Keynote presentation East Asian Regional Council of Schools November 2013, Bangkok, Thailand

1. Listening As A Radical Act of
Teaching and Learning
EARCOS Leadership Conference, Bangkok, Thailand
November 3, 2013
Kirsten Olson
Old Sow Coaching and Consulting, USA
@olsonkirsten
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2. No “Who’s Who of Listening...”
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3. REVOLUTION
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4. “TO BE LISTENED TO
IS STRIKING,
PARTICULARLY BECAUSE IT
IS SO RARE.”
-PARKER PALMER
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5. “Being listened to is so close to being loved
most of us cannot tell the difference.”
-David Oxberg
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6. 6
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7. Experiences of school
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8. 8

9. 9
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10. LISTENING TO STUDENTS
(WITHOUT JUDGMENT)
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11. 11

12. 12
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13. 13
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14. 14
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15. “
I
told
my
teacher
I
wanted
to
go
to
college.
He
said
I’d
be
pregnant
and
drop
out
in
two
years.”
15

16. “I’m
one
taco
short
of
a
combina6on
pla9er.”
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17. “My math
teacher told
me, ‘You’ll be
flipping
burgers for the
rest of your
life. Don’t
even try to
learn math.”
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18. 18
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19. WE WILL HAVE TO
‘LISTEN INTO’ OUR
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20. END OF SCHOOLING
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21. Dawn of Learning
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22. “Frankly, I had never thought of listening as an important subject by
itself. But now that I am aware of it, I think that perhaps 80% of my work
depends on my listening to someone, or on someone else listening to me.”
“I’ve been thinking back about things that have gone wrong over the past
couple of years, and I suddenly realized that many of the troubles have
resulted from someone not hearing something,
or getting it in a distorted way.”
“It’s interesting to me that we have considered so many facets of
communication in the school organization, but have inadvertently
overlooked listening. I’ve about decided that it’s the most important link in
the organization’s communications,
and it’s obviously also the weakest one.”
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23. Listening As An Essential Act
of Leadership
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24. Listening Accelerates
Development:
Our Own and Others’
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25. Listening Creates
Pathways to
Complex Systemic
Thinking
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26. LISTENING WARRIOR
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27. 27
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28. 28
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29. 29
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30. 30
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31. 31
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32. “Listened into being.”
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33. 33
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34. http://video.501videos.com/previews/sfRzTrwt-fs3Zxk6Q
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35. Our future is here.
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36. 36

37. Learning Has Left The Building
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38. 38

39. HOW NOT TO LISTEN
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40. YOUR WORST LISTENING
HABIT?
Interrupting
Not looking at the speaker
Rushing
Not showing interest
Getting ahead
Not responding to requests
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41. WHY LISTENING IS SO HARD
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42. 42
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43. 43
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44. Our brains are preoccupied by our own thoughts.
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45. Innovative thinking requires space...
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46. BUDDHA BELL
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47. LISTENING AS A PRIORITY
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48. DEEP LISTENING ASKS...
•
PREPARE THE BODY
•
DAILY PRACTICE WITH GOALS
•
ATTENTION TRAINING
•
COMPASSIONATE, NONJUDGEMENT
•
EMBRACE CURIOSITY
•
MAKE SURE YOU GOT IT RIGHT?
(PARAPHRASE)
•
COLLABORATIVE ACTION
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49. 3 LEVELS OF LISTENING
“To listen with intuition is next to godliness...”
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50. POWERFUL LISTENING
IS A PRACTICE
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51. “WHEN EMPLOYEES STOP TALKING
AND START FIGHTING:
THE DETRIMENTAL EFFECTS OF
‘PSEUDO-VOICE’ IN ORGANIZATIONS”
-
de Vries, Jehn, Terwel (2011), Journal of Business Ethics
“This study finds that there’s a consequence to
giving employees a voice:
A company then has to listen. “
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52. 52
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53. WHAT LISTENING INTENTION
DO YOU GO HOME WITH?
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54. “BEING LISTENED TO IS SO CLOSE TO BEING LOVED
MOST OF US CANNOT TELL THE DIFFERENCE.”
-DAVID OXBERG
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