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An article in Nursery World highlighted a child's right to provision, protection and participation, with the last element of participation placing a duty on adults to listen to children and act upon their views.
These rights come from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The article highlighted how the principle of children expressing their views has been increasingly embraced within the early years. Listening is at the heart of early years good practice.
The article also mentioned that listening is crucial to ensure children's right to protection from discrimination is respected. Inclusion should be considering barriers for participation for all and not just disabled children.
(Nursery World, 3 July 2008)
An article in Nursery World focused on the importance of consulting with young children, following the launch of the Children's Plan and the duty for local authorities and service providers to do this.
Key benefits were outlined such as citizenship, helping children to realise they are valued, inclusion, learning and service improvement. To plan a consultation the article outlined that listening must be integral to the consultation process. It described listening as a six-spoke wheel which includes listening, observing, documenting, reflecting, taking action and feeding back.
Understanding stages of child development was also highlighted as crucial, as younger children have shorter attention spans and their thinking is more egocentric. The pros and cons of giving children photographs were also explored, with the example of a child taking pictures of sparkly greeting cards. This wasn't because she liked the cards or because they meant something to her, but because she liked sparkly things. The article emphasises the need to cross check with children what the pictures mean to them, to ensure clarification and avoid drawing the wrong conclusions.
(Nursery World, 17.04.08)
There can be little doubt that, in terms of literacy, and
perhaps all school-based education, the most fundamental skill
of all is listening. Unless children can listen, discriminatively
and with growing attention, they will be slow to understand
and slow to talk. As they grow older, they'll have difficulty
relating and attending to their teachers, which easily leads
to behavioural problems and disaffection, blighting the ability
to learn throughout their school career.
For many years it's been clear to early years practitioners
that, in an increasingly noise-filled world, children's listening
skills are being steadily eroded. Television, video and computer
games now fill homes with daylong noise. Shared family mealtimes,
once a daily opportunity for conversational speaking and listening,
have given way to television-dominated grazing. Nowadays,
even the pushchairs face outwards, so parents don't even chat
to their children as they wheel them down the road; but with
the level of traffic noise these days, would the children
hear anyway? Gradually, and scarcely without noticing it has
happened, our society has stopped teaching its children how
to listen.
It is, therefore, extremely important that, as soon as possible,
we make learning to listen (and its counterpart, learning
to speak) a major focus of attention.
Discrimination of sounds
Many children need help in the most basic listening skill
of all - discriminating a foreground sound against background
noise. It's hugely important, therefore, that as soon as children
arrive in a pre-school setting, we provide activities (e.g.
'Dodgems', where moving children are given a sound to listen
out for such as clapping, which is the signal for 'start'
and 'stop') to help them develop this essential skill. Once
able to signal out significant sound, children must learn
to discriminate and attend to a widening range of auditory
information, through plenty of musical activities, 'listening
walks' and games (e.g. Spot the sound). The ability to listen
discriminately is vital if children are to acheive the fine
discrimination between speech sounds for clear articulation
and phonological awareness.
Social listening
Listening to one-to-one conversations involves making frequent
eye contact with the speaker. However, many children these
days find it difficult to make eye contact, perhaps because
in homes where television is constantly switch on, people
look at the screen rather than each other. Other specific
social skills include: attending to the speaker (e.g. focusing,
not fidgeting, ignorning distractions - gradually building
up attention span); remembering and responding to what is
said, and turn-taking. Actitives to improve social listening
include 'Circle time' and 'Here's looking at you, kid', where
the teacher uses eye contact rather than words as a selection
device, for instance, when it's time for the children to get
their coats to go home.
Developing aural attention span
Listening games and activities should aim at the gradual and
incremental development of children's aural attention span.
Activities include 'Sausages' where the teacher chooses a
favourite story book and selects a word that appears frequently,
explaining to the children that they must listen carefully
for the chosen word and each time they hear it, shout 'sausages'.
One important element in encouraging children to listen is
to ensure that what you have to say is worth listening to!
Over-exposure of your voice for behaviour management or organisation
can lead some children to switch off. Look for ways of substituting
other modes of communication wherever possible, for instance,
instead of using your voice to attract children's attention,
devise a physical signal such as holding one arm in the air,
and ask children to respond by quietly signalling back.
Developing auditory memory
While developing aural attention span helps children to attend
and concentrate, developing auditory memory helps them to
learn. At all stages, but particularly in the early years,
auditory memory seems to be bound up with kinesthetic learning,
and among the first sequences of sound children learn are
rhythmic chants. From as early as possible, attention should
be paid to helping children keep a steady beat and every opportunity
should be taken to use action rhymes and songs as a medium
for learning.
Other activities to improve auditory memory include 'Ted's
walk' where the teacher makes up a short story about Ted (or
another favourite soft toy) going for a walk. Start off by
setting the scene, for example, 'One bright sunny day,
Ted decided to go for a walk. He walking down the road towards
the shops and first thing he saw was...'. Each child chooses
one thing that Ted saw. When everyone has had a turn, see
how many thing the children can recall.
From Foundations of Literacy: a balanced approach to language,
listening and literacy skills in the early years, Sue
Palmer and Ros Bayley, Network Educational Press Ltd, 2004.
To order contact Network Education Press Ltd; Tel. 01785 225515
Good listening does not happen by accident. It is a learnable
skill, and with a consistent approach we can help all children
become better listeners.
Be a good listener
Young children learn by listening, watching and copying, so
we must be good role models. Listening is an active process
requiring our full participation, and when children experience
the power of being listened to, they learn by example.
Be aware of what good listening involves
Many practitioners are very supportive of children's listening,
but because they do it intuitively, are not really aware of
what works best and why. (E.g. eye contact, attending to the
speaker, remembering and responding to what is said).
Be a genuine listener
When children are playing, we need to involve ourselves sensitively
in their play and listen really carefully to the things they
have to say.
Demonstrate the value of listening
As adults, we can help children see that good listeners achieve
in ways that aren't available to people who don't know how
to listen. When children are involved in conflicts over space,
friends or resources, we can help them listen to each other
and resolve their difficulties, thus developing essential
skills for life and learning.
Help children make links
During periods of child-initiated learning, we can sensitively
remind children of the skills they have been developing at
group times and to help them to use these skills as and when
appropriate.
Provide a suitable environment
Are there quiet places where children can go to listen to
each other, listen to stories and play musical instruments?
If at all possible we should also provide a performance area
where children can perform for each other and learn how to
be a respectful member of an audience.
Combine the spoken word with a visual component
Remember that children's information processing skills
are still developing. Show children what you want them to
do, and use puppets, props and even photographs to make your
spoken words come alive.
Think about relevance
Children, like adults, find it easier to listen if the
words are relevant to them. The more an activity or conversation
is meaningful, the easier it is for children to listen.
Keep group sizes small for for story and circle time
Children will naturally want to contribute if they are interested
in what is going on. Small groups allow children to think
their thoughts aloud.
Taken from Foundations of Literacy: a balanced approach
to language, listening and literacy skills in the early years,
Sue Palmer and Ros Bayley, Network Educational Press Ltd,
2004 and "Hear, hear" an article by Penny Tassoni
in Nursery World, 20.11.03
This is a publication from Learning and Teaching Scotland
that aims to stimulate discussion about the theory, method
and everyday realities of listening to children in early education
in Scotland. It includes contributions from Professor Kathleen
Marshall, the Children's Commissioner for Scotland; Linda
Kinney, Head of Early Childhood, Play and Out of School Care,
Stirling Council; and Peter Moss, Professor of Early Childhood
Provision, University of London. There is an overview by Dr
John Davis, Lecturer, Moray House School of Education, University
of Edinburgh. For more information and to download the publication
visit www.ltscotland.org.uk/earlyyears/resources/publications/ltscotland/talklistening.asp
Listening was always assumed to be
something that children picked up naturally, but factors such
as background noise, stress and time-pressed working parents
can mean that the skill isn't being learnt. By Noel O'Hare.
There's something very odd about the fact that we put so
much emphasis on children's literacy and practically none
on listening skills. Around 45 per cent of communication is
spent listening and only nine per cent writing. Listening,
like talking, is assumed to be a skill that children pick
up naturally, but it's no longer something that parents and
teachers can take for granted.
"The problem is that children are not being communicated
with inside the home," says speech therapist Helen White,
co-author with Christina Evans of a new book called Learning
to Listen to Learn. "There's so much noise in the home
environment - TV, washing machines, phones, computer games,
etc - that when the mother or father calls children, on the
rare occasions that happens, they're not reacting."
White, a New Zealander now working in London, says the number
of children with delayed language development has soared in
recent years because they're not getting the opportunities
to develop listening and language skills before they start
school. Background noise, time-pressed working parents, stress
and lack of awareness are some of the reasons. Other factors,
such as the direction of pushchairs (facing away from the
parent) and the use of pacifiers, may also impede parent-child
dialogue and impair language development.
A major factor, though, is socio-economic status. White cites
the work of American researchers Betty Hart and Todd R Risley,
who followed the progress of groups of children from welfare,
working-class and professional families. "By the age of four,"
she says, "a professional's child will have had 50 million
words addressed to it, a working-class child 30 million and
a welfare child just 12 million. They found that the professional
child at the age of three had a bigger vocabulary than the
parent of a welfare child."
The researchers also measured how the children were spoken
to. At the age of three, the one from the professional family
had had 700,000 encouragements addressed to it, compared to
only 60,000 for the welfare child. That sort of disparity
creates a massive long-lasting disadvantage. "We were awestruck,"
commented the researchers, "at how well our measures of accomplishments
at three predicted language skill at nine to 10."
Another factor putting young children at a disadvantage is
the way that adults talk to them. Some adults refuse to use
babytalk or motherese. White quotes Sally Ward, a prominent
British speech therapist: "A lot of middle-class adults, especially
teachers, won't do it, and talk to their infants as if they
were 20. It causes all sorts of problems."
Motherese, which occurs primarily in Western countries, is
still controversial - but proponents believe that it helps
children to acquire language more quickly because the high
pitch gives it special acoustic properties that appeal to
infants. It may also help that pronunciation tends to be clear,
with careful distinctions between similar-sounding phonemes
and relatively few abstract words. The one-to-one dialogue
gives children the chance to practise speech, something not
achieved by plonking them in front of a television set. In
Britain, a Talk To Your Baby campaign was launched in 2003.
Liz Attenborough, the co-ordinator of the campaign, run by
the National Literacy Trust, told the Daily
Telegraph: "Unbelievable as it seems, some children
starting nursery do not seem to have ever had a one-to-one
conversation with anyone."
Young children are also not being played with, says White.
She is seeing more and more of them with dyspraxia or clumsy
child syndrome, which can affect their language development.
"We have to take these children back to movements that they
should have done as infants. Allowing children to crawl develops
their brain. If they skip that and are put into walkers to
scoot around, they miss that stage."
It was while teaching school children with specific language
impairment how to listen attentively that White and Evans
realised that the same techniques could benefit children in
mainstream classes. The speech and language centre headed
by White is attached to a secondary school, Lampton School
in Hounslow, west London, which gave them the opportunity
to train all new Year 7 students. The results, says White,
have been impressive, leading to improvements in social skills,
learning and classroom behaviour.
A key element of the programme is teaching the children to
use a range of senses to enhance their listening. They quickly
learn that listening attentively is more complex than they
thought. Sitting correctly, not slouching, makes active listening
much easier, says White. By sitting in a relaxed upright position,
you make effective use of your vestibular system, which helps
us to maintain balance and move through space. The vestibular
system, located in the inner ear, influences auditory, visual
and muscle functions.
"If you put children in this sitting position [back upright,
feet on floor, hands on desk], which is very relaxed, they
absolutely hate it. But then we give them a series of exercises
to do, like folding arms, and the brain will develop new patterns
and they get used to it."
Facing the speaker is also important, yet in many primary
school classrooms the students are arranged in groups that
make it difficult to focus on what the teacher is saying.
The research shows that children seated in pairs facing forward
spend up to 120 per cent longer on task.
If parents want their children to listen to them at home,
says White, then they need to cut out distracting background
noise and make sure that the child is facing them. But parents
also need to model listening. What was coming through from
the children was that their parents weren't listening to them,
particularly dads. We do need to stop what we're doing and
watch and listen to the child and show we're listening. The
biggest thing a parent can do is listen, not just pretend
they're listening."
(Noel O'Hare, Listener - the things that
matter, 17.09.06)
To communicate effectively, listening is the all-important
skill your toddler needs to learn, says Vanessa Howard
First I heard a thud, closely followed by a wail. Dashing
towards the sound of distress, I was met by my two-year-old
son who reported, "Me had a collapsident." I didn't
know whether to laugh or cry. Who else but a toddler can mangle
words so magically and in an instant make you see the world
anew? His meaning was clear: he'd accidentally fallen and
hurt himself. He had obviously picked up the word 'collapse'
from our play with bricks and 'accident' from the many calamities
that are part-and-parcel of a toddler reaching one of their
many milestones.
Quite simply and logically - and wondrously - he had put
meanings to actions. His developing brain had computed that
when a tower of bricks fall they are said to have "collapsed"
and when something falls unintentionally it is said to be
an "accident." Hence, his rather clever conclusion
that he had had a "collapsident."
Awesome. My "linkey" (his way of currently saying
"little monkey") is becoming a little man as moments
like these signify the great primordial leap for mankind.
If , as is said, the eyes are the windows on the soul, then
the ears are the gateway to humanity.
Geneticists at Cornell University recently announced that
our ability to listen closely is what differentiates us from
chimps and is the trigger for the evolution of language. This
might sound like stating the obvious, but the conundrum has
always been that, as humans and chimps share 99 percent of
their genes, what was the one percent that made us into the
creatures we are now? For over a decade, research focused
on language as being the key difference, but repeated studies
concluded that the region of the brain that controlled language
seemed to be identicial in both species.
What the Cornell reseach now suggests is that the capacity
for listening in humans has been specially tuned by natural
selection. While chimps showed a higher rate of change in
the genes that govern the structure of the skeleton (making
them stronger and better able to climb trees) the human ear
was becoming highly tuned to sound.
So forget opposable thumbs, it was when our hairy forebears
mastered the skill of tuning into sounds and seeing the actions
that rendered them meaningful that marked the big step for
mankind.
It is strange to think that the once popular figuring of
the Three Wise Monkeys might represent the real difference
between apes and man. If you adapt the title of this piece
of kitsh from "Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil"
to hear no speech, see no speech, then, very simply, you get
the negative outcomes: speak no speech. Which unfortunately,
describes what is happening to an increasing number of children.
Alarm bells started ringing about five years ago when primary
school teachers, under pressure to meet government literacy
targets, found that many children starting school did not
have the basic skills to understand what was being asked of
them. They couldn't recognise the sounds that are the basis
for language, and weren't experienced in the disciplines involved
in engaging in conversation with others. Quite simply, they
couldn't communicate.
The scale of the problem was first acknowledged late last
year when the government announced that "oracy"
was to be introduced onto the primary school curriculum as
an integral subject, commanding 10-hours teaching time a week.
Alan Bell, the chief inspector of schools, was painfully
blunt when he explained the need for lessons in listening
and talking. In a nutshell, he said children were arriving
at school unable to do either because parents were failing
to engage with them at the crucial stage of early speech and
language development. Namely, the first three years when the
brain develops 70 percent of its adult capacity.
This came hot on the heels of a statement from Alan Wells,
director of the Basic Skills Agency, that communication within
families had become little more than a "daily grunt"
as parents no longer shared family meals with their children,
who were more than likely being babysat by television.
Is this a true picture of family life today? Are we really
less communicative than previous generations? The answer,
sadly, seems to be yes. "This is a problem we're seeing
across all social sectors," says Liz Attenborough of
the National Literacy Trust campaign, Talk To Your Baby. "We're
living in a time-poor society where the demands on parents,
who are often both working, mean children are being rushed
around with little opportunity to engage with their world."
Of course, as parents, we know one possible solution. Give
us more and better paid maternity and paternity leave, make
flexi-time a right, possibly throw in a cleaner, and we wouldn't
have this problem. While the government is looking at all
these options (bar the cleaner) my money's on pigs flying
first. So, in the meantime, what are parents of young families
supposed to do?
"Talk, talk, talk to your baby and toddler at every
opportunity," says Liz Attenborough. "Give them
a running commentary of what you are doing when you are together."
To which many of us will say, "I do, I do, I do."
But of course in the first two years of life it is not as
simple as that. During this period the ears don't simply pass
messages to the brain, they cultivate its development and
pile-drive vital neurological pathways.
"Hearing is probably a child's most important sense,"
says neuroscientist Lise Eliot. "Through it children
experience language and music, both of which stimulate their
intellectual and emotional development in ways no other sense
can."
Seemingly, many of us assume that, once our baby has passed
his basic distraction test at his 6-9 months check, the ears
will simply do their job: we talk and our fledgling toddlers
listen and learn. Unfortunately, it's not as simple as that.
"Listening is a skill that has to be learnt," says
Angela Harding, director of Christopher Place, the specialist
speech, language and hearing centre in London. "Unfortunately,
too many children today are not being given the opportunity
to learn."
To teach a child how to listen involves many things: they
need to hear, see, engage with the speaker, get pleasure from
the social interaction and learn about turn-taking.
When your baby gurgles and coos, this is her first elementary
conversation with you. If you respond, she'll respond in turn.
She will have been listening to you in the womb for the last
four months of pregnancy, which, as many tests have shown,
is when the ears first start to function. Consequently, she'll
enjoy the sound of the voices of you and your partner more
than anyone elses.
That's not to say you can avoid talking in high-pitched "motherese"
for the first six months. All parents naturally adopt this
exaggerated, sing-song way of talking. And it's the perfect
way to communicate because a baby's hearing is set at a considerably
higher level than our own. (The difference narrows during
the first two years but it won't have reached parity until
the child is around 10 years of age.)
From hereon in, it's a case of talking. Repetitively. This
is the point when most of us invest heavily in nursery rhyme
books. Your jaws might ache, the rhymes might eventually become
the aural equivalent of Chinese water torture, but when your
child first adds the "O" to your 501st rendition
of Old MacDonald Had A Farm, you'll be in heaven and calling
all and sundry with the news.
501st? Did she count them all? You forget, I'm a time-poor
mother. The point is that it is generally agreed that a toddler
needs to hear a word in context over 500 times before they
become confident to use it. (Obviously you will find there
are exceptions to this rule: "Stop that!" will never
be fully understood while the first F-word in extremis will
immediately be taken to heart and parroted all around the
playgroup.)
But you get the pciture. In your child's first 18 months
or so you're going to put in a lot of groundwork for little
albeit priceless responses, which is why over the past five
years 'time-pressure' on parents has become such a cause for
concern.
Unfortunately, there's no way of cheating. Wouldn't it be
great if we could just play a looped tape of Old MacDonald
and get the whole thing over in a day. Or, indeed, stick our
toddler in front of the TV and watch their language flourish
from behind a newspaper. If only: Yes, your child will hear
and see, but the consensus of opinion is they will not make
the critical connections from the aural and visual clues necessary
to help them learn language and communication skills.
"To learn how to listen and learn the symbols and sounds
of language, you need to give your child your full attention,"
explains Harding. "For words to have any meaning to her,
parents have to map their meaning onto an object."
This involves getting down to your toddler's level, both
literally and metaphorically. Go to where he wants to play
and give (excuse the cliché) 'quality time' where he
is the sole focus on your attention. And let him lead the
game. So, don't grab his car and say, "Wow, this is a
Sunbeam Tiger, with a 16-valve engine and more torque per
square inch than a Harrier Jet." First off, it won't
only be your toddler who thinks you're sad and mad, but it
will simply be incomprehensible to him.
Whereas responding to his "car goes brrm" with
"car goes brrm, brm, brrm - very fast" with the
appropriate actions will help him make the many connections
inherent in your aural and visual clues. Such direct play
is teaching more than the difference between fast and slow,
or whatever the subject of the game, he will also be picking
up clues about inference, nuance, pitch and much more. For
example, a cup of tea is hot. When your toddler heads for
it with crazed fascination, you warn her of the potential
harm by speaking faster, adding alarm to the pitch of your
voice, and, in all proability, play-act recoiling to emphasise
the hazard and its potential to hurt.
It's not all about picture-book context, drilling words in
and need-to-know stuff. Put a sock on your nose, wellies on
your arms, do a prat fall. Anything to intrigue your toddler
will help her learn and spark wonder, which demands communication.
Introduce her to new things and she will want to share her
experiences with you. Similarly, if she hurts you, express
your hurt so that she begins to understand the whole gamut
of emotional responses.
It's not only parents whose input has come under scrutiny.
During the research into why children's communications skills
are deteriorating, nurseries also came under the spotlight.
And the conclusion were harsh. To the extent that a flurry
of initiatives has been launched to investigate how to train
nursery staff to play with toddlers in a way that helps them
learn the rudiments of communication.
Before you reach for the panic-button, it's not simply the
case that the majority of nursery staff and childminders aren't
doing this already; it's a question of are they doing it well
enough in the environments in which they work to enhance the
work of parents? A nursery (and often a childminder's home
with a specially-adapted nursery room) is generally a noisy
place. Naturally, they are full of toddlers with competing
needs and demands. The problem is, this inevitable noise is
being massively amplified by the nature of the buildings themselves.
With their hard, easy-to-clean surfaces, blinds instead of
curtains, lack of soft furnishings, nurseries and generally
echo-chambers that make a toddler pushing a trolley sound
like an on-coming articulated lorry. Put 10 or 20 in a such
a room and the cacophony can be deafening even for the most
trained ears.
"There is increasing concern that the right environments
are not being created to make it easy for babies and toddlers
to hear the notes that make up the music of language,"
explains Harding. "From the moment they are born, they
are having to compete with background noise to understand
and hear language. In this regard, nursery schools face a
particular problem."
At this age, the ear is still developing, making toddlers
particularly poor at discriminating between sounds in a noisy
setting. Which means a toddler's needs are largely at odds
with the modern world. Traffic noise, television, radio, music
and electonic toys are all potential sources of excessive
noise that may interfere with his ability to pick up the subtleties
of speech. As parents, we natually talk louder to our toddlers
to hold their atttention in such environemnts. Ideally, however,
Harding recommends that for part of the day the radio, TV
or CD should be turned off "so your child can hear your
best voice signal."
This is not to say we should live in tyranny to our toddlers,
nor some hermetically sealed cell: simply that we should endeavour
whenever possible to take time out to explain their worlds
to them. Any parent with older children will tell you the
better able your child is at communicating the less terrible
the twos are (and the experts add, the rest of his life.)
What can't be over-emphasised is the pleasure - all too fleeting
- that a toddler getting to grips with language brings. They
do "discombabulate" it, as Doddy used to say of
the Diddymen. Misuse, mispronunciations, inappropraite context,
they really do say the funniest things.
Taken from "Hear no, see no, speak no...", Junior
magazine, March 2004
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