Why?

Remember when we were little kids and we always asked “why?” Our curiosity was endless. We wanted to know how things worked, why they worked the way they did, how come things stopped working, etc. At some point between that curious toddler and adult today, that curiosity has dimmed. Most adults I meet today are not quite their toddler selves, and with good reason! They usually have toddlers of their own. And well, if you’ve seen a toddler before, you know that they are in no shape to take care of another toddler.

I do want to share with you about a group of adults who I had the pleasure of working with some years ago who still managed to keep that curiosity alive in their professional lives at the very least. I was fortunate enough to work with them when I first started teaching. While many teachers are amazing, this group of educators really was top notch and I’ve learned so much from them. I’d like to share their level of curiosity with you.

Allow me to elaborate. These teachers asked the question “why?” every chance they got. They asked it so frequently I thought it was about to go out of style. Any time we planned lessons together or graded tests or did anything that was required of us to teach, “why?” was always looming over our heads. As time passed, I learned that there were some “why?” questions that we had answers to, while others were meant for us to just ponder for a bit.

For example, after a test that many students didn’t do well on, “why?” came up. There were many thoughts that popped up in our heads:

1. Maybe testing kiddos without a review day was not the best idea,
2. Maybe testing kiddos on a Monday was even worse,
3. Maybe the concept was too challenging and they needed more time,
4. Maybe we didn’t do a good job explaining the concept the first time around,
5. Maybe they needed more examples during the unit like the examples on the test,
6. Maybe the level of difficulty of the lessons and homework was not quite on par with the test,
7. Maybe the kiddos had gaps before they started the school year that we didn’t know about, etc

Interesting how a single word – WHY – was able to spark so much conversation.

In my years of teaching, I’ve learned that asking this question was even more helpful before I planned lessons. Why is this assignment important? Why do we teach this topic this way? Why is the pacing of the topics set in the way that it is currently?

I usually ask myself the question of “why” even when I’m working with students in a small group setting – why are we doing this? In fact in the last week of tutoring about 50 students I can honestly say that I’ve asked myself this question during every session. Why are we assigning 60 calculation problems for homework to middle schoolers? Why are we not assigning any word problems to high schoolers? Why are elementary students not assigned any math homework to practice recently learned concepts? Why are elementary students assigned too much homework?  Why do we need to start the year off with the hardest topics for some of the grade levels? Why don’t we review for a little longer? Why do we need so much review time?

As a first year teacher, I was very privileged to have amazing support to help me think about these questions. But I realize that not every teacher has the same amazing support that I did. So when you’re planning lessons, or unit pacing, or assignments or even assessments, be more like your toddler self. Start or continue to ask “why?” Happy teaching!