Listen Wise: Teach Students to Be Better Listeners

Discover how to engage your students effectively by strengthening their listening skills

In Listen Wise: Teach Students to Be Better Listeners, journalist, entrepreneur, and author Monica Brady-Myerov delivers a concise and thoughtful treatment of how to build powerful listening skills in K-12 students. You’ll discover real-world examples and modern, research-based advice about helping young people improve their listening abilities and their overall academic performance. With personal anecdotes from the accomplished author and accessible excerpts from the latest neuroscience of listening and auditory learning, the book is a critical resource that will explain why listening is the missing piece of the literacy puzzle.

This important book will show you:

• Classroom stories and teacher viewpoints that highlight effective strategies to teach critical listening
• Why building listening skills in students is crucial to improving reading, especially for English learners.
• Why the Lexile Framework for Listening is contributing to a surging recognition of the importance of listening in the academic curriculum

Perfect for K-12 teachers looking for new ways to understand their students and how they learn, Listen Wise will also earn a place in the libraries of college and master’s level students in education.

Why do kids need specific training in how to listen?

"Active, critical listening should be taught, just like we teach reading or math. There’s abundant scientific evidence to support this. As educators focus increasingly on developing a variety of students’ skills, such as critical thinking, problem solving, and self-control, listening is integral to that mix. Just because students hear doesn’t mean they listen, and just because they listen every day doesn’t mean they’re good at it.  Not only can better listening enhance a student’s critical thinking and problem-solving skills, but multiple studies show that better listeners are also better readers. In fact, studies show that listening comprehension is the dominating influence on reading comprehension, starting in the fourth grade. In addition, children who are not reading proficiently by the third grade are more likely to drop out of high school. At least until the eighth grade, most children are better at listening than they are at reading. And when educators pair listening and reading, the former acts as a booster for the latter." (Boston Globe, 2021)

Sign up to the ListenWise book launch event on Monday April 26th at 7pm ET (hosted by the Brookline Booksmith).

Monica Brady-Myerov is a 25-year veteran public radio journalist, and is the founder and CEO of Listenwise, a listening skills company. Monica Brady-Myerov is a content area specialist in audio and its use in the classroom and an expert in podcasting, fact-based reporting and narrative storytelling.

Reference:  Boston Globe "Good listening boosts kids’ literacy? We’re all ears."