Teacher use of silence in elementary education

Abstract

The aim of this study was to expand the scope of the sparse empirical research literature concerning teachers’ use of silence. Ninety-six primary school teachers responded to a survey about their use of silence during a specific event in school and about their general attitudes about using silence in the classroom. For the specific event, teachers used silence primarily to bring the students to reason or calm them down, to facilitate reflection, encourage experiencing of feelings and communicate a subtle message. In general, teachers indicated that they would use silence with older students who are solving a task, are assimilating the information presented or are sensitive to criticism, but they would not use silence with students who may misunderstand the silence or with whom they have a poor relationship. Teachers learned about using silence mostly through teaching experience. We argue that teacher educators need to continue to systematically investigate the perception and experiences of silence in classroom settings for designing more effective teacher education courses.

Keywords

• Teacher silence
• Elementary education
• Children