You choose this time. The quiet in the room is even more overwhelming than the noise of a minute ago. Several students scribble furiously. Obviously they have much to say. One boy sits perplexed.
Several students finish in minutes and shut their notebooks.
Others are still writing thirty seconds before the bell rings when I tell them they may put their notebooks in the crate to be graded and pack up. The noise resumes and signaled by the bell, it drifts out into the hallway. It was a time routinely set aside for reflection. To me, reflection is a form of metacognition - thinking about my own thinking. It means looking back with new eyes in order to discover.