How to Teach Children Listening Skills Through Reading

Focused reading can make students more attentive listeners.

Students need to develop good listening skills as early as possible for long-term academic success. Effective listeners don't just hear-they remember what they hear which facilitates understanding. Improving listening through reading is beneficial because your students will improve comprehension while learning the importance of paying attention and focusing on the speaker.

Instructions

1. Read aloud to your class frequently. You probably already do this if you teach Kindergarten and first grade. Older students will enjoy being read to if they get to choose the subject. Read a chapter of a popular novel or a magazine article about their favorite singer or movie star. Limit oral reading to ten or fifteen minutes.

2. Allow students to listen to classmates' reading. Have a few kids read orally for three minutes into a tape recorder. Play the recording for the class and have them guess the reader.

3. Listen to oral reading online. Kid Sites has links to children's stories of many genres. There are also sites for middle and high-school students. Most of the narration is expressive and provides a good example of fluent reading. Have students take a brief quiz on the story afterwards to assess their comprehension and listening ability.

4. Allocate time for silent sustained reading at least twice a week. Give students a copy of a magazine article or a passage from a story. Have them read it silently for ten or fifteen minutes, depending upon the length of the text. Pair students and pick one to retell what they read to their partner. The listener has to write three points the speaker makes while retelling.

References

• Learning Through Listening: Listening While Reading
• Little Ones Reading Resource: Listening Skills
• Kid Sites: Online Stories
• Poets: Online Poems