As the daughter of a father from the North and a mother from the South, (I'm more like my father), I always moved a little bit quickly when it came to wait time in the classroom. I remember from my student teaching that more wait time was the one suggestion I nearly always was given when it came to feedback for improving my classroom and instruction. As time passed, I became better at providing time in my classroom, but it was always a painfully conscious process.
In Creating Cultures of Thinking, Ritchhart centers his book around 8 forces that educators truly need to master in order to transform our schools. One of those forces is time. He notes that using time wisely creates relationships and when using time, "Attending to the building of relationships with students is fundamental to good teaching, and it is important to do this at the start. Teachers can't wait until later to build those connections; they may have lost students by then" (90). One of the ways that we build this relationship factor is using time in order to communicate students' value to them and deliberately arranging time in our classroom to allow students to make their thinking explicit and seen. In terms of wait time, the way in which we use it specifically communicates to students whether we value their thinking in the classroom. But if you're like me, in the back of your head are always those questions: "Am I wasting time? What else do we have to get through today? Are we able to fit this lesson into 40 minutes if Johnny keeps talking?" In reality, however, we must understand that the time we provide students to think communicates to them that thinking is important and valuable, and we are allowing them to model thinking for each other-a life skill they will need in their future professions. So, what exactly is wait time and how does it work in the classroom? Rowe's (1986) research on the relationship between time and thinking gives us some idea. In her research, she found that there are two types of wait time. Wait Time 1 is the time we as teachers spend after we have asked the question, before calling on students. Wait Time 2, on the other hand, is the time we spend after the student has finished speaking; it ends when we comment again or give the student feedback. The average teacher wait time is usually about one second. In all reality, could you create a thoughtful, detailed response in only that short time frame? What usually ends up happening is students turn such interactions into a classroom competition, trying to get the right answer, rather than the thought-out answer. And the solution? Rowe (1986) found that increasing wait time by even five to seven seconds was associated with an increase in the length of student responses, greater use of evidence (and we need that for the GMAS), an increase in explorative thought (imagining possibilities), increases in the number and types of questions students asked (think higher DOK levels), better listening skills and more responses to the comments of others, increased confidence and participation, and better achievement on written tasks (we need that too!). So how should we see our classroom, and what should be our goal? Imagine watching a game of one-on-one, where the ball is thrown back and forth, back and forth by only a couple of participants. How many of us are ready to pay tickets for that affair? Well...maybe if it's our team. But, then, imagine there is a game in which we have lots of players, taking turns with the ball, rather than passing a ball repetitively back and forth? What differs? The players are more engaged. The audience is more engaged. All of the players are improving their skill, instead of just the two. Each and every player is growing in his or her practice. It is a fascinating and interactive exchange, and it involves all of us, physically, emotionally, mentally...everything regardless of what role we play. And now, think: What if these games were our classrooms?; which team would you rather represent? But, before you answer, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait :) Extend your wait time to at least five seconds and see what happens, and then comment if you've noticed anything. What does your use of time and wait time communicate to your students? Keep up the good work! -LDE Ritchhart, R. (2015). Creating cultures of thinking: The 8 forces we must master to truly transform our schools. Rowe, M. B. (1986). Wait-time: Slowing down may be a way of speeding up. Journal of Teacher Education, 37 (43), 43-50.
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