How To Improve Listening Skills In Kids

There are two separate things you seem to want to achieve: make her read, improve listening skills.

Both are lofty goals but would benefit from a little tweaking.
Reading: Do not make it a chore or an unpleasant experience for her. It can make her dislike reading for years. At 5 years of age, the aim should be to explore the worlds that books open to us. One book per week, even a board book with a total of 30 words -- read slowly and peacefully and analyzed after reading -- is better than mandated 30 minutes reading sessions thrice a week. You mean well, but reading with child is an activity that cannot be done in a rush. Twenty minutes at her bedtime that are sacred, and you spend them with her reading a book as a nightly ritual would be an option. It counts for mom-daughter quality time when she is not competing for your attention with your phone, kitchen, dinner prep and toddler. It will also have a logical end time.

Listening skills: At first I thought you meant the ability to really listen to others which even adults rarely demonstrate consistently. What you probably mean is the ability to follow instructions. My guess is that your DD is doing fine in school when required to follow instructions. At home, she is craving more time with you. With a more relaxed and unhurried you. If teacher is not commenting about her not following instructions at school, then, let it be. As it is, girls tend to be very sincere rule-followers in the 7-mid teens age group.

Your time crunch can be distilled down to four factors: cooking, cleaning, toddler, lazy dad who prefers tv & laptop. At least two of these need realignment so you have more dispensable time in the evenings. : ) And obviously, toddler cannot be one of those two.

For a working mom of Indian origin, weekday evening time being mostly devoid of cooking is essential right from kid's kindergarten years till child is at least in 7th or 8th grade. Nothing drains time like Indian cooking and the dirty vessels it generates.

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Don't force the reading, don't insist on it being done for x number of minutes. And go easy on any worksheets at this age. Reading a book is only part of the experience. Talk about it. Talk about the characters, what they did, why they did, relate it to your lives, ask what could be an alternate ending. Adapt to your hectic evening. She could sit at the kitchen table, while you cook and multitask retelling her the book's story with her as one of the characters, pausing at times so she can fill in.

In a few months or even now, you could write small notes to her, and she writes back to you. On an iPad or chromebook. You could spend 30 minutes in the weekend writing a few notes for the week. The notes could be about a book you both are reading, about an old photo, or some upcoming event. At 6:30 or 7 pm, it becomes a daily activity that she gets a "just for her" note from mommy.

For the reading, choosing what to read can be a tough decision with a still-reluctant reader. Years ago, we had the Berenstain Bears book collection. Once a collection or a few authors are pre-decided, Easy to get a few from the library every month. It is like not having to open the fridge and go "what should I cook today?" : )

Sorry the response became a chapter book. : ) The gist is don't force reading. There are 4-5 things I forced each of my kids to do like that, and like clockwork, they grew to abhor each of those. Most didn't matter. One that I regret to this day is forcing them to look through the telescope I had bought and assembled. I so badly wanted them to look with wonder at the skies. Turns out such wonder won't be hurried.

 

: ) It takes villages to raise the parents.

 

Adding to what @Rihana mentioned above, I would look for books of characters she loves to watch on tv. The entire Disney princess set is available as all sorts of beginning readers book. My dd was exactly like yours at that age. When all kids in school were reading the magic tree house series, she wasn’t interested at all. I spent a lot of time worrying about my inability to get her to read. I knew she loved being read to. It just had to be stories of her choice. I just started reading one or two books to her every night. Then, I found that she will try to read books that interests her. I got a ton of those books and made her read one line while I read three to finish the story. She slowly picked up reading fluently from bob books and from the princess books. Incidentally, today she got me an English essay to read. I marveled at her vocabulary and told my DH who was standing next to me about how she is a voracious reader and how that enhances the writing. He laughed and reminded me of all that effort I had put in years ago to get her to even like reading. He was reminding her that her love for reading came from a mom who decided to make sure she loves it. I then come here to find your thread!

Don’t rush it. Reading is a life long habit. Start small. Even if she isn’t reading, you read to her. I was so worried comparing her to her peers but in hindsight it was nothing. She’s turned out ok and is reading beyond my expectations.