Today, Explained - The Island of Explained: Listen up!

Episode Date: August 13, 2022

Kiarra and Izii are having an argument when they are unexpectedly transported to the Island of Explained. There, they meet an Engin-Ear and a magical unicorn who teach them how hearing works and why actively listening with empathy is key to resolving arguments between friends.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Another weekend, another episode of Today Explained to Kids, which typically would have me saying something like, adults, time to break out the earmuffs. But honestly, I think you adults could stand to learn a thing or two from this one. I'm going to hand it off to Izzy and Kiara on Today Explained to kids. Get more everything with FanDuel Sportsbook and Casino. Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600. Visit ConnexOntario.ca. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Let's try something a little different. Today!

Explain! What? Today! Oh. Explain! Okay. Today! I get it. Explain! Today! Oh. Explain! Okay. Today! I get it.

Explain! Today! Today! Explain! What? Explain! Today! Today, explain!

Hey, Kiara. Hi, Izzy. How's it going? It's going great. I'm actually just finishing up putting together the plan for the next episode of Today Explained to Kids. Um, I think you're mistaken. It's my turn to plan the next episode. I have an amazing idea for a show about my friend Zip the Hummingbird.

He has such good eyes. He can see all these extra colors that are invisible to humans. Since it's a podcast, Zip's going to just talk about all the colors we can't see. Um, actually, Kiara, I think you're mistaken. It's my turn to plan an episode, and it's going to be about the physics of spaghetti. Like, why it's so hard to break it into just two pieces, how it will curl when it's boiled, and how to get it perfectly al dente every time. The world has been waiting for a podcast about spaghetti science, and this will be my masterpiece.

If you want to know if your pasta is cooked, you can just taste it. Nobody cares about the physics of spaghetti. Oh, and people want to hear about colors they can't even see on a podcast? Well, if you would just hear me out. And if you would just open your mind a little, you'd understand that spaghetti science is fascinating and everyone loves spaghetti. Everyone loves colors. But it's my turn.

No, it's not. Yes, it is. No, it's not. Yes, it's... What just happened? Yes it is. No't portal us here. Ugh. I just wanted to spend the day working on my new episode, and now instead I'm here with you in this cold gray hallway. And why is this lighting so bad? More importantly, where's the portal?

I don't even see a portal anywhere. But there's always a portal. This is so weird. How are we going to get back? And are we even on the island of Explained? Hey, look out this window. It seems like we definitely are on the island of Explained. Yeah, that's what I said. Let's just go outside and find another portal. This hallway to the left looks like the way out. No, I think we should take the hallway on the right. Look, it's gotta be on the left. I'm going left. Well, I'm going right. You're impossible. Whoa. What? I went right and you went left. And now we're both in the same place again. How did we end up here?

This place is the worst. Is this hallway just one big circle? Nope, not a circle. It's more like a labyrinth, a maze. Isn't it cool? It is definitely not cool. What is this place? And how do we get out of here?

We need to find a portal back home. Sure, sure. We'll get you back home. Right after your appointment. But we don't have an appointment. Are you Izzy and Kiara? Uh, yeah. Then you have an appointment. With me. I'm the Engine Ear. My specialty is ears. And this is the Here and Now Clinic. Come in, come in.

I'm still not following. I'm the one who brought you here. To fix your ears, obviously. You haven't really been hearing each other. I really don't like this at all. Yeah, can you just send us back home through the portal? Oof, looks like I've got my work cut out for me. I told you my specialty is ears and I'm going to help you here. Okay, how are you going to help us here, Engineer? Well, first I need to scan your ears and brains. Now, if the two of you would just step into this shiny metal cube...

I'm not getting in there. Well, if you won't get in, how else am I supposed to help you get back home? You're obviously here because you haven't been hearing each other. And the first thing we need to do is to make sure your ears are working properly. So, in you go. Fine. Okay, all done. Come on out and see.

These are giant versions of your ears and brains. Wow, there's so much stuff in there. Yeah, look at all that wax. Gross. But what's all that other stuff? Is that a snail? Nope, that's your inner ear. I'll get to that in a minute. Let's start from the part of your ear that we can all already see, the outer ear. It's shaped kind of like a bowl to help make sounds louder and funnel them into your head. The sounds go through the ear canal, that's this little tunnel over here, and you see this drum?

There's a drum in our ears? Well, it's built like a drum. It's a thin piece of skin stretched tight like a drum. The eardrum. The eardrum is attached to three teeny tiny bones, the smallest bones in your body. So when sounds hit the eardrum, it makes those tiny bones vibrate. Those bones make the sounds louder and send them into this snail-shaped part

called the inner ear. And inside that snail are millions of tiny little hair-shaped cells, which turn sounds into electricity. Wow, I had no idea I could turn sounds into electricity. That's not the half of it. Next, those electrical impulses travel across neurons in the brain, brain cells. They go all the way down to the bottom of your brain, then to the center of your brain, and finally back out to the edges of your brain, right next to your ears. Okay, so after our ears turn the sounds into electricity, that electricity goes bouncing around our brains? That's amazing.

Yeah, it's pretty cool. Now, let's see how well you're both hearing. I'll push this button to activate test mode, and... Hello! Okay, here we go. to activate test mode and... Both of you are hearing just fine. Then what are we still doing here? Wait, what's that light? Huh? The one that's not lighting up. Oh, of course. That's the listening light.

Seems like you're both hearing, but not listening. What's the difference? Well, hearing, that's my specialty. That's about how your ears detect sounds. But listening is something else altogether. Huh? What does that mean? Some people can't hear or have trouble hearing, and they communicate in different ways through sign language or writing.

Listening is when you actually pay attention to what someone is communicating to you, however they're communicating to you. It's about understanding. And when you're in a fight, listening can be the hardest thing to do. Well, if someone here isn't listening, it's definitely not me. I always listen to my friends. You're the one who never listens, Izzy. Oh, yeah? Well, watch this.

Engineer, I'd like to listen to you tell me how to fix this listening problem so we can get off the island. Well, that's actually not my specialty. Maybe you weren't listening when I said this before, but I'm an engineer, so I focus on the ears and how hearing works. But you don't actually need your hearing to be able to listen. If listening is your problem, I've got a colleague who can probably help you. I'll send her your brain scans and you can see her now. Just go down the hall and make a right after the break. Support for Today Explained comes from Aura.

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And because we're all connected over text message, it was just so easy to send a link to everybody. You can save on the perfect gift by visiting AuraFrames.com to get $35 off Aura's best-selling Carvermat frames with promo code EXPLAINED at checkout. That's A-U-R-A-Frames.com, promo code EXPLAINED. This deal is exclusive to listeners and available just in time for the holidays. Terms and conditions do apply. Ah, it's always nice to have a little break. That ear exam was kind of wild.

I can't believe we went through all of that only for the engineer to tell us our ears are working and we're still stuck here. Ugh, stop complaining, Kiara. It's your fault we're here in the first place. It is not. It's your fault we're here in the first place. It is not. It's your fault we're here. Let's just see if the engineer's colleague can help us. Hi, I'm Izzy and this is Kiara. The engineer said you could help us fix our listening, but she didn't tell us who you are.

I'm Dr. Erin Clabo. I'm a neuroscientist, and I do research on how we can better understand each other and how our neurons connect together and can change based on the things that we do and feel and experience. That sounds promising. Oh, I see the engineer sent you our brain scans. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So what are we looking at here? We have a map of the whole brain in front of us. And what's important to know is that every single part of the map is responsible for something else that you do with your behavior. Okay. So each part of our brains does something different.

And the engineer said the parts of our brains that hear are working just fine. So which part of the brain helps us listen? And how is that different from hearing? When you're really listening to someone, the information travels into lots of different areas in the brain where you can really consider what they're saying and you can think about the way they might be thinking and feeling and then you can respond accordingly. So there's a big difference

between simply hearing the sounds that someone's saying and understanding what they're actually meaning or the place that they're coming from. But I do understand what Izzy is saying. They don't care about colors. That's not what I'm saying. That's not what I meant. And they want to take my turn away from me. I never said that. Kiara, I don't think you really were listening. Dr. Aaron is right. Well, it's really hard to listen to somebody when you're in an argument. It's hard to listen when you're angry and when you know you're right and your friend is wrong. What if I don't want to listen? When you're having an argument and you only hear someone instead of listening to them, you're going to be at the same place at the end of the conversation as you were when you came in

because you're simply waiting your turn until they stop talking so that you can say what you want to say. But if you really are listening to someone, you actually might change your perspective based on what they're saying. If you're only hearing, then there's really no point of having the conversation. If you're listening, you can actually make really meaningful change and you can resolve conflict in a much easier way than if you only have your hearing ears on. Huh. okay. I think I see what you mean.

If Kiara and I don't listen to each other, we'll never be able to find a solution to our argument. So where do we start? What's the key to being a good listener? Empathy. Empathy? What's that? Empathy is getting outside of our own self.

So you understand what emotions they might be experiencing, what feelings, if they're feeling sad or happy based on something that happened to them. I think I get what you mean, but how do we do that? Especially when we're feeling our own feelings already. Yeah, like if I'm feeling really mad at Kiara because she thinks it's her turn to choose a topic for today, explain to kids, but I know it's really my turn. Ugh, I just don't know if I can empathize with her right now.

Yeah, I'm too mad at Izzy to even try. But I do want to get back home. So, how can we practice empathy? Whoa! This is the unicorn of empathy. A unicorn? The unicorn has the ability to let anyone that touches its coat to be able to feel what someone else is feeling or to pretend to be that other person for 10 seconds. How does it work? All you need to do if you want to know how someone is feeling, you think of that person in your head and you place your hand right in between the unicorn's eyes, right underneath its horn. And you'll be able to take the point of view as the person that you're thinking of. You can step into that person's

shoes. Okay, so I'm putting my hand on the unicorn's face and I'm thinking of Izzy. I can understand that Izzy is feeling angry, but not just angry. Also hurt. They feel like I don't care about them or their feelings or opinions and it's making them sad. Izzy, is that how you're feeling? I mean, yeah. It really did hurt me that you just shot down my spaghetti science idea

even though you know how much I love spaghetti. Hmm. This unicorn of empathy really is something. I want to try too. I'll put my hand on the unicorn's coat. Hmm. She really believes it's her turn to choose an episode topic. And she's frustrated that we don't agree.

Wow. Empathy is pretty amazing. It's like a superpower in some ways. Like to be able to step outside yourself, it's not super easy to do. And it does need to be practiced. Wait, you mean I can have the superpower of empathy just by practicing? The one thing that I wish everyone, kids and adults, knew about empathy and about listening is that we get better at it every time we do it. So let's just say hypothetically that I don't have a unicorn of empathy at home. How am I supposed to practice empathy and get really good at listening to other people and resolving all of our conflicts? In order to be a good listener, you need to take a minute to be

open to what the other person is saying so that you're really listening to them. The second thing you need to do is you need to try to put yourself in their shoes and take their perspective. So that means is pretend with all the creativity that you can have there, pretend that you are that person. What would they be thinking? What would they be feeling? I can try that. If you're fighting with a friend, I think that coming together and having a conversation is the most important thing to do. However, you shouldn't rush that conversation. If you feel overly angry or hurt, you should wait a little bit until you're clearly thinking

and have kind of reflected on the things that you want to say. Okay, so step one, take a deep breath and try to cool down. And step two, use your imagination to try to understand what the other person could be feeling and thinking. Got it. The most important thing when you're resolving conflict with a friend is to figure out together how you're going to do it differently going forward so you don't end up in the same situation again. Okay. If you're someone who had your feelings hurt, I would suggest that you say how you feel. Tell them how you would like to be treated differently

or how you think you can resolve it. If you're somebody who hurt someone else's feelings, I would say that you need to own what you did. Take responsibility for it. You need to try to understand where the other person's coming from. And you need to tell them how you're going to do it differently next time. Kiara, I don't want to fight with you. I don't want to fight with you either, Izzy. You're my friend and I love learning on the island of Explained with you. Me too. Although I have to admit I would like to find a portal off the island and get back home. Same. But how? Unicorn of Empathy? Can you help us get home? Well, okay. Let's hop on.

Izzy, I'm sorry I hurt your feelings when I said nobody cares about spaghetti science. I know you love spaghetti, and a lot of other people do too. And I know you were just so excited about colors we can't see, and I have to admit it is a pretty good podcast idea. Thanks, Izzy. Maybe next time we could come up with a topic together? I'd love to do that. But what could it be?

Hmm. Maybe there's a great topic right under our noses. Maybe this is the podcast? What we just did. Listening. Oh, yeah. We can learn about the ears and the brain. And the unicorn of empathy.. And the unicorn of empathy.

Of course, the unicorn of empathy. Hey, what's that over there? Is that a portal? We made it back. And it's all thanks to you. And you. This episode was written and produced by Shoshi Shmulevitz. The team at Transmitter Media includes Isabel Carter, Kiara Powell, Daphne Chen, and Sarah Nix. The team at Vox includes Noam Hassenfeld and Bert Pinkerton.

Our executive producers are Greta Cohn and Catherine Wells. Marilla Giesch is our fact checker. Sophia Landman sound designed and mixed the series. Special thanks to Dr. Erin Clabo, a neuroscientist at the University of Virginia, and to her unicorn of empathy. You can hear all of our episodes and find related activities at fox.com slash today dash explained dash two dash kids.