The first thing to say about silence is that it is not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes silence results from lots of hard thinking going on and sometimes silence it essential to allow a shy member of the group to formulate a response they are happy with and summon up the courage to speak.
However, everyone hates those long silences which seem to last for ever and you shift from trying to think of something to say to willing the person opposite you to speak to wishing the floor would open up and swallow you. There are a number of things that can be done, some that amount to tricks of the trade, others that attempt to address the problem at a more fundamental level.
There is a reason speaking
It can't be stressed enough that the purpose of seminars is for students to talk, everyone needs to have a go at speaking about ideas they have been studying, it brings the subject alive and helps you to connect it to the rest of your life. Knowing that it is good for you doesn't make it any easier of course so the first strategy is to make it easy.
Pairs
People who clam up in seminars usually have no problem talking to a friend, so start off in pairs, talk to the person next to you - before the seminar starts - or the tutor can start off the seminar by asking everyone to talk to the person next to them. Even, 'how was the lecture?' can work in pairs. A better starting question would be, 'in your pairs try to come up with one example from your experience of an action having unforseen consequences', or something that relates to the issue to be discussed. The keys are to keep it open - any question with lots of possible answers and - allow personal experience a role, because everyone is an expert regarding their own personal experience.
Sub-groups
Working in smaller groups can also make talking easier and by spreading the tasks between sub-groups more material can be covered. Also because sub-group A is responsible for sub-group B's understanding of what the problems posed by, e.g., qualia, are they will make sure they get it clear. Once you are a member of a team who have to feed back your results to the whole seminar it is much easier to chip in than when it was you on your own.
Rounds
This is where you start or punctuate the seminar with a space where everyone should say something in turn, e.g., what was the most interesting idea you encountered last week?; or, what would be your candidate for an updated list of the virtues? Make the question unthreatening and preferable not one with a yes no answer, voting is better for that. The main purpose of the round can be just to break the ice and get everyone to have at least said something then they are more likely to speak again, but it can also be used effectively to generate a useful list of things to take further in discussion.
Being explicit about the problem
It is always easier to start in the right way than to fix a dynamic in a seminar group that has become difficult. Everyone in the group is partly responsible for how it goes and one way to make a change or to start as you mean to go on is to be explicit about what you want to get out of your time in a seminar group. "The last group I was in had all these long silences it would be great to void that", "Hardly anyone spoke last week so what about trying something new", "Does anyone have any suggestions about how we could make these seminars more helpful, exciting, participatory, and so on". And note that these strategies are for both tutors and students.
Return to Seminar Guide // Return to Collaborative Learning in Philosophy page