I know:

– “learning is messy.”

– “a quiet classroom isn’t always learning.”

– “I know my class is engaged by the noise level.”

– Insert your own volume-based educational statement here.

Heck, I’ve said some of those things out loud myself.  And honestly, I believe them too.  My classroom is the one that is consistently the loudest because we are constantly moving, trading partners, trading ideas, talking about whatever it is we need to talk about.  I encourage that conversation, that discussion because it’s healthy and we can’t continue to teach our students that quiet is always best.  Life isn’t always quiet and sometimes, you just have to deal with loud, messy, and obnoxious!

BUT

Sometimes, there is a beauty in a quiet classroom, one where I can see students working on various things.  Today, students were reading, working on comprehension questions, vocabulary, SpellingCity, and the quiet, that quiet was a little an early Christmas present.  Now, a quick walk around helps to refocus everyone, myself included, but for the most part, it was simply work that they did.  Do you know how rare it is in my room, for there to be a 10 minute period where the sounds of writing, keyboards, and reading are the ONLY sounds around??  Bigfoot rare!  Locness Monster rare!  Common sense standardized testing rare! 😉

Anyway, my classroom is usually a very busy place, but sometimes, that quiet, it’s a necessary sound, and not at all unwelcome! 🙂