The Sound of Silence

I guess the post title seems relevant right now. I'm sorry OK, to those of you who have noticed...and to those who haven't well I haven't posted for a while. The post title goes beyond the emptiness of the blog however, it connects to some thoughts I've been having about teaching.

Studies have shown that the average wait time between a teacher asking a question and expecting a response is as small as 0.9 seconds. That's not much time. It has raised some thoughts in my mind: about what it is that we expect of our pupils. If I'm ever puzzled by a question I often require a sizable gap in which to think, do we not want our students to be puzzled? To think?

This leads me on to a method that I came across in a variety of sources (my PGCE course, Starting Points, and fortunately for me at school) a numerical relationship is presented on the board in front of the class in complete silence. Pairs of numbers are drawn up, and that is it. Students are then invited (silently) to suggest other pairs that may fit the relationship. Simple as it sounds this method can have a real power. Students are often captivated by the silence, and are able to sit and try to work out what is going on. Why don't you try it?