Teaching Children to Listen: A practical approach to developing children's listening skills

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Children with poor listening skills will find it difficult to discriminate between sounds – for example, the different sounds human voices, or the noises various animals make. When children are using their bodies to move, they are concentrating better, learning more and developing better listening skills. Two-channelled attention, 4–5 years: children can now move their attention between an activity and a speaker without stopping to look at them. Their attention span may still be short, but children are now ready to pay attention within a group. Children can now attend to a visual and verbal activity at the same time. At bedtime, make up a nonsense story together by taking turns adding one line and seeing where the story goes.

Think about it for a moment. What is your normal, knee-jerk reaction to the 10,000 requests you get from your child every day? “NO,” right? The classic Simon Says game is excellent for making your child pay attention and listen to instructions.Listening to other people speaking enables children to develop vocabulary, comprehension and language skills. You will see the difference over time as your child refines their listening skills. Initially, it may take a while for your child to realize the music has paused and to stop dancing. 4. I Went to the Zoo and I Saw a… Say a string of words to your child that are part of a particular theme or category. Insert one word into the set that does not belong and ask your child to identify the word that doesn’t belong. You can extend the game by getting a child to become the person giving instructions. 15. Simon Says These activities will support the phonics work you get from your child's school and are fun ways to work on reading and spelling without needing a pen and pencil!

Eleanor Johnson looks at the development of children’s ability to listen and pay attention, and suggests strategies for improving both skills… Attention under voluntary control, 3–4 years: children begin to control their own focus of attention and can shift this between an activity and the speaker. However, children still have to look at the person speaking.

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Repeat the game, getting them to move in different ways – for example, hopping, skipping, crawling, jumping sideways, etc. If your students are listening to a speech, watching a documentary clip, or hearing a story read aloud, break it up by stopping a few times and having students write a question or two about what they just heard. This way, students actively listen for any confusion or wonderings they may have -- this takes a high-level of concentration. It's important to provide models for this since we are typically trained in school to look for the answers and information rather than to focus on what is not understood or is still a mystery. Motivating Words This is an enlightening exercise that often clearly shows if listening skills are in place or require some sharpening.