Checking for listening - Tips for Teachers by Craig Barton

Contents

Checks for listening are exactly what they sound like: Questions you ask your students to see if they are paying attention. Developing a classroom culture where students listen hard to each other can be difficult, but it is the gateway to improving student learning when you get it right.

Diagnosis

Do your students listen to:

Your instructions?
Your explanations?
Each other?

And what is your evidence?

Evidence

I hypothesise that most students do not listen as much as we hope or think they do.

When I visit schools, I often see posters like this adoring classroom walls:

Teachers are aware that actively listening is important, but then I also see examples like this:

Students not listening to instructions:

Example 1

Teacher: Write your answers in your book, not on your mini-whiteboards

Four minutes later, the teacher discovered seven students writing their answers on their mini-whiteboards. The students then had to copy everything into their books.

Example 2

A teacher said he wanted to see every student’s mini-whiteboard in 3, 2, 1…

5 boards out of 30 were shown

When the teacher quizzed a student about why their mini-whiteboard was not in the air, the student said they didn’t know they had to.

Example 3

A teacher told her students to write their answers as fractions, not decimals, so they don’t lose accuracy. Here are their books 10 minutes later:

Not a fraction in sight.

Students not listening to explanations:

Example 1

Teacher: The reason we multiply by 0.85 is because we need to reduce the price by 15%. 100% – 15% = 85%, and 85% as a decimal is 0.85

When copying down the worked example 30 seconds later, one girl raised her hand and asked where the 0.85 came from.

Example 2

A teacher noticed his students had a misconception with division, always dividing the bigger number by the smaller number. So, he stopped the class and gave a good explanation, complete with visuals, as to why 4 divided by 28 was not equal to 7.

A few minutes later, I asked four students what 2 divided by 8 was equal to. Had they been listening, one answer the certainly would not give would be 4. Here are their answers:

Example 3

Two students had struggled with question 3 of this Do Now:

So, the teacher explained clearly how to work it out.

A few minutes later, I asked those two students the same question the teacher had just been through on the board. Here are their responses:

Student 1: I don’t know
Student 2: What are you on about, mate?

Students not listening to each other:

Each other is at the bottom of the list of things students listen to. As soon as you choose a student to answer a question or participate in some way, the rest of the students switch off because it is not about them.

Example 1

Teacher: How many metres in a kilometre?
Emma: 1000
Teacher: Correct

One minute later, two students were stuck on the first question because they did not know how many metres in a kilometre.

Example 2

Teacher: Why are you putting your initials there?
Mollie: Because I like cheese, but I don’t have a brother
Teacher: Why has Mollie put her initials there… Tom?
Tom: What?

Example 3

Teacher: We start with 3 and 9 because 3 multiplied by 9 is 27
Teacher: Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Mo
Mo: Because 3 multiplied by 9 is 27
Teacher: Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Ollie
Ollie: Because 3 is a factor of 9
Teacher: We need to be listening better. Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Jack
Jack: Because 3 multiplied by 9 is 27
Teacher: Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Bobby
Bobby: I’m still trying to figure it out

Two questions before we move on:

How many of these things could happen in your classroom?
Why do they happen?

Why do things like this happen?

On the student side:

Attentional bandwidth is limited. Schools are attention-rich environments. The things we want students to pay attention to are probably not what they will pay attention to unprompted.

One study found that children reported being off task approximately 24% of the time. Most inattention episodes were classified as task-unrelated thoughts (i.e., ‘pure’ instances of mind wandering, 9%) or attentional failures due to distractions (9%).

On the teacher side:

Teachers may be seduced by poor proxies for listening – in other words, visible behaviours that give the indication that studetns may be listening, but are not actually evidence of listening:

Students are quiet. You can make a good case that students being quiet is a necessary condition for listening, but it is certainly not a sufficient one. Students could be quiet but paying attention to a million other things besides the instructions, explanations or answers of their classmates we hope they are listening to.
Students are looking at you. A roomful of students looking at us perhaps increases the chance of them listening, but again it does not guarantee it. Their eyes may be with us, but where is their mind?
Students nodding & smiling. Have you ever nodded and smiled your way through a meeting or a CPD session as your mind drifted off to a better place? Exactly.
Students telling you they are listening. I often hear teachers say things like: Tom, are you listening? Of course Tom is going to say yes. But that doesn’t tell us anything useful.
You are listening. This is particularly important when it comes to listening to the response of a classmate. We are listening intently, we have heard every word, but what about everyone else?
Engaging explanations. This is perhaps the hardest one to accept. We have planned an explanation that is simply captivating. Bells, whistles, and thrills aplenty. How could anyone not be listening?

Why is listening important?

Two reasons, one obvious, one more subtle.

Listening is a good proxy for attention, and attention is the gatekeeper of learning.

In Josh Goodrich’s excellent Responsive Coaching book, he presents 6 big teacher challenges:

Notice that before we worry about optimising communication, driving thought and gathering feedback, we need to secure attention. Without our students’ attention, everything else we do will likely be a waste of time.

Back to our study, higher frequency of mind wandering was strongly associated with poorer memory recall.

2. If we don’t check students are listening, we do not know why they don’t understand

We explain something to our students, perhaps via a worked example, and then check whether they understand by asking them a related question. They get that question wrong. Why is that?

It could be that they didn’t understand. Or it could be that they were not listening to us.

The key point is that we do not know, and hence, we cannot formulate an optimal response.

Solution steps

Part 1: Ensure students can listen

When explaining or giving instructions, don’t do anything else
Empty hands, eyes on me when explaining
Use a narrated countdown
Prepare students by checking for non-subject content
When a student is speaking, step away from them
Be aware of Attention Contagion

Part 2: Ensure students have an incentive to listen

Following “I don’t know”, ask: What was the question?
Don’t rely on students telling you they are listening
Use high-frequency checks for listening during explanations
If Call and Respond is a step too far, stick to Cold Call
Plan checks for listening in advance
Warn students you are going to check for listening
Don’t confuse checks for listening with checks for understanding
Text comes last
Hold students to account if they don’t listen
Explain, Frame, Reframe
Get students to rehearse
Set yourself a challenge

Part 1: Ensure students can listen

When explaining or giving instructions, don’t do anything else

When explaining or giving instructions, don’t:

Hand out books or worksheets
Circulate the room
Have your back turned

Instead, stand in a position where you can see everyone, wait for silence, and then deliver a clear and concise explanation or instruction in a voice that everyone can here.

2. Empty hands, eyes on me when explaining or giving instructions

One reason for this is to stop students from messing about:

But also, we need to tell students not to try to copy down when we are explaining, because their eyes and attention will not be on the information we are giving at the moment:

3. Use a narrated countdown

Lots of teachers use narrated countdowns to secure attention. Here are three that I have seen work:

Example 1

I need your attention in…
3… stop your conversations
2… pens down
1… looking at me
Thank you

Example 2

I’m going to ask you to stop working in…
3… sitting up in a learning posture
2… emptying your hands…
and 1… tracking me …
Thank you

Example 3

I need you silent, empty hands, looking at me in…
3… I can see Emma finishing her conversation
2… I can see Jacob putting his pen down
and 1… nearly everyone…
Thank you

Narrated countdowns can be improved by doing the following:

Use the same prompt each time
Stand in a position where you can see everyone
Be seen looking
Using non-invasive strategies where students have not followed your instructions
Praise students who have
Wait until you have 100% compliance

4. Prepare students by checking for non-subject content

If students lack confidence in a subject, they may switch off before we have had a chance to secure their attention. A good way to combat this is to prepare them to listen by using non-subject content.

I saw a teacher tackle this issue brilliantly. Before beginning his explanation, he said:

The colours of the Swedish flag are blue and yellow.
What are the colours of the Swedish flag?… Evie?
Which flag’s colours are blue and yellow… Ben?
Newcastle United won the FA Cup four times in the 1950s.
How many times did Newcastle United win the FA Cup in the 1950s?… Mo?
Who won the FA Cup four times in the 1950s?… Miran?

Now, you all got those questions correct because you were listening. I am now going to explain something else, and check you are listening in just the same way. This is different to understanding. Anyone can listen. It is not about the maths, it is just about listening to what I say.

By introducing students to checks for listening for non-subject content, the teacher was able to remove any barriers to listening that a lack of confidence with subject content might bring, and ensure he had everyone’s attention.

5. When a student is speaking, step away from them

Students will typically give verbal responses at a volume that is appropriate for the teacher to hear. That makes it very difficult for any students far away or behind the speaker to hear.

Adam Boxer suggests we step away from the speaker/

Stepping away from the speaker has three benefits:

It increases the chance of the student speaking louder
You can keep an eye on the other students
We communicate the message that this is not a one-to-one conversation

6. Be aware of Attention Contagion

A study looked at the concept of Attention Contagion: the spread of attentive (or inattentive) states among members of a group. The study found that students who see attentive classmates will be more attentive themselves, and those who see inattentive classmates will be less attentive. Unsurprisingly, students in the study who saw attentive classmates performed much better on a quiz than those who saw inattentive classmates.

This could have implications for seating plans. Where do we place our attention and less attention on students as we strive to create a norm of attentiveness in the classroom?

Part 2: Ensure students have an incentive to listen

Following “I don’t know”, ask what the question was

If a student replies to “I don’t know” to a check for understanding question, always ask them what the question was. Students will be unable to tell you at an alarming rate.

Identifying this is important for two reasons. First, how you deal with a lack of understanding will likely differ from how you deal with a lack of listening. Second, regularly doing this and holding students accountable starts developing the culture of attention we want in our classrooms.

2. Don’t rely on students telling you they are listening

Just as “Does this make sense?” is not a good check for understanding, “Are you listening?” is not a good check for listening. We need more reliable evidence. For example:

Instructions: We are going to answer this next question on our mini-whiteboards… Where are we going to answer this next question?

Explanations: The first step to solve this equation is to add 9 to both sides… What is the first step to solve this equation?

Each other: I think -7 is bigger as it is closer to 0… What did Jenny say, and do you agree?

3. Use high-frequency checks for listening during explanations

This is the big idea I got from my conversation with science teacher, Pritesh Raichura. Pritesh litters his explanations with checks for listening to sustain student attention.

Here is an example:

This is an isosceles triangle…
I say i-sos-ce-les, you say…
In an isosceles triangle, two of the angles are equal
In an isosceles triangle, how many of the angles are equal?… Tom
What type of triangle has two equal angles?… Mo
In an isosceles triangle, two of the angles are equal.
All of you, in an isosceles triangle…

Let’s examine some of the features:

We have two means of participation:

Call and Respond: For the pronunciation of isosceles and the final statement, all students are expected to reply in unison
Cold Call: Two individual students are called upon when breaking down the statement. Notice we use Question… pause… name to ensure all students are thinking about the answer

If Call and Respond is a step too far, then stick to Cold Call for checks for listening.

Notice the use of a technique called Explain, Frame, Reframe, where the teacher explains statement, then asks the first student to repeat the second half, and the second student to repeat the first half. We will discuss this technique in more detail below.

Finally, notice that these are all checks for listening, not checks for understanding. Hence, if students do not know the answer, the only possible reason is that they have not been listening, so we can hold them accountable.

Here are five reasons why such high-frequency checks for listening are worth considering:

Checks for listening help focus attention

Classrooms are an attention-rich environment, and checks for listening can help direct students’ attention to the critical information that will help their learning.

2. Checks for listening help sustain attention

Have you ever sat through a staff briefing or a twilight and found your mind wandering? How would your attention change if the person running the session regularly asked people in the audience to repeat what they had just said?

Pritesh has a couple of great graphs illustrating this:

3. Checks for listening allow us to diagnose

If a student does not know the answer to a check for understanding question, we don’t know if it is because they genuinely do not understand or they have not been paying attention. If we have checked for listening during our explanation, then we have ruled out the second possibility and can hence tailor an appropriate response.

4. Checks for listening allow more students to feel successful

Students are unlikely to focus on the difference between a checking for understanding question and a checking for listening question. What matters more to them is that the teacher asked them a question, and they know the answer. With frequency checks for listening, many students have many opportunities to feel successful.

5. Checks for listening can improve our explanations

If we are going to direct our students to listen to us, we are obliged to make what we are saying worth listening to. Check out this transcript from my own teaching:

Okay… so… um, when we have an equation with an x-squared… or, in fact, any letter squared… it doesn’t need to be x, it could p or q, or anything… we call these letters unknowns… so when they are squared… so the exponent needs to be 2… um, so equations that have a squared term in them, they are called quadratic equations

Terrible.

Checks for listening can help us break up our explanations into smaller chunks, thus improving them:

This is an example of a quadratic equation

[Check for listening]

It is a quadratic equation because the highest power of the unknowns is 2

[Check for listening]

If, like me, you fear that such checks for listening will break up the flow of your explanation, consider the following:

Without them, you have no idea if anyone is listening
If students are listening, they will respond immediately
After doing these for a while, you can reduce the frequency of the checks

4. If Call and Respond is a step too far, stick to Cold Call

Trying out more than one new idea at a time is a recipe for disaster. So, if you do not already use Call and Respond in your classroom, stick to Cold Call for checks for listening.

5. Plan checks for listening in advance

Giving explanation and instructions in short manageable chunks that lend themselves well to checks for listening is difficult at first. Thereofre, it is a good idea to plan them in advance.

Here is an example from a teacher I coach, planning how she will explain to studetns how to mutiplky out a single bracket. Each * indicates when she will check for listening:

Scripting explanations in this way is not needed after a while. But, until you get used to this way of explaining or giving instructions, it is beneficial.

6. Warn students you are going to check for listening

Checks for listening are not designed to catch out students who are not listening. They are designed to improve attention in the classroom. So, set students up for success by explaining that you will be checking for listening.

7. Don’t confuse checks for listening with checks for understanding

This is a check for understanding:

What is the first step to solve this equation?… Ben

This is a check for listening:

The first step to solve this equation is to make one side equal to zero

What is the first step to solve this equation?… Ben

In this example, notice what happens when the teacher switches from checks for listening to checks for understanding:

The explanation takes longer, students get confused, and the teacher cannot hold them accountable as they do not know if their failure to respond correctly results from a lack of understanding or attention.

When modelling, I only ask checks for listening questions, as my goal is to sustain attention. Checks for understanding come later.

8. Text comes last

This slide is no good for checking for listening:

Students can just read and repeat the steps without needing to pay attention.

Doing the check for listening first, and adding the step or working out on the board after is a simple, but effective way to improve checks for listening.

Consider this example:

The teacher could explain that to fill in the right-hand box we do 2 multiplied by 3x to give 6x.

They could then ask a student what goes in the right-hand box.

Then write in 6x

Then ask another student where the 6x came from

9. Hold students to account if they don’t listen

One of the key points about checking for listening is that if students get the questions wrong, it must be because they are not listening. So, if students get checks for listening questions wrong, they need to be held to account for this, or their incentive to pay attention will fall.

Consider the scenario from earlier:

Teacher: We start with 3 and 9 because 3 multiplied by 9 is 27
Teacher: Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Mo
Mo: Because 3 multiplied by 9 is 27
Teacher: Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Ollie
Ollie: Because 3 is a factor of 9
Teacher: We need to be listening better. Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Jack
Jack: Because 3 multiplied by 9 is 27
Teacher: Why did we start with 3 and 9?… Bobby
Bobby: I’m still trying to figure it out

What is the appropriate sanction for Bobby?

10. Use Explain, Frame, Reframe

To make checks for listening more cognitively engaging, we can use Explain, Frame, Reframe:

Explain: The formula to work out the area of a triangle is half base multiplied by height
Frame: The formula to work out the area of a triangle is…
Reframe: Half base multiplied by height is…

Explain, Frame, Reframe has two benefits:

It means students have to pay attention to the full statement and not just the end bit
It helps students make more sense of, and hence better retain, the statement as they are thinking about and preparing both parts of it

11. Get students to rehearse with their partner

Pritesh talks about three phases of questioning:

High-frequency checks for listening to sustain attention
Turn and Talk rehearsal to build understanding
Checks for understanding to give you valuable data as

That middle stage is important. Students have experienced an explanation with lots of discrete checks for listening. Before they attempt to apply what they have listened to to a new question, it is important to give them an opportunity to put the steps together themselves.

Pritesh develops this idea using an example from Science:

As you teach new ideas explicitly, give pupils the chance to practice the vocabulary or practice explaining the ideas themselves.

For example, if you are teaching pollination & plant fertilisation, you might explain that pollination is when pollen lands on the sticky stigma. Immediately, you might ask pupils to rehearse this first step with their partners: “Tell your partners a sentence with the words: pollination and stigma – go!” 20 seconds later, ask for hands up and pick someone to share.

Then you explain that after pollination the pollen grows a pollen tube that goes down the style and into ovary of the flower. You have now used six ‘tier three’ words (pollination, pollen, stigma, style, pollen tube and ovary) and you are only just getting started! The pupils will definitely welcome more chances to rehearse. “Tell your partners what has happens after pollination – use the image and labels on the board to help you – go!”

In essence: give two facts of a process, rehearse both, give the third fact, rehearse it, give a fourth fact, rehearse all four etc.

12. Set yourself a challenge

Adam Boxer has a game called The Repeated Instructions Game. You start the day with 10 points. Every time you have to repeat an instruction, you lose a point. The rationale is that if an instruction needs repeating, it can only be because students have not been listening. The goal is to get to the end of the day with points still in the bag. Getting through period 1 might be a more realistic goal to start with.

The same format could be used to check if students are listening to your explanations, and each other.