This article discusses the issue of "making the invisible visible" from a methodological and a substantive viewpoint. The ideas emerged from a doctoral research study into individual target setting with middle ability students in an English secondary school. The students involved had been identified by assessments as "average" and by their teachers as quiet, unnoticed children. It is suggested that the methods used by the researcher to elicit the students' perceptions could also be used by teachers in order to engage these quiet students in a learning discourse.