Assignment Prompt & Instructions
– 2 years ago
**files (2)**
– ## Time.pdf
– ## TalkLess.pdf
**## Time.pdf**
Rocks, pebbles, sand:
There’s very little extra time in education, particularly when so many other urgent and
important items rise to the top of the agenda. After reviewing the examples provided,
how would you approach this differently? What similar scenario have you observed in
your setting?
Submit a Word document with your answers.
here is a short visual interpretation of the story.
[http://www.youtube.com/embed/cPgMeKfQFq8](http://www.youtube.com/embed/cPgMeKfQFq8)
**## TalkLess.pdf**
Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
Lessons in the art of listening, from a C.I.A. agent, a focus group moderator and more.
Jan. 9, 2020
By Kate Murphy
When was the last time you listened to someone? Really listened, without thinking
about what you wanted to say next, glancing down at your phone or jumping in to offer
your opinion? And when was the last time someone really listened to you? Was so
attentive to what you were saying and whose response was so spot on that you felt truly
understood?
We are encouraged to listen to our hearts, our inner voices and our guts, but rarely are
we encouraged to listen carefully and purposefully to other people. Instead, we talk over
one another at cocktail parties, work meetings and even family dinners. Online and in
person, it’s all about defining yourself, shaping the narrative and staying on message.
And yet, listening can be more valuable than speaking. Wars have been fought, fortunes
lost and friendships wrecked for lack of listening. It is only by listening that we engage,
understand, empathize, cooperate and develop as human beings. It is fundamental to
any successful relationship — personal, professional and political.
In writing a book about listening, I asked people from Brooklyn to Beijing what it meant
to be a good listener. The typical response was a blank stare. People had no trouble,
however, telling me what it meant to be a bad listener, rattling off actions such as
interrupting, looking at a phone, and responding in a narcissistic or confused way. The
sad truth is that people have more experience being cut off, ignored and misunderstood
than heard to their satisfaction.
Of course, technology plays a role. Social media provides a virtual megaphone, along
with the means to filter out opposing views. People find phone calls intrusive and ignore
voice mail, preferring text or wordless emoji. If people are listening to anything, it’s
likely through headphones or earbuds, where they feel safe inside their own curated
sound bubbles. This is all fueling what public health officials describe as an epidemic of
loneliness in the United States.
But tech is not the only culprit. High schools and colleges have debate teams and
courses in rhetoric and persuasion, but rarely, if ever, offer classes or extracurricular
activities that teach careful listening. You can get a doctorate in speech communication
and join clubs such as Toastmasters to perfect your public speaking, but who strives for
excellence in listening? The image of success and power today is someone miked up and
prowling around a stage or orating from behind a lectern. Giving a TED talk or
delivering a commencement speech is living the dream.
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
The cacophony of modern life also stops us from listening. The acoustics in restaurants
can make it difficult, if not impossible, for diners to clearly hear one another. Offices
with an open design ensure every keyboard click, telephone call and after-lunch belch
make for constant racket. Traffic noise on city streets, music playing in shops and the
bean grinder at your favorite coffeehouse exceed the volume of normal conversation by
as much as 30 decibels, and can even cause hearing loss.
So how can we reclaim the lost art of listening? After a couple of years studying the
neuroscience, psychology and sociology of listening, as well as consulting some of the
best professional listeners out there (including a C.I.A. agent, focus group moderator,
radio producer, priest, bartender and furniture salesmen), I discovered that listening
goes beyond simply hearing what people say. It also involves paying attention to how
they say it and what they do while they are saying it, in what context, and how what they
say resonates within you.
It’s not about merely holding your peace while someone else holds forth. Quite the
opposite. A lot of listening has to do with how you respond — the degree to which you
facilitate the clear expression of another person’s thoughts and, in the process,
crystallize your own.
Good listeners ask good questions. One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned as a
journalist is that anyone can be interesting if you ask the right questions. That is, if you
ask truly curious questions that don’t have the hidden agenda of fixing, saving, advising,
convincing or correcting. Curious questions don’t begin with “Wouldn’t you agree…?” or
“Don’t you think…?” and they definitely don’t end with “right?” The idea is to explore
the other person’s point of view, not sway it.
For example, when trying to find out why people might go to the grocery store late at
night, a focus group moderator told me, she didn’t ask leading questions like, “Do you
shop late a night because you didn’t get around to it during the day?” or “Do you shop at
night because that’s when they restock the shelves?” Instead, she turned her question
into an invitation: “Tell me about the last time you went grocery shopping late at night.”
This, she said, prompted a quiet, unassuming woman who had hardly spoken up to that
point to raise her hand. “I had just smoked a joint and was looking for a ménage à trois
— me, Ben and Jerry,” she said. Grocers, take note.
You also want to avoid asking people personal and appraising questions like “What do
you do for a living?” or “What part of town do you live in?” or “What school did you go
to?” or “Are you married?” This line of questioning is not an honest attempt to get to
know who you’re talking to so much as rank them in the social hierarchy. It’s more like
an interrogation and, as a former C.I.A. agent told me, interrogation will get you
information, but it won’t be credible or reliable.
In social situations, peppering people with judgmental questions is likely to shift the
conversation into a superficial, self-promoting elevator pitch. In other words, the kinds
of conversations that make you want to leave the party early and rush home to your dog.
[http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/](http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/)
Instead, ask about people’s interests. Try to find out what excites or aggravates them —
their daily pleasures or what keeps them up at night. Ask about the last movie they saw
or for the story behind a piece of jewelry they’re wearing. Also good are expansive
questions, such as, “If you could spend a month anywhere in the world, where would
you go?”
Research indicates that when people who don’t know each other well ask each other
these types of questions, they feel more connected than if they spent time together
accomplishing a task. They are the same kinds of questions listed in the widely
circulated article “36 Questions That Lead to Love” and are similar to the conversation
starters suggested by the Family Dinner Project, which encourages device-free and
listening-focused meals.
Because our brains can think a lot faster than people can talk, beware of the tendency to
take mental side trips when you should be listening. Smart people are particularly apt to
get distracted by their own galloping thoughts. They are also more likely to assume they
already know what the other person is going to say.
People with higher I.Q.s also tend to be more neurotic and self-conscious, which means
that worry and anxiety are more likely to hijack their attention. If you fall in this
category, it could be helpful to consider listening a kind of meditation, where you make
yourself aware of and acknowledge distractions, then return to focusing. Rather than
concentrating on your breathing or a mantra, return your attention to the speaker.
The reward of good listening will almost certainly be more interesting conversations.
Researchers have found that when talking to inattentive listeners, the speakers
volunteered less information and conveyed information less articulately. Conversely,
they found that attentive listeners received more information, relevant details and
elaboration from speakers, even when the listeners didn’t ask any questions.
How you listen can work like a self-fulfilling prophecy: If you’re barely listening to
someone because you think that person is boring or not worth your time, you could
actually make it so. Moreover, listening to other people makes it more likely other
people will listen to you. This is partly because it’s human nature to return courtesies,
but also because good listening improves your chances of delivering a message that
resonates.
Listening is a skill. And as with any skill, it degrades if you don’t do it enough. Some
people may have stronger natural ability while others may have to work harder, but each
of us can become a better listener with practice. The more people you listen to, the more
aspects of humanity you will recognize, and the better your instincts will be. Listening
well can help you understand other people’s attitudes and motivations, which is
essential in building cooperative and productive relationships, as well as discerning
which relationships you’d be better off avoiding.
[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html)
[https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/](https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/)
[https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people](https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people)
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558)
[https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363](https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363)
We are, each of us, the sum of what we attend to in life. The soothing voice of a mother,
the whisper of a lover, the guidance of a mentor, the admonishment of a supervisor, the
rallying call of a leader and the taunts of a rival ultimately form and shape us. And to
listen poorly, selectively or not at all limits your understanding of the world and
prevents you from becoming the best you can be.
Kate Murphy is a journalist and the author of “You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing
and Why It Matters,” from which this essay is adapted.
The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear
what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our
email: letters@nytimes.com.
Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter
(@NYTopinion) and Instagram.
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html)
[https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor](https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor)
[mailto:letters@nytimes.com](mailto:letters@nytimes.com)
[https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion](https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion)
[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
[https://www.instagram.com/nytopinion/](https://www.instagram.com/nytopinion/)
– Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
**## TalkLess.pdf**
Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
Lessons in the art of listening, from a C.I.A. agent, a focus group moderator and more.
Jan. 9, 2020
By Kate Murphy
When was the last time you listened to someone? Really listened, without thinking
about what you wanted to say next, glancing down at your phone or jumping in to offer
your opinion? And when was the last time someone really listened to you? Was so
attentive to what you were saying and whose response was so spot on that you felt truly
understood?
We are encouraged to listen to our hearts, our inner voices and our guts, but rarely are
we encouraged to listen carefully and purposefully to other people. Instead, we talk over
one another at cocktail parties, work meetings and even family dinners. Online and in
person, it’s all about defining yourself, shaping the narrative and staying on message.
And yet, listening can be more valuable than speaking. Wars have been fought, fortunes
lost and friendships wrecked for lack of listening. It is only by listening that we engage,
understand, empathize, cooperate and develop as human beings. It is fundamental to
any successful relationship — personal, professional and political.
In writing a book about listening, I asked people from Brooklyn to Beijing what it meant
to be a good listener. The typical response was a blank stare. People had no trouble,
however, telling me what it meant to be a bad listener, rattling off actions such as
interrupting, looking at a phone, and responding in a narcissistic or confused way. The
sad truth is that people have more experience being cut off, ignored and misunderstood
than heard to their satisfaction.
Of course, technology plays a role. Social media provides a virtual megaphone, along
with the means to filter out opposing views. People find phone calls intrusive and ignore
voice mail, preferring text or wordless emoji. If people are listening to anything, it’s
likely through headphones or earbuds, where they feel safe inside their own curated
sound bubbles. This is all fueling what public health officials describe as an epidemic of
loneliness in the United States.
But tech is not the only culprit. High schools and colleges have debate teams and
courses in rhetoric and persuasion, but rarely, if ever, offer classes or extracurricular
activities that teach careful listening. You can get a doctorate in speech communication
and join clubs such as Toastmasters to perfect your public speaking, but who strives for
excellence in listening? The image of success and power today is someone miked up and
prowling around a stage or orating from behind a lectern. Giving a TED talk or
delivering a commencement speech is living the dream.
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
The cacophony of modern life also stops us from listening. The acoustics in restaurants
can make it difficult, if not impossible, for diners to clearly hear one another. Offices
with an open design ensure every keyboard click, telephone call and after-lunch belch
make for constant racket. Traffic noise on city streets, music playing in shops and the
bean grinder at your favorite coffeehouse exceed the volume of normal conversation by
as much as 30 decibels, and can even cause hearing loss.
So how can we reclaim the lost art of listening? After a couple of years studying the
neuroscience, psychology and sociology of listening, as well as consulting some of the
best professional listeners out there (including a C.I.A. agent, focus group moderator,
radio producer, priest, bartender and furniture salesmen), I discovered that listening
goes beyond simply hearing what people say. It also involves paying attention to how
they say it and what they do while they are saying it, in what context, and how what they
say resonates within you.
It’s not about merely holding your peace while someone else holds forth. Quite the
opposite. A lot of listening has to do with how you respond — the degree to which you
facilitate the clear expression of another person’s thoughts and, in the process,
crystallize your own.
Good listeners ask good questions. One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned as a
journalist is that anyone can be interesting if you ask the right questions. That is, if you
ask truly curious questions that don’t have the hidden agenda of fixing, saving, advising,
convincing or correcting. Curious questions don’t begin with “Wouldn’t you agree…?” or
“Don’t you think…?” and they definitely don’t end with “right?” The idea is to explore
the other person’s point of view, not sway it.
For example, when trying to find out why people might go to the grocery store late at
night, a focus group moderator told me, she didn’t ask leading questions like, “Do you
shop late a night because you didn’t get around to it during the day?” or “Do you shop at
night because that’s when they restock the shelves?” Instead, she turned her question
into an invitation: “Tell me about the last time you went grocery shopping late at night.”
This, she said, prompted a quiet, unassuming woman who had hardly spoken up to that
point to raise her hand. “I had just smoked a joint and was looking for a ménage à trois
— me, Ben and Jerry,” she said. Grocers, take note.
You also want to avoid asking people personal and appraising questions like “What do
you do for a living?” or “What part of town do you live in?” or “What school did you go
to?” or “Are you married?” This line of questioning is not an honest attempt to get to
know who you’re talking to so much as rank them in the social hierarchy. It’s more like
an interrogation and, as a former C.I.A. agent told me, interrogation will get you
information, but it won’t be credible or reliable.
In social situations, peppering people with judgmental questions is likely to shift the
conversation into a superficial, self-promoting elevator pitch. In other words, the kinds
of conversations that make you want to leave the party early and rush home to your dog.
[http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/](http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/)
Instead, ask about people’s interests. Try to find out what excites or aggravates them —
their daily pleasures or what keeps them up at night. Ask about the last movie they saw
or for the story behind a piece of jewelry they’re wearing. Also good are expansive
questions, such as, “If you could spend a month anywhere in the world, where would
you go?”
Research indicates that when people who don’t know each other well ask each other
these types of questions, they feel more connected than if they spent time together
accomplishing a task. They are the same kinds of questions listed in the widely
circulated article “36 Questions That Lead to Love” and are similar to the conversation
starters suggested by the Family Dinner Project, which encourages device-free and
listening-focused meals.
Because our brains can think a lot faster than people can talk, beware of the tendency to
take mental side trips when you should be listening. Smart people are particularly apt to
get distracted by their own galloping thoughts. They are also more likely to assume they
already know what the other person is going to say.
People with higher I.Q.s also tend to be more neurotic and self-conscious, which means
that worry and anxiety are more likely to hijack their attention. If you fall in this
category, it could be helpful to consider listening a kind of meditation, where you make
yourself aware of and acknowledge distractions, then return to focusing. Rather than
concentrating on your breathing or a mantra, return your attention to the speaker.
The reward of good listening will almost certainly be more interesting conversations.
Researchers have found that when talking to inattentive listeners, the speakers
volunteered less information and conveyed information less articulately. Conversely,
they found that attentive listeners received more information, relevant details and
elaboration from speakers, even when the listeners didn’t ask any questions.
How you listen can work like a self-fulfilling prophecy: If you’re barely listening to
someone because you think that person is boring or not worth your time, you could
actually make it so. Moreover, listening to other people makes it more likely other
people will listen to you. This is partly because it’s human nature to return courtesies,
but also because good listening improves your chances of delivering a message that
resonates.
Listening is a skill. And as with any skill, it degrades if you don’t do it enough. Some
people may have stronger natural ability while others may have to work harder, but each
of us can become a better listener with practice. The more people you listen to, the more
aspects of humanity you will recognize, and the better your instincts will be. Listening
well can help you understand other people’s attitudes and motivations, which is
essential in building cooperative and productive relationships, as well as discerning
which relationships you’d be better off avoiding.
[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html)
[https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/](https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/)
[https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people](https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people)
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558)
[https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363](https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363)
We are, each of us, the sum of what we attend to in life. The soothing voice of a mother,
the whisper of a lover, the guidance of a mentor, the admonishment of a supervisor, the
rallying call of a leader and the taunts of a rival ultimately form and shape us. And to
listen poorly, selectively or not at all limits your understanding of the world and
prevents you from becoming the best you can be.
Kate Murphy is a journalist and the author of “You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing
and Why It Matters,” from which this essay is adapted.
The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear
what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our
email: letters@nytimes.com.
Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter
(@NYTopinion) and Instagram.
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html)
[https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor](https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor)
[mailto:letters@nytimes.com](mailto:letters@nytimes.com)
[https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion](https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion)
[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
[https://www.instagram.com/nytopinion/](https://www.instagram.com/nytopinion/)
– Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
**## Time.pdf**
Rocks, pebbles, sand:
There’s very little extra time in education, particularly when so many other urgent and
important items rise to the top of the agenda. After reviewing the examples provided,
how would you approach this differently? What similar scenario have you observed in
your setting?
Submit a Word document with your answers.
here is a short visual interpretation of the story.
[http://www.youtube.com/embed/cPgMeKfQFq8](http://www.youtube.com/embed/cPgMeKfQFq8)
**## TalkLess.pdf**
Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
Lessons in the art of listening, from a C.I.A. agent, a focus group moderator and more.
Jan. 9, 2020
By Kate Murphy
When was the last time you listened to someone? Really listened, without thinking
about what you wanted to say next, glancing down at your phone or jumping in to offer
your opinion? And when was the last time someone really listened to you? Was so
attentive to what you were saying and whose response was so spot on that you felt truly
understood?
We are encouraged to listen to our hearts, our inner voices and our guts, but rarely are
we encouraged to listen carefully and purposefully to other people. Instead, we talk over
one another at cocktail parties, work meetings and even family dinners. Online and in
person, it’s all about defining yourself, shaping the narrative and staying on message.
And yet, listening can be more valuable than speaking. Wars have been fought, fortunes
lost and friendships wrecked for lack of listening. It is only by listening that we engage,
understand, empathize, cooperate and develop as human beings. It is fundamental to
any successful relationship — personal, professional and political.
In writing a book about listening, I asked people from Brooklyn to Beijing what it meant
to be a good listener. The typical response was a blank stare. People had no trouble,
however, telling me what it meant to be a bad listener, rattling off actions such as
interrupting, looking at a phone, and responding in a narcissistic or confused way. The
sad truth is that people have more experience being cut off, ignored and misunderstood
than heard to their satisfaction.
Of course, technology plays a role. Social media provides a virtual megaphone, along
with the means to filter out opposing views. People find phone calls intrusive and ignore
voice mail, preferring text or wordless emoji. If people are listening to anything, it’s
likely through headphones or earbuds, where they feel safe inside their own curated
sound bubbles. This is all fueling what public health officials describe as an epidemic of
loneliness in the United States.
But tech is not the only culprit. High schools and colleges have debate teams and
courses in rhetoric and persuasion, but rarely, if ever, offer classes or extracurricular
activities that teach careful listening. You can get a doctorate in speech communication
and join clubs such as Toastmasters to perfect your public speaking, but who strives for
excellence in listening? The image of success and power today is someone miked up and
prowling around a stage or orating from behind a lectern. Giving a TED talk or
delivering a commencement speech is living the dream.
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
The cacophony of modern life also stops us from listening. The acoustics in restaurants
can make it difficult, if not impossible, for diners to clearly hear one another. Offices
with an open design ensure every keyboard click, telephone call and after-lunch belch
make for constant racket. Traffic noise on city streets, music playing in shops and the
bean grinder at your favorite coffeehouse exceed the volume of normal conversation by
as much as 30 decibels, and can even cause hearing loss.
So how can we reclaim the lost art of listening? After a couple of years studying the
neuroscience, psychology and sociology of listening, as well as consulting some of the
best professional listeners out there (including a C.I.A. agent, focus group moderator,
radio producer, priest, bartender and furniture salesmen), I discovered that listening
goes beyond simply hearing what people say. It also involves paying attention to how
they say it and what they do while they are saying it, in what context, and how what they
say resonates within you.
It’s not about merely holding your peace while someone else holds forth. Quite the
opposite. A lot of listening has to do with how you respond — the degree to which you
facilitate the clear expression of another person’s thoughts and, in the process,
crystallize your own.
Good listeners ask good questions. One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned as a
journalist is that anyone can be interesting if you ask the right questions. That is, if you
ask truly curious questions that don’t have the hidden agenda of fixing, saving, advising,
convincing or correcting. Curious questions don’t begin with “Wouldn’t you agree…?” or
“Don’t you think…?” and they definitely don’t end with “right?” The idea is to explore
the other person’s point of view, not sway it.
For example, when trying to find out why people might go to the grocery store late at
night, a focus group moderator told me, she didn’t ask leading questions like, “Do you
shop late a night because you didn’t get around to it during the day?” or “Do you shop at
night because that’s when they restock the shelves?” Instead, she turned her question
into an invitation: “Tell me about the last time you went grocery shopping late at night.”
This, she said, prompted a quiet, unassuming woman who had hardly spoken up to that
point to raise her hand. “I had just smoked a joint and was looking for a ménage à trois
— me, Ben and Jerry,” she said. Grocers, take note.
You also want to avoid asking people personal and appraising questions like “What do
you do for a living?” or “What part of town do you live in?” or “What school did you go
to?” or “Are you married?” This line of questioning is not an honest attempt to get to
know who you’re talking to so much as rank them in the social hierarchy. It’s more like
an interrogation and, as a former C.I.A. agent told me, interrogation will get you
information, but it won’t be credible or reliable.
In social situations, peppering people with judgmental questions is likely to shift the
conversation into a superficial, self-promoting elevator pitch. In other words, the kinds
of conversations that make you want to leave the party early and rush home to your dog.
[http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/](http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/)
Instead, ask about people’s interests. Try to find out what excites or aggravates them —
their daily pleasures or what keeps them up at night. Ask about the last movie they saw
or for the story behind a piece of jewelry they’re wearing. Also good are expansive
questions, such as, “If you could spend a month anywhere in the world, where would
you go?”
Research indicates that when people who don’t know each other well ask each other
these types of questions, they feel more connected than if they spent time together
accomplishing a task. They are the same kinds of questions listed in the widely
circulated article “36 Questions That Lead to Love” and are similar to the conversation
starters suggested by the Family Dinner Project, which encourages device-free and
listening-focused meals.
Because our brains can think a lot faster than people can talk, beware of the tendency to
take mental side trips when you should be listening. Smart people are particularly apt to
get distracted by their own galloping thoughts. They are also more likely to assume they
already know what the other person is going to say.
People with higher I.Q.s also tend to be more neurotic and self-conscious, which means
that worry and anxiety are more likely to hijack their attention. If you fall in this
category, it could be helpful to consider listening a kind of meditation, where you make
yourself aware of and acknowledge distractions, then return to focusing. Rather than
concentrating on your breathing or a mantra, return your attention to the speaker.
The reward of good listening will almost certainly be more interesting conversations.
Researchers have found that when talking to inattentive listeners, the speakers
volunteered less information and conveyed information less articulately. Conversely,
they found that attentive listeners received more information, relevant details and
elaboration from speakers, even when the listeners didn’t ask any questions.
How you listen can work like a self-fulfilling prophecy: If you’re barely listening to
someone because you think that person is boring or not worth your time, you could
actually make it so. Moreover, listening to other people makes it more likely other
people will listen to you. This is partly because it’s human nature to return courtesies,
but also because good listening improves your chances of delivering a message that
resonates.
Listening is a skill. And as with any skill, it degrades if you don’t do it enough. Some
people may have stronger natural ability while others may have to work harder, but each
of us can become a better listener with practice. The more people you listen to, the more
aspects of humanity you will recognize, and the better your instincts will be. Listening
well can help you understand other people’s attitudes and motivations, which is
essential in building cooperative and productive relationships, as well as discerning
which relationships you’d be better off avoiding.
[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html)
[https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/](https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/)
[https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people](https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people)
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558)
[https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363](https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363)
We are, each of us, the sum of what we attend to in life. The soothing voice of a mother,
the whisper of a lover, the guidance of a mentor, the admonishment of a supervisor, the
rallying call of a leader and the taunts of a rival ultimately form and shape us. And to
listen poorly, selectively or not at all limits your understanding of the world and
prevents you from becoming the best you can be.
Kate Murphy is a journalist and the author of “You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing
and Why It Matters,” from which this essay is adapted.
The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear
what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our
email: letters@nytimes.com.
Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter
(@NYTopinion) and Instagram.
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html)
[https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor](https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor)
[mailto:letters@nytimes.com](mailto:letters@nytimes.com)
[https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion](https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion)
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[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
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– Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
**## Time.pdf**
Rocks, pebbles, sand:
There’s very little extra time in education, particularly when so many other urgent and
important items rise to the top of the agenda. After reviewing the examples provided,
how would you approach this differently? What similar scenario have you observed in
your setting?
Submit a Word document with your answers.
here is a short visual interpretation of the story.
[http://www.youtube.com/embed/cPgMeKfQFq8](http://www.youtube.com/embed/cPgMeKfQFq8)
**## TalkLess.pdf**
Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.
Lessons in the art of listening, from a C.I.A. agent, a focus group moderator and more.
Jan. 9, 2020
By Kate Murphy
When was the last time you listened to someone? Really listened, without thinking
about what you wanted to say next, glancing down at your phone or jumping in to offer
your opinion? And when was the last time someone really listened to you? Was so
attentive to what you were saying and whose response was so spot on that you felt truly
understood?
We are encouraged to listen to our hearts, our inner voices and our guts, but rarely are
we encouraged to listen carefully and purposefully to other people. Instead, we talk over
one another at cocktail parties, work meetings and even family dinners. Online and in
person, it’s all about defining yourself, shaping the narrative and staying on message.
And yet, listening can be more valuable than speaking. Wars have been fought, fortunes
lost and friendships wrecked for lack of listening. It is only by listening that we engage,
understand, empathize, cooperate and develop as human beings. It is fundamental to
any successful relationship — personal, professional and political.
In writing a book about listening, I asked people from Brooklyn to Beijing what it meant
to be a good listener. The typical response was a blank stare. People had no trouble,
however, telling me what it meant to be a bad listener, rattling off actions such as
interrupting, looking at a phone, and responding in a narcissistic or confused way. The
sad truth is that people have more experience being cut off, ignored and misunderstood
than heard to their satisfaction.
Of course, technology plays a role. Social media provides a virtual megaphone, along
with the means to filter out opposing views. People find phone calls intrusive and ignore
voice mail, preferring text or wordless emoji. If people are listening to anything, it’s
likely through headphones or earbuds, where they feel safe inside their own curated
sound bubbles. This is all fueling what public health officials describe as an epidemic of
loneliness in the United States.
But tech is not the only culprit. High schools and colleges have debate teams and
courses in rhetoric and persuasion, but rarely, if ever, offer classes or extracurricular
activities that teach careful listening. You can get a doctorate in speech communication
and join clubs such as Toastmasters to perfect your public speaking, but who strives for
excellence in listening? The image of success and power today is someone miked up and
prowling around a stage or orating from behind a lectern. Giving a TED talk or
delivering a commencement speech is living the dream.
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
[https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america](https://www.cigna.com/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/loneliness-epidemic-america)
The cacophony of modern life also stops us from listening. The acoustics in restaurants
can make it difficult, if not impossible, for diners to clearly hear one another. Offices
with an open design ensure every keyboard click, telephone call and after-lunch belch
make for constant racket. Traffic noise on city streets, music playing in shops and the
bean grinder at your favorite coffeehouse exceed the volume of normal conversation by
as much as 30 decibels, and can even cause hearing loss.
So how can we reclaim the lost art of listening? After a couple of years studying the
neuroscience, psychology and sociology of listening, as well as consulting some of the
best professional listeners out there (including a C.I.A. agent, focus group moderator,
radio producer, priest, bartender and furniture salesmen), I discovered that listening
goes beyond simply hearing what people say. It also involves paying attention to how
they say it and what they do while they are saying it, in what context, and how what they
say resonates within you.
It’s not about merely holding your peace while someone else holds forth. Quite the
opposite. A lot of listening has to do with how you respond — the degree to which you
facilitate the clear expression of another person’s thoughts and, in the process,
crystallize your own.
Good listeners ask good questions. One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned as a
journalist is that anyone can be interesting if you ask the right questions. That is, if you
ask truly curious questions that don’t have the hidden agenda of fixing, saving, advising,
convincing or correcting. Curious questions don’t begin with “Wouldn’t you agree…?” or
“Don’t you think…?” and they definitely don’t end with “right?” The idea is to explore
the other person’s point of view, not sway it.
For example, when trying to find out why people might go to the grocery store late at
night, a focus group moderator told me, she didn’t ask leading questions like, “Do you
shop late a night because you didn’t get around to it during the day?” or “Do you shop at
night because that’s when they restock the shelves?” Instead, she turned her question
into an invitation: “Tell me about the last time you went grocery shopping late at night.”
This, she said, prompted a quiet, unassuming woman who had hardly spoken up to that
point to raise her hand. “I had just smoked a joint and was looking for a ménage à trois
— me, Ben and Jerry,” she said. Grocers, take note.
You also want to avoid asking people personal and appraising questions like “What do
you do for a living?” or “What part of town do you live in?” or “What school did you go
to?” or “Are you married?” This line of questioning is not an honest attempt to get to
know who you’re talking to so much as rank them in the social hierarchy. It’s more like
an interrogation and, as a former C.I.A. agent told me, interrogation will get you
information, but it won’t be credible or reliable.
In social situations, peppering people with judgmental questions is likely to shift the
conversation into a superficial, self-promoting elevator pitch. In other words, the kinds
of conversations that make you want to leave the party early and rush home to your dog.
[http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/](http://dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/)
Instead, ask about people’s interests. Try to find out what excites or aggravates them —
their daily pleasures or what keeps them up at night. Ask about the last movie they saw
or for the story behind a piece of jewelry they’re wearing. Also good are expansive
questions, such as, “If you could spend a month anywhere in the world, where would
you go?”
Research indicates that when people who don’t know each other well ask each other
these types of questions, they feel more connected than if they spent time together
accomplishing a task. They are the same kinds of questions listed in the widely
circulated article “36 Questions That Lead to Love” and are similar to the conversation
starters suggested by the Family Dinner Project, which encourages device-free and
listening-focused meals.
Because our brains can think a lot faster than people can talk, beware of the tendency to
take mental side trips when you should be listening. Smart people are particularly apt to
get distracted by their own galloping thoughts. They are also more likely to assume they
already know what the other person is going to say.
People with higher I.Q.s also tend to be more neurotic and self-conscious, which means
that worry and anxiety are more likely to hijack their attention. If you fall in this
category, it could be helpful to consider listening a kind of meditation, where you make
yourself aware of and acknowledge distractions, then return to focusing. Rather than
concentrating on your breathing or a mantra, return your attention to the speaker.
The reward of good listening will almost certainly be more interesting conversations.
Researchers have found that when talking to inattentive listeners, the speakers
volunteered less information and conveyed information less articulately. Conversely,
they found that attentive listeners received more information, relevant details and
elaboration from speakers, even when the listeners didn’t ask any questions.
How you listen can work like a self-fulfilling prophecy: If you’re barely listening to
someone because you think that person is boring or not worth your time, you could
actually make it so. Moreover, listening to other people makes it more likely other
people will listen to you. This is partly because it’s human nature to return courtesies,
but also because good listening improves your chances of delivering a message that
resonates.
Listening is a skill. And as with any skill, it degrades if you don’t do it enough. Some
people may have stronger natural ability while others may have to work harder, but each
of us can become a better listener with practice. The more people you listen to, the more
aspects of humanity you will recognize, and the better your instincts will be. Listening
well can help you understand other people’s attitudes and motivations, which is
essential in building cooperative and productive relationships, as well as discerning
which relationships you’d be better off avoiding.
[https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/style/36-questions-that-lead-to-love.html)
[https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/](https://thefamilydinnerproject.org/)
[https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people](https://hbr.org/1957/09/listening-to-people)
[https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886914005558)
[https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363](https://doi.org/10.1080/10904018.2015.1029363)
We are, each of us, the sum of what we attend to in life. The soothing voice of a mother,
the whisper of a lover, the guidance of a mentor, the admonishment of a supervisor, the
rallying call of a leader and the taunts of a rival ultimately form and shape us. And to
listen poorly, selectively or not at all limits your understanding of the world and
prevents you from becoming the best you can be.
Kate Murphy is a journalist and the author of “You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing
and Why It Matters,” from which this essay is adapted.
The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear
what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our
email: letters@nytimes.com.
Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter
(@NYTopinion) and Instagram.
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192](https://www.amazon.com/Youre-Not-Listening-Missing-Matters/dp/1250297192)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/opinion/letters/letters-to-editor-new-york-times-women.html)
[https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor](https://help.nytimes.com/hc/en-us/articles/115014925288-How-to-submit-a-letter-to-the-editor)
[mailto:letters@nytimes.com](mailto:letters@nytimes.com)
[https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion](https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion)
[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
[http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion](http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion)
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– Talk Less. Listen More. Here’s How.