ABSTRACT
It was a simple experiment hatched at recess. When the teacher moved to the right side of the classroom, students responded to the teacher's questions. However, when the teacher stood on the left side of the room, the teacher's questions went unanswered. It did not take long for one of your author's eighth-grade teachers to find himself standing on the right side of the room unaware of why he was standing there. We enjoyed this prank for a few minutes, but soon we could not contain our cleverness. We revealed our plot. Fortunately, the teacher had a good sense of humor and joined in the laughter, somewhat amazed at our scheme. What we intuitively tested is now a well-documented fact: Students have the power to influence their teachers' behaviors and, in tum, affect the learning environment. Although in the case of this impromptu eighth-grade experiment, our class was deviously conscious of what we were doing and the teacher was unaware of our influence, ideally, both teachers and students should be aware of how students' verbal and nonverbal messages affect the teaching and learning process.
