The author's first teaching position was as a 4th and 5th grade teacher at a school in Philadelphia. There, she learned the Quaker value of adding silence and periods of reflection to her teaching to provide a wider range of students with the opportunity to participate in classroom discussions. Later, a focus on silence as a teaching strategy led her to explore how students themselves use silence as a form of communication. The author also investigated the ways students might participate in classroom conversations through both talk and silence. How does a teacher respond when students are silent in the classroom? This article offers strategies that teachers can add to their teaching repertoire by understanding what silence means and how to use it.