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Guest Author: Nabilah Kabir

Nabilah is at teacher of English at a Secondary School. (X – NKEnglishEd, LinkedIn – http://www.linkedin.com/in/ nabilah-k-b40003189)

Teachers are often told that the way to “hear” quieter students is to implement techniques like cold calling, exit tickets, or structured group work. And many of us do. We scaffold discussion with sentence stems, insist on “no hands up” questioning, and create smaller oracy tasks to coax hesitant pupils into finding their voice. 

Yet, even in classrooms where these strategies are embedded, quieter students in KS3 and KS4 English continue to be overlooked. Why? Because the problem is not only about participation structures; it is about the way English as a subject is assessed, valued, and taught. 

The Limits of Technique 

Take a Year 10 English Literature classroom. Even with a well-executed cold-call system, a student can still give minimal or superficial answers. They have spoken, yes, but have they revealed the depth of their understanding? With the time pressures of covering set texts, teachers may move on, noting the “participation” without probing further. 

Or consider exit tickets: they provide snapshots of understanding, but rarely illuminate the ongoing, cumulative gaps that build up for quieter pupils. A student who can parrot a quotation from Macbeth today may still be unable to weave that quotation into a coherent analytical paragraph tomorrow. 

The truth is, techniques can create the appearance of inclusion without necessarily surfacing the silent struggle beneath. 

A Subject-Specific Blind Spot 

English amplifies this issue because it equates voice with competence. 

• Literature study is built around interpretation. The louder, more confident students set the tone of class readings, often steering discussions into the “right” analytical zones (ambition in Macbeth, Gender in An Inspector Calls). Quieter students, even when called upon, may simply echo these dominant interpretations rather than risk offering their own. 

• Writing assessments assume that students’ ability to articulate in extended written form mirrors their conceptual grasp. But for quieter pupils who rarely test ideas aloud, writing can feel like producing in a vacuum—unpractised, unscaffolded, and therefore limited. 

• Oracy and speaking/listening tasks (though formally devalued in GCSE specifications) reinforce the same dynamic: the confident thrive, the hesitant comply, and the teacher is left with a distorted picture of who is struggling. 

In short, English is a subject where “being heard” and “being able” have become dangerously entangled. 

The Deeper Issue: Visibility and Teacher Perception 

What’s at play is less about pedagogy and more about visibility. Teachers, myself included, often feel a greater sense of urgency around students whose needs are “loud” — whether through disruption, constant questioning, or charismatic over-participation. Quieter students don’t signal their struggle, so they fade from the radar. 

Even with structures in place, we gravitate toward those whose misunderstanding is immediately visible in their behaviour or speech. By contrast, the student who silently produces a “safe” paragraph that ticks basic boxes does not trigger the same concern—even if that same student is stagnating at a Grade 4 while capable of so much more. 

This is where the equity gap widens. Silence masks both struggle and potential. 

Why This Matters More at KS3/KS4 

The danger is magnified at these stages because of the cumulative, layered nature of the English curriculum. 

• At KS3, pupils are introduced to abstract literary concepts (narrative voice, symbolism, authorial intent). If a student quietly fails to grasp these, the misunderstanding follows them into GCSE. 

• At KS4, where time is consumed by exam preparation, quieter students’ hidden struggles can crystallise into fixed underperformance. The louder voices continue to shape classroom dialogue and revision priorities, while the silent ones are carried along by the current—until they reach the exam hall, alone with their half-formed ideas. 

By then, it is too late to intervene. 

Moving Beyond Strategies 

If the “usual” strategies aren’t enough, what next? Here are some questions worth asking ourselves as English teachers: 

1. Do we track voices as carefully as grades? 
   Instead of merely noting who spoke in a lesson, we might ask: Whose ideas shaped the conversation? Whose interpretations never surfaced? 

2. Do our assessments privilege the vocal? 
   Quieter students often perform better in low-stakes, private tasks than in public-facing class discussions. Are we balancing both when judging progress? 

3. Are we too quick to equate correctness with understanding? 
   A neat, formulaic PEEL/WHW paragraph can hide a lack of conceptual depth. How often do we probe beneath the surface of “safe” responses? 

4. Are we listening for silence as much as sound? 
   Who goes entire lessons without offering an original thought? Who is “present” but never truly heard? 

Towards a Cultural Shift 

What’s needed is not simply more techniques, but a shift in classroom culture. One that acknowledges that voice is not a proxy for learning in English. 

This might mean: 

• Creating assessment opportunities that decentre verbal dominance (annotated extracts, reflective journals, personal responses). 

• Building in “slow dialogue” tasks where every student must submit an idea, but without the pressure of immediacy. 

• Recognising that the quietest students are not always the most secure and making their invisibility itself a cause for teacher curiosity. 

Ultimately, we need to retrain ourselves to see silence not as relief, but as data. 

Quieter KS3/KS4 students are not overlooked because teachers don’t care, or because strategies aren’t in place. They are overlooked because English as a subject privileges those who speak loudly, quickly, and often. Until we interrogate this deeper bias—until we stop equating compliance with comprehension—our strategies will only skim the surface. 

The challenge is not simply to give quieter students space to speak, but to create a classroom culture in which their silence itself is read, understood, and acted upon. 

Written by Nabilah Kabir