Empathic...listening gets inside another person's frame of reference. You look out through it, you see the world the way they see the world...you understand how they feel.

Empathy is not sympathy...(which is) a form of judgment.... The essence of empathic listening is not that you agree with someone; it's that you fully, deeply, understand that person, emotionally as well as intellectually. (p. 240)

Sometime between the humiliation of feeling beaten by great strips of dog-eared cotton and the self-assurance of learning in new ways, I began hearing more from my students as they shared their thoughts and ideas with me. They shared not only background issues but their present learning needs and desires. I learned that one student used to sleep in a tree; he learned to use phonics to read unknown words. Being able to speak to a willing audience about life as a homeless person seemed to free him to listen and learn. I heard what it was like to be a refugee or a prisoner of war in a country not known for kindness to prisoners. Students who shared life experiences with me were much more open about their learning needs and what they wanted—and didn't want—from learning materials and tutors.

Not that I didn't listen before the VALTA Project. I did, but only to a degree—I would try to keep the student "on track," ensuring that our time together was spent on literacy. Now I'm not afraid of what I might hear and know some students need to speak. I know I can handle my own emotions, so I make better connections with students whose backgrounds include violence.

I am now in even greater awe of students with the courage to ask for help with reading or writing. I thought I knew how it felt, because I've been continuing to study as I've worked as a coordinator—French, learning disabilities, literacy research—but I studied from books so I felt at least a little competence. Trying to balance my body and brain in a yoga pose, and completing the huge-hook-and-strips-of-unwieldy-fabric crochet project were totally humbling experiences. I did finish the rug, after taking it in all its knotty misery to a patient friend who tried to keep from laughing as she showed me how it's done. I really didn't have a clue how a student might feel until I made the rug.