This paper takes up the issue of student voice as part of a larger political and pedagogical project to create spaces in our schools for students' social, cultural, and individual identities, including their learning identities; that is, that all of the students in our nation's classrooms find that people who "look like them" are welcome (Dei et al., 2000). The article begins by presenting a brief rationale for valuing students' voices in classrooms. The authors then argue that what Bartolome (1994) calls the "methods fetish" that increasingly dominates urban classrooms-and special education-is the principal means by which the voices of many students are silenced. Finally, the authors draw on a number of examples of classroom practice to illustrate the power of whole language practices to tap the political and pedagogical power of students' voices.