Listening is the best skill..
Listen with two ears, think over with a single mind and then speak with the only tongue. This is the skill which young teachers don’t inculcate and look forward to because of their urge to be the first one to speak. And this is also the problem of the senior teachers because they feel that they have already listened a to a lot of such stuff.
Listening to a peer, to a colleague, to a junior, to a senior and lastly, to your learner is as crucial as breathing. A teacher has to create an environment around the learner to grow and become someone with a substance. Unless teachers listen, they will not be able to find the best way out of something they and their learners are stuck at . Unless you listen , you will not be listened.
The only reason I find for this lackluster approach to listening is, ego. Lately I discovered that this is actually unwillingness to learn and that makes you literally unavailable for innovations and growth. So, Start listening.
Listening makes us more informed and it augments our curiosities because the more we listen , the more we ask. A learner should always be heard. A teacher will then only be heard.
Listen to your colleague with all the attention you can pay. This is because knowledge is never free , attention is to be paid. It hardly matters whether your colleague is younger and in experienced or older and experienced. A focused and learned teacher with two years of experience can be far better than a stereotyped teacher with decades of experience. If a teacher cannot beatify the learner’s life with knowledge , discretion and wisdom , teacher just worked as an employee. Harsh but that’s how it is.
