What is the best idea you have ever seen for developing the listening skill?

Answer 1

The first thing you must do is to learn to focus attention entirely on listening. The psychologist Carl Rogers had an exercise where you converse with another, but before you say anything original you first must paraphrase what the other person just said to make certain you understood properly. That's the best basic one; there are other good ones for more advanced listening skills--look for books on the subject!

Answer 2

I once attended a course where the presenter threw 26 words at us and asked us to memorise them. Nobody did. Then he told us a story utilising the same words and everyone remembered them, even backwards. Here's a simpler version.

Take these ten words:

Day
shine
wood
house
blue
dog
home
lock
dinner
night

Now memorise them and write down as many as you can.
If you can't try putting them in a little story like this:-

One DAY I awoke to see the Sun SHINE through the window so brightly that I decided to take a walk in the WOOD. As I did I came across a little HOUSE that had a BLUE door. Suddenly I heard a DOG barking and remembered that I had left my own in the kitchen at HOME. I hurried back, put the key in the LOCK and found that he had eaten my DINNER. Because of this I went hungry that NIGHT.

If you utilise this by putting facts given to you into a little ready-made story that you can easily bring to mind it may help you to remember things. Don't forget, we had 26 words to remember.

Answer 3

Repeat part of what the person said in your response.