Productive Listening and the Third Point Document

As someone who grew up in a Jewish family on Long Island, interruptions were a natural part of conversations - never viewed as rude, just how we communicated. It wasn't until I moved to rural New England that I had to change my conversational patterns and temper my mode of communicating with others. Thankfully, this move coincided with attending grad school, and being in grad school involved lots of attentive listening and thoughtful conversation. I have worked both personally and professionally to avoid interrupting people (in general) and it is still something I think about consciously all the time - especially when teaching. Mentoring will be no different. In my practice conversation with Heidi, we agreed to discuss her goal for the beginning of school and to develop it into a S.M.A.R.T. goal. I selected figure 13.5 on page 165 of the AASL standards (see photo) as the guiding third point document to help guide the conversation. Unfortunately, this part of the video call didn't get recorded due to a technical glitch. However, I did notice as it was happening, that I was able to really focus on the process. I listened for clarity and was able to reflect back with paraphrasing what she was contemplating. Rather than jumping to problem solving, I simply listened attentively and moved the conversation from one step to another on the S.M.A.R.T. goal infographic. I did so by using clarifying statements and interjecting things like - so you just said _ and that seems to fit _. I'm glad to have had the chance to practice this skill, not just productive listening, but helping someone turn a general professional goal into a S.M.A.R.T. goal, because it is very likely a step that will be needed in mentoring. 

This part of the video is when I was taking the part of the mentee - also helpful to just be able to talk through a problem that another librarian could fully understand without explaining the details of how things usually work. It makes me see the absolute essential role that a mentor plays in a mentee's life, at least in my region where we are almost all singletons in a building if not a whole district or supervisory union. It's so important to have a PLC to connect with, and I'm glad to know that VSLA can help in that role.