ABSTRACT
The assertion of ignorance is a pedagogical strategy that dates back to the earliest accounts of teaching, and is probably even older than that. When the responsibility for responding to an inquiry is redirected back onto the student, it sends a message that the struggle to think through the question is more important than the answer itself. Educators have long known that it is more likely for students to recall answers they have previously figured out on their own, compared with something they were simply told. One mark of a healthy classroom environment is the presence of a substantial amount of subject-related talking by students. Direct answers to questions that arose in the course of an inquiry-based activity were offered less frequently than other types of responses, but appeared to be necessary on occasion in order to move a student along towards more substantial questions.
