One of the most sincerest forms of respect that children can show is actually listening to what another has to say. Most people do not listen with the intent to understand but with the intent to reply. When I hear myself saying hello and goodbye to people at the beginning and end of a class (recordings are revealing), I'm shocked at how I babble on. I guess I feel the need to fill the space and of course Zoom and its lag can produce silences and overlaps that stunt the natural course of a conversation. As so many children are communicating via this medium it is more important than ever for them to learn the art of listening to others.
Every good conversation begins with good listening and that applies to a child’s communion with nature. If a child can learn to listen to others then she can learn to listen to the natural phenomena that connects her to the world, like a babbling brook, birds singing in the trees or the mew of a cat or hoot of an owl in the dead of the night.
If she can learn to listen to her natural surroundings then, eventually, she can train herself to have a better ear to listen to the landscape of her mind and the inner workings of her body. For this she will need to be silent, which makes sense to her when you point out that LISTEN and SILENT are formed of the same letters. They are one and the same.
