Try This at Home: Speaking, Listening, and Power

As part of our “Try this at home” summer series, this week, I want to give you something to think about in your at-home conversations and relationships – something that I hope will offer insight you can carry with you into your coaching work. Let’s think about the relationships among speaking, listening, and power. This triad is represented in the dynamics of  power over,  power under,  and  power with.  Let’s explore each.
 
When we speak but don’t listen, we are exercising  power over  the person we are in conversation with. You might find yourself in this power dynamic when giving instructions to someone – maybe you are telling your teenager your expectations for their use of the family car; or, more appropriately, you might give a curse command to a toddler to keep them safe. Power over doesn’t usually serve a relationship well, but there are times when it’s deemed necessary.
 
A  power under  relationship is one in which you are listening, but not speaking. Maybe you are being told something by someone in a leadership position. Maybe you are holding your tongue because you don’t want to start an argument. While listening is important for any productive conversation, if that’s all you do there’s an unequal (and perhaps unhealthy) power dynamic in the situation. Power under relationships can feel suffocating.
 
In a  power with  relationship, we, and the person we are in conversation with, are both speaking  and  listening. This might be the situation with your partner or during a deep conversation with a trusted friend. There’s a give-and-take, equanimity and equality. Power with relationships are honoring, respectful, and productive.
 
Considering the power dynamics in our everyday conversational relationships can give us useful information about our inclinations and intentions and even about the relationships themselves. Pause for a moment and examine a few of the relationships in your life. Can you identify a situation (or a relationship) in which you engage in  power over  conversations? Can you remember a time when you were in a conversation that felt like a  power under  relationship? Which relationships in your daily life typically demonstrate  power with  conversations?
 
Working now to become more aware of conversational power dynamics will help you be sensitive to such situations in your coaching work. As you aim for more equitable power distribution on the daily this summer, you’ll fall into these patterns more naturally in your coaching work next fall.

This week, you might want to take a look at:
 
3 Ways to More “Aha” Moments in Coaching: 
 
http://www.growthcoaching.com.au/articles-new/3-ways-to-more-aha-moments-in-coaching
 
 
Build a reading pause pile to soothe, uplift, and inspire:
 
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/e183-permission-to-pause-how-short-stories-and-essays/id1631731255?i=1000713245426
 
 
Developing independent writers:
 
https://choiceliteracy.com/article/developing-independent-writers/
 
 
7 ways to support students’ well-being:
 
https://www.schoolstatus.com/blog/7-ways-schools-can-support-k-12-students-mental-well-being
 
What one teacher learned from readers’ notebooks:
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3V2bWew1lTo&feature=emb_logo

That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!
 
Want more coaching tips? Check out my book, Differentiated Mentoring & Coaching in Education: From Preservice Teacher to Expert Practitioner, available from Teachers College Press!  I’m so excited to share it with you! You can use the code: FDNS25 for 20% off. Click  here  and I’ll email you the free Book Group Study Guide that includes questions, prompts, and activities you can use as you share the book with colleagues.  I hope you’ll love this book as much as I loved making it for you!

 
This week, you might want to take a look at: