Wait time is the window between a teacher’s asking a question and expecting a student to respond. What usually happens when a student doesn’t respond quickly? The teacher either expands upon the question, provides an answer, or cold calls on someone else. Teachers typically wait only up to one second after asking a question before moving on to one of these options. When students do respond that quickly after the question, the answer tends to be a superficial response.
Research has shown that increasing wait time from 1 second to 3-5 seconds can have significant benefits including increases in response length and quality, the number of volunteer responses, student confidence, the number of student follow up questions, and the amount of student interaction with each other.
Remember from last week that the neurological differences that cause learning disabilities affect a person’s ability to receive, store, process, retrieve or communicate information. Taking in information, processing it, and forming a response often take longer in an LD student. This is why we have the accommodation of extended time during tests. This is also why an LD student likely needs a longer wait time when asked a question. It allows the student’s brain to take in and process the question and formulate their response. It also helps to decrease the stress that builds up in the LD student who is working on an answer, but at the same time knows that the teacher is expecting a quick response; stress slows down processing even more, which only exacerbates the situation for this student. An LD student who feels the pressure of needing to respond quickly, will often resort to “I don’t know,” not because they don’t know, but because they have learned that they can’t get an answer out fast enough so why try.
There is actually a second wait time – the time between the student’s response and the teacher’s reaction. Again, research shows that teachers typically wait less than one second before reacting to a student’s response. Increasing this wait time to 3-5 seconds allows the student to expand upon their answer, which allows the student to use higher order thinking. This also leads to better class discussions.
This sounds simple and can make a big difference in student achievement. The tricky part is that teachers aren’t comfortable with silence – we think the student doesn’t have an answer or that learning isn’t taking place if there is silence. One suggestion is to put it right out there to students that after you ask a question, you want “thinking time” before you will call on anyone or before anyone raises a hand. Allowing longer wait time can also concern teachers who feel as if they have a large amount of material to get through and by increasing wait time, they will not get through as much. However, research has shown that increased wait time results in better understanding, therefore less time is spent on follow up questions and clarification – it can actually make class time more efficient and effective.
