Mary Budd Rowe (1925–1996) was an American science educator and education researcher, best known for her work on "wait time," which showed that when teachers wait longer for children to answer a question, learning and inference can dramatically improve.
[1] Born and raised in New Jersey, Rowe attributed her interest and approach to science education to an early encounter with Albert Einstein.
[3] On her middle school's annual visit to Princeton, she encountered the physicist gesturing and moving his hands rapidly, looking at a fountain.
He then showed her how to wave her fingers to create a strobe effect and examine the shapes the water made.
"[1] Rowe attended college in New Jersey, graduating with bachelor's degrees in biology and education in 1947.
[1][3] Rowe collected hundreds of recordings of classroom talk, and fed the sound from the tapes into a mechanical plotter to allow her to measure the lengths of pauses in conversation.
[6] Rose found that "sanctioning behavior"—either positive praise or negative feedback—discouraged the quality of student responses.
[1] She served on several high-profile commissions, including the National Research Council Committee on Science Education Standards and Assessment.
She served as a science advisor to educational television shows, 3-2-1 Contact, Voyage of the Mimi, and Reading Rainbow.
[1] Rowe's research on wait time has had an lasting impact, influencing how science educators are trained for decades after first publication.