcing them on others because they want to be right. If a person listens to the opposing view, either a flaw will present itself or the person’s own perspective will be forced to change. Arguing for a particular viewpoint without listening to the other side results in an argument that sounds uneducated and ends up going in circles. By putting true listening into practice, one can both sound more knowledgeable when expressing an opinion and show why his/her own perspective is better than that of the opposition by providing proper evidence to challenge the main points of the other side.

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Works Cited
Dictionary.com
. Dictionary.com. Web. 27 Sept. 2015.
Grohol, John M. "Become a Better Listener: Active Listening."
Psych Central
(2007).Web. 27
Sept. 2015
Treasure, Julian. "Julian Treasure: 5 Ways to Listen Better."
YouTube
. YouTube, 29 July 2011.
Web. 27 Sept. 2015.

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