Embracing the silence
For our second workshop reading activity (Teaching at UAL), I read ‘Embracing the silence: introverted learning and the online classroom ‘, by Karen Harris. Harris’ article resonates with me and leads me to reflect on my own perception and approach -or maybe use- of silence.
When reading and reflecting on Harris’ article, I realised that I do accept and maybe even embrace silence more than I would have thought. It is probably one of my biggest concerns as a teacher to feel that my students might not see the value in the content that I bring to them but perceive my session as a total waste of time; so, with that underlying worry, it seems inevitable to read quietness as boredom and lack of interest, which I would have thought I would personally find very discouraging. However, after reading Harris article, I have come to the conclusion that silence it is not something that triggers that fear.
Having being an introvert student myself, has probably reinforce my tendency for spotting the introverts in the room and perceiving their struggle when they sense an overwhelming moment coming up: maybe some unavoidable eye contact that feels like an upcoming question being directed to them, or a group activity that is about to take place the day they unintentionally ended up sitting by strangers. I empathise – and relate to a good extend- as it would put me off actively and proactively engaging in a public, obvious way, if the control and decision to take part was taken away from me.
Even though I am very conscious of the energy in the session, I do feel comfortable with my open questions echoing in the silent rooms sometimes, having to answering them myself or insistingly rewording them until I get some sort of response. I often provoke “reflective breaks” when I ask them to individually review and develop their immediate notes, so if they don’t feel like sharing thoughts and questions at the spot, they at least have them developed somewhere and ready to review at the right time.
It was an encouraging reading, which I could discuss with my peer at the workshop – we both had randomly picked the same reading, which allowed us to have a deeper talk where we considered the opportunities that silence hold and, we still overlook in our practice.
We reflected together on the value of silence as an energetic source of information, allowing for a deeper understanding of the group, the individual profiles in it and their learning processes and needs. Also, our discussion led to opening an additional perspective to the value of silence at a more spiritual level – almost like a facilitating tool for the preliminary personal conversations with the self, which set the course of the rest of the learning process.
This is an unknown area to me that I would love to explore further.