SPOTLIGHT TWOTYPESOFSILENCE IN

In aseries of interviews with secondary school staffIhave been exploring silence in schools. There has been agrowing trend of imposing silences in schools, with students required to move betw t een lessons in enforced silence and afocus on minimising distraction and trying to compel student attention solely upon the teacher.Yet this is notthe only type of silence which can occur in our schools. The other formofsilence can be more comfortable, mutually agreed, and supportive.

Researchers havefound several different ways to describethese tw t odistinct ty t pes of silence.Whilst they canbecharacterised as positive and negative,(Lees 2012) or strong and weak, (Kalamaras 1994), Iprefer to describe such silences as either companionable or coercive.A coercive silenceischaracterised by aneedto control, forindividuals to be silenced. Although suchsilence maybeadheredto, it often generates passivity t ,disengagement and resentment Contrasted with this is the companionablesilence, which is mutually agreed and feels safe,secure andnurturing. management approaches to ensure engagement can also be counterproductive here; many readers will be familiar with students who are filled with silent anxiety during teacher talk, worried that they will be asked to give an answer on demand and fearful that they will somehowfail. Such experiences for our students are frequently counterproductive as they nurture resentment and disinterest. They are also exhausting.

Coercive silences are often experienced as “being silenced”. Such silences are imposed, disciplinaryand upheld byteacher talk. Yetsuch silence from students does not mean that they are listening and fully engaged (just as such silences during whole-school CPD do not mean that we are all listening and fully engaged).

One teacher Iinterviewed described noticing astudent with SEND staring out of the window.Rather than challenging him from the front of the class, she instead walked over to him, followed his gaze for afew moments, and then enquired in aquiet conversational tone what he waslooking at. The boy replied that hewas watching the birdson theschool field and, without breaking his gaze from the large flock of geese, asked the teacher what they were doing. She explained to me that what followed was aquiet conversation, with which other students gradually joined, as she and the boy discussed how the preparing migrate for the explained to me that, while the discussion was not directly relevant to her lesson, the few minutes spent talking about the geese created amoment of genuine engagement and educational curiosity between her and the class. Thosefew momentsofshared silence as teacher and student companionably observed and considered the geese had been an important moment of both learning and developing astronger relationship betw t een theteacher andher students. Creating silences in class can be achieved effectively if introduced as part ofagame. I observed one teacher with avery boisterous class who was able to gain near total silence on request before her class could go to break. The lesson always finished with a game of ‘Pin Drop’. When the teacher held up apin, the students suddenly became incredibly quiet, and at agiven moment, she would release the pin. At this point the students at the back of the room said ‘No!’ in oud and definitive voice, and the activity was repeated. Sat at the back of the room Iwas surprised that on thethird attempt ould indeed hear the pin fall onto the carpeted floor in aroom full of teenagers. Surely as near to silence as can ever be expected in asecondary school; and all entirely voluntaryand playful in spirit.

In acompanionably silent classroom, veryone may be working quietly, but there s no fear of breaking that silence if needed. Such rules need to beexplicitly taught and demonstrated;whilethetask may be completed in silence, it is important that the silence can be broken if astudent hasa question or is seeking clarification. Such breaks to the silence need to be welcomed as they demonstrate to everyone that this is indeed a companionable and contemplative silence and not adisciplinary and coercive one. One leads to comfortable engagement while the other can generate resentful passivity

We often enforce silences in our lessons as a method of classroom management –there are certainly times where this is necessary, even essential. However,once adequate behaviour has been established, it is important to ensure that enforced silences donot lead topassivity, excessive teacher talk, and disengagement.

It may be time to tryintroducing afew momentsofcompanionable silence into your lessons. This could be abrief, timed, period where students plan their answer to a question in silence before any problems can be raised or clarifications requested. It might be an opportunityfor students and staffto engage in an individual creative writing, art, or constructiontask in contemplative silence before sharing their work.

Or possibly the safe, secure, playful silence where aclassroom full of teenagers might even hear apin drop.