Listen actively & take away more: two clever approaches!

Listen actively & take away more: two clever approaches!

Active listening is an important skill that you need in your studies, at work and ultimately in all of life. This article examines the possibilities for promoting active listening and also deals with the correct structuring of spoken content.

From passive listener to active listener

The reason that many meetings and lectures are inefficient is due to the passivity of the audience. If you are not actively involved, the brain simply runs on the back burner and can absorb less.

However, there are two different approaches to changing from a passive listener to an active listener – one is creative and the other is particularly structured:

1. Sketchnoting
2. keep record

In the following, we will take a closer look at what is behind the two ideas and for which areas of application they are suitable.

What is sketch noting?

In order to remain mentally active during a conversation or lecture, the concept of sketch notes was developed. These are small drawings and snippets of text that are written down on the side.

In a sketchnoting tutorial you can learn the most important basic forms of the technique. However, sketchnotes are a very individual thing. They should help the listener to take the key facts with them and to remember them even after weeks.

The brain is already more receptive when listening, so that significantly more is stored in the memory. At the same time, you can also look at the notes and ideally you are immediately in the picture again.

Keep a log

Creating a protocol is less creative and relatively sterile. It is very well suited for summarizing the essential content of a meeting. One speaks then of a so-called result protocol.

There is also a history log. Here, exactly what was said is written down and it is useful for anyone who wants to read everything again. However, this can be very exhausting and not necessarily effective if you want to have a quick overview.

Which procedure is better?

Whether sketchnoting or the protocol is used depends on who the notes are made for. Sketchnoting is more of an individual thing. Others will hardly be able to understand what exactly is going on based on the notes. Minutes are a great way to let others know who weren’t present at a talk or meeting.

Tip: It may be advisable to combine both methods. The sketch notes, which are freely and creatively made on the side, can ultimately be turned into a result log that is also informative for other people.