Responding to Students’ Personal Concerns

ARC SeminarRoxie Catts and Nancy Stiller

February 8, 2011

What is Active Listening?• A structured way of listening & responding to

others • Focusing attention on the speaker • Suspending one’s own frame of reference • Suspending judgment • Avoiding other internal mental activities

Barriers to Effective Listening• Knowing the answer• “Trying” to be helpful• Treating discussion as competition• Trying to influence or impress• Reacting to red flag words• Misplaced trust in the precision of words• Mixing up the forest and the trees

Case Study

Samantha is meeting with you for the first time. She tells you that she is having difficulty in her college algebra class. She looks tired and resigned to being “bad at math.” She says, “I hate math.” She begins to cry. She composes herself and says, “My parents didn’t like it either. My Mom told me that we just don’t have math genes. Anyway, I heard this quote ‘… in real life there is no such thing as algebra.’ So, what’s the point.”

Case Study

Justin has met with you once to discuss course registration, last semester. He seems very anxious today. He says, “My Dad called last night. You know, I’m from New York … my Dad told me that if my GPA is below a 3.0, he doesn’t see the point of paying out of state tuition for me to come here … so, if I don’t get a 3.0, I have to go back home. I don’t know if I can live up to his standards.”

Active Listening Resourceshttp://dus.psu.edu/cfe/listskil.htm

http://www.mindtools.com/CommSkll/ActiveListening.htm

http://www.nacada.ksu.edu/clearinghouse/links/listening.htm

http://www.nacada.ksu.edu/clearinghouse/advisingissues/Communication.htm