Honouring silence in class

A creature that hides and ‘withdraws into its shell’ is preparing a ‘way out’. This is true of . . . the sudden outburst of one who has long been silent.

Gaston Bachelard

One fine day in the early 80s, my class teacher sent me home with a serious-looking note for my parents. The next day, my worried mother hurried to the school for an “emergency” parent-teacher meeting. Apparently, the teacher wanted to find out what was making me such an unusually quiet child. A domestic crisis, perhaps? Was there need for help? My poor mother was horrified. We were the happiest family she knew and I was totally normal in her opinion. Regardless, this led to a series of lectures at home on “how to be more sociable”.

Alas, I remained a quiet student throughout my school years. While other children sometimes got scolded by teachers for talking too much, I usually got picked on (yes, it felt exactly like that) for being too quiet. One teacher even made the whole class applaud when I finally chipped in an opinion at the end of the school term. It was only at university that I pushed myself to exist in a different, louder way.

When I look back on the very first incident with my class teacher, I see a caring, well-intending educator. I also see a person interpreting silence as a problem, a bad sign.

Today, this fear of silence continues in our personal and professional lives. Most of us try to fill the “void” with incessant talking, TV, computers, smart phones. We seem to be unable to navigate through life without white noise in the background.

In our schools too, we have created implicit rules about talk and silence. Talk is the indicator of learning, and silence that of…apathy, boredom, perhaps even hostility. That is why many teachers feel uneasy with silent time. When we ask a question, we usually expect an answer, not a prolonged silence. This is normal because paying attention to talk is easy while listening to silence is a complex task. Silence also has multiple meanings that are hard to interpret. It’s possible that a quiet student has failed to learn, but it’s equally possible that she is simply displaying a different form of participation – perhaps taking time to process a topic, striving for mental clarity, formulating a complex answer, or wanting to deliver another, totally different message. If we learn to listen to and honour silence, we may be able to better connect with these deeper thinkers in our classrooms.

Here are 3 steps to achieve this:

1. Respect silence. Change your perceptions of silence and the silent student. She may not be disengaged or lazy, but thinking that bit more deeply. Make time to also discuss this with all your students and instil respect for silence.

2. Teach silence. Negotiate silent time in your classes. Allow students to reflect on their learning, focus on important issues, read a book, or simply daydream. This is not a waste of time. Silence is restful, it slows people down and improves concentration. It also boosts creativity and makes room for good ideas to surface.

3. Mobilize silence. It is not enough to respect and teach silence. Students should also be given opportunities after silent time to turn their thoughts into talk and/or action. So follow silent time with a discussion or another activity where thoughts can be transformed into more conventional ways of participation. This will lead to a more engaged, more equitable and louder classroom environment.

Silence is not the absence of noise; it is a state of being. There is room in it for beauty, peace and inspiration. Carminho, my favourite Portuguese fadista, summarizes this concept beautifully in a soulful fado song:

Nunca é sîlencio vão (Silence is never void).