You're sleeping on the couch tonight!

Even though we are all in school to become teachers, this program teaches us much more than simply methods of education. There are always delicious little snippets of information which can be used in our daily lives. MCM, for examples, tells us that most days, we listen roughly twice as much as we speak, and almost five times as much as we write! Interestingly enough, this could be potent fodder for fights with that special someone. Take the following dialogue as an example:

Wife: I told you last week we were going to spend today finding out how many shoes I have that match my purses! You never listen! I hate you! You're sleeping on the couch!

Husband: Well, my beautiful wife, according to Marianne Celce-Murcia, we listen TWICE as much as we speak. Why, today alone I've engaged in bi-directional listening 17 times, and autodirectional listening this morning when I was asking myself what I wanted for breakfast! I listen to you five times more than I write to you! Doesn't that count for anything?

Wife: I'm sorry, you're so brilliant and handsome. I love you.

See what happened there? I totally defused a potentially hostile situation just by using information I acquired during my education.

There were a few questions I had during the reading though. Is reading considered unidirectional or autodirectional? Is autodirectional listening considered a constant? As in, am I CONSTANTLY engaged in autodirectional listening, and can I be engaged in bidirectional listening (or a conversation) and autodirectional listening simultaneously? Or do we switch from one to the other? I will have to watch for this.