Grateful Listening Activity

This activity sugessted by some notes created by Carol Gabrielli, cg@pdx.edu.

Grateful Listening suggests that a person can create an interior posture that facilitates a quality of listening that is removed from critique or question.

What do we mean by "critique or question"

Why do we listen?

These memory skills, making-sense-of skills, and duplication skills are rooted in inquisitive soil. At their best, all good learning activities encourage students to examine and wonder and doubt and believe and wonder again.

Lets Brainstorm.

Suppose I ask Lindsey what she did over the weekend.

When I ask, she tells me that on Saturday she and friends had a great Italian dinner at Nana Nina’s on Market Street. She goes on and on about the excellent service, the good wine list, the unparalleled eggplant parmesan and, finally, the creamy vanilla cannolis she and her friends enjoyed.

What prompted this story of Lindsey’s?

"What if the entire time Lindsey is telling me about her dinner with friends I am thinking this: I can’t believe she went to Nana Nina’s and thinks she had a good Italian meal or attentive service or nice wine. She can’t possibly know what real eggplant parmesan tastes like because if she did she would know theirs is made with processed cheeses, as are those "creamy" cannolis she raved about. If she wants good authentic Italian food, she should go to The Tuscany Room on Main. They have beautifully flavored and presented foods there, and they were just written up in The Metro Restaurant Guide. I should tell her that. As soon as she pauses to take a breath I’ll tell her so she knows for next time. I have an extra copy of The Metro Restaurant Guide. I will bring it in for her tomorrow. I will tell her that too.

  1. Am I really listening to Lindsey?
  2. Or is my purpose to deflate her experience, question her judgment, belittle her abilities and educate her with my wisdom?
Can you think of lived experiences from both sides? as the story teller and the story requester.

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