Making this talk an articulated and visible part of the class is a conscious approach teachers can use to encourage voice. The teacher might begin a class by asking each student to bring in a question or an issue for discussion. This works especially well with novels. The list is put on the board and the students choose the ones they want to discuss. Or students are asked to choose passages they have enjoyed and tell what they like about the passage.
Discussion often opens up as students hear classmates read and discuss something they, too, enjoyed.
Frequently, students will talk back and forth with one another, developing an understanding of character or situation that builds from their own reading and thinking rather than from the teacher's questions. The larger point is that teachers at all levels can help students use talk as a tool and at the same time work with them to create a classroom in which all voices are valued, in which differences are acknowledged, and in which power is more equitable regardless of gender, race, or class. As with most educational issues, the solutions are up to individual teachers wrestling with a myriad of social, political, and educational demands. Teachers teach in countless situations, work with students of all sorts and abilities, and struggle with problems particular to individual schools and classrooms. But teachers can be agents of change who strive to create equitable classrooms for all their students.