Coming out of the pandemic, I had a rude awakening—the sheer act of raising my hand was now mortifying. Many other PHS students grew accustomed grown accustomed to turning off their cameras and being anonymous in class. When we raised our hands for the first time out of a virtual classroom, we realized how much class attention was suddenly focused on us, and for most students, that attention was unwelcome. We all had to re-learn how to actively participate. Even after a year of in-person learning, students are still hesitant to speak in class.

Teachers have made the classroom environment more comfortable by asking us for our pronouns and allowing us to choose our own seats, but most methods of encouraging participation are less accommodating, and still, can lead to the quietest among us do not have their voices heard. Tactics like cold calling (calling on people at random) and strict participation grades are not working as intended. These strategies either do not work or cause class discussions to feel superficial, rather than insightful. In order for each student to be represented in class, PHS must institute systematic change to class participation.

One of the main factors of participation anxiety is the discouraging responses that teachers give to students. Teachers say things like “you should have known this” or “did you even take notes?” when students make an error or ask a seemingly obvious question. Public humiliation discourages not just those unprepared, but everyone. Teachers should explain why a student’s answer is wrong and give them a chance to correct themselves.Instead of calling students out for their errors and forcing them to invent half-baked contributions on the spot, teachers could allow students to talk in small groups and discuss their ideas with people they feel comfortable with as a sort of “warm up” before opening the conversation up to the entire class. Teachers could also ask more open-ended questions to allow students to bounce ideas off of one another, instead of pressuring students with right or wrong answers. Class discussions shouldn’t entail going over the homework. They should be designed to expand on the ideas established by the homework, and let students ask their peers questions about these new concepts and insights.

Student participation can also be hindered by the responses of other students. Even if a student feels confident in their answer, the idea that their peers could judge their answers, or outright ignore what they have to say, can be all it takes to turn a raised hand into a lowered one. . If the class is silent, being the first one to talk is difficult because few students want to be the first one to talk or have their ideas judged. In order to solve this problem, teachers must make sure that students are being respectful of one another, no matter how absurd a postulation may seem to be. Teachers should reassure students that their ideas will not be judged, and will instead be used for others to gain a new perspective on the topic at hand. By encouraging some of the louder students to make room for people that aren’t usually heard, class discussions can become more fulfilling.

Participation is only a part of some classes’ final grades, but all PHS classes should make it at least some part of the grading process. Some teachers require every student in their classes to contribute at least once per period. Students who don’t participate are docked a full percentage point for each day they don’t add something to the class conversation. Although this method can seem daunting for some students, it actually works brilliantly in terms of getting students out of their shells, and makes sure that a diverse array of opinions are presented every day. That said, it is important to note that participation grades alone do not provide sufficient incentive for students to raise their hands. Teachers must have a system in place to encourage participation that is independent of grades; otherwise, they are just punishing shyness.

Personally, class discussions are my favorite part of the school day. Last year in English, I was able to formulate the main idea of one of my essays thanks to our class discussion about All Quiet on the Western Front. Hearing the opinions of others and framing my ideas around their insights made me understand the subject material much better, and stimulated my intellectual curiosity about a myriad of tangential subjects that came up during the class’s discussion. Not only do conversations like these provide new perspectives, but they also help students get to know others, which is especially vital now at the beginning of the school year.