Listening From The Heart

By Chris Nelson and parent committee

Each month, our parent newsletter focuses on a Discipline With Purpose, skill. Our children focus on these skills at school, and this column will offer practical ways to focus on them at home.

 It is important that we support our school in teaching our children to become self-disciplined. As you may recall, a self-disciplined person is one who is able Îto wait.' While delaying impulsive actions a person thinks about a course of action.

In addition to providing some at-home activities, we will spotlight our Adult's Code of Ethics each month. Our children learn more from our actions than from our words. When we show them we use the skills as adults, they will want to use them as well.

The beginning of the year is a great time to focus on the skill of Listening. This skill is the only one with steps. The first three are critical. They are:

1. Stop what you are doing - Calm yourself
2. Clear away distractions - External and internal
3. Look at or toward the speaker

 Tell each child:

1. How important he/she is in your life.

2. One thing you noticed him/her doing in the past week on his/her own without any help.

3. That you are sorry if in the past you haven't listened using these steps, and you promise to try in the future to really listen.

Invite the entire family to follow the rule." If my eyes you cannot see, don't begin to talk to me."

As adult members of the school community, we can model the skill of listening by following our Code of Ethics. "I will model the steps of listening when I communicate with others in the School community to avoid misunderstanding."