|
Active Listening |
Active listening is a communication skill that you can use to improve your ability to understand and comprehend verbal information. This skill will also help you to communicate your ideas and knowledge more effectively. In this module you will learn about effective active listening skills. You will understand how the communication process actively involves a sender and a receiver.
Whether our roles are as students, friends, workers, or family members we spend a lot of time communicating. To communicate well, we have to listen well. We often just hear words and don't really listen carefully or critically. Active and careful listening shows our sensitivity to others. It is a critical part of paying attention to other people and being mindful of life's basic and substantive issues. For example, any time we catch ourselves trying to formulate comments or responses while other people are talking we aren't really listening to what they are saying.
You may discover references to terms similar to active listening--phrases such as attentive listening and clear communicating, for example. Whatever the terminology, better listening skills will help avoid miscommunication. If you know how to listen for meaning, you will have a better chance of absorbing what a speaker intends to say.
The overall goal of this module is to help you to become an active listener. Specifically, the objectives for learning about active listening are for you to be able to:
- Define active listening and its relationship to communication
- Describe active listening skills and their components
- Engage in and model active listening skills
Read the Active Listening Information and complete the activities.
The materials for the iStudy for Success modules were originally developed at the Jack P. Royer Center for Learning and Academic Technologies.
Additional materials were developed and assistance was provided by the University Learning Centers (ULC), University Park.
The ANGEL version of the modules is being administered by Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT), a unit of Information Technology Services.
For more information about iStudy for Success modules, please contact tlt@psu.edu
The Pennsylvania State University ©2004 All rights reserved. Please read the entire license agreement before distributing the modules, and before modifying and sharing the content of the modules. This statement MUST accompany this module and all derivative works.