Salvation for civilization – could better listening be part of the solution….

“Listen to understand. Audioeducation for schools”

A new book for teachers “Listen to understand. Audioeducation for schools” has been written to support teachers to create better conditions for deeper learning.

We are living in a society which has increasing difficulty with attentive listening. Due to this, we talk over each other and argue instead of a genuine communication. We are focused on delivering quick messages or responses, having no patience for listening and dialogue. Everybody today wants to attract attention, but few can sustain deeper attention. We are losing the quality of attentive listening or any meaningful listening at all.

Questionnaire for teachers and setting the scene…

So, close your eyes. Do you hear it? The sounds of the world around you. The sounds in your home, your kitchen, your favourite coffee machine.

What about in school? What you can hear in your classroom? What you can hear in the school corridor? Perhaps, numerous, overlapping sounds, are impossible to distinguish? Perhaps: chatter, shouts, shrieks, footsteps or stamping of feet, slamming doors….

Yes, this is noise. In such noise, we live our lives. Not only in schools: busy streets, coffee houses, markets … We are accustomed to the noise, but is it safe for our health and well-being? How do we feel in noisy school corridor? And how do we feel in quiet forest? How can we improve conditions to be comfort and learning in schools? This book is about that!

The purpose of the book

The book “Listen to understand” – audio education for schools, is designed for teachers to help them with attentive listening during learning and to help them to change an unfriendly acoustic environment in schools. Idea of the book was born in Audionomia Foundation (consociating people related to radio reportage) and then supported by “Komfort Ciszy”(“Comfort of the Silence”) Association focused on building acoustics quality.

Lesson scenarios

There are dozens of lesson scenarios (supplemented with audio files available on dedicated webpage) in the book to be conducted in classrooms or outdoors.

• Children might be asked to listen several times to the same sentences spoken with different emotions – to listen to what is unspoken.
• They might be asked to recognize their classmates by their footstep sound or to interpret field recordings.
• What do you hear? How far? Is it moving? In what direction? Is it animal? How big it is?

Sound theory and practical info

There is also some theory inside: what is the sound and the noise, acoustic ecology, soundscape, soundwalk, listening and communication, auditory hypersensitivity etc.

Also some practical information on room acoustics in schools and its impact on pupils and teachers and tips how to improve it.

National roll-out being achieved

Thanks to the sponsor (PZU insurance company), these books are now available in 3000 schools and preschools across the whole of Poland.

“Great idea for a book! At the times when sensory fondness is crushed by the noise and unwanted content, work on our kids’ audio sensitivity is like diamond cutting. Read this book and join the jewellers’ team.” Justyna Dżbik-Kluge, journalist

Authors:

There are 3 authors: Magda Świerczyńska-Dolot ,  Kinga Sygizman and Katarzyna Michalak.

For more information, contact Audionomia here or please contact Mikolaj Jarosz

Previous groundbreaking school acoustic study in Poland on AcousticBulletin.com:

Changing acoustics means changing everything