Tell Me Why!

last wednesday i watched Jeopardy! one of the contestants on the show was a teacher (i forget his name). alex trebeck asked the teacher if his students knew he was on Jeopardy!

"they do know. actually, they cheer for me. they're probably watching right now."

   "do the students who cheer for you get better grades?"

   "weeeeell, all my students get good grades- correllation is not necessarily causation."

or the dialogue went something like that. 

frankly, i can't remember the last time i had to grade something, but i work with, play with, and hang out with enough kids to know that they never run out of questions. ever.

but it isn't something for which they recieve a low of high mark, no matter how much they may try to flatter the teacher. 

it might be easier to grade based on flattery, though...

but why don't we 'grade' based upon curiosity? 

"why do we have to learn adverbs and adjectives."

   "so you don't confuse then with nouns and verbs."

   "why do i have to know those things, too?"

   "because you speak. if you're going to speak, you are going to have to speak well?"

   "but why do i have to speak well?"

   "because you want to be heard. you want people to know that you matter; that what you say matters."

   "i don't care about what people think of me."

   "do you have friends?"

   "yeah."

   "do you want your friends to stay your friends."

   "yeah."

   "then you care. now- adverbs and adjectives."

okay, okay. that scenario is idealized, yes. on the spot, a student asking me "why" might put a little more pressure on me just to answer, "just because." and everyone hates that answer. i don't want to be that teacher- that adult- that condescends. 

it may be annoying to ask "why?" because going back to the correlation/causation thing: the student may not even be particularly sincere in asking. he may just be trying to get me off track and waste time. (i know i did that.)

but he asked. 

don't ask if you don't want to know. you may or may not be ready for my answer. and don't be worried if i don't know either. that's one of the main points of being human: asking and growing.

"no, seriously. why do i have to know about adverbs and adjectives?"

   "well, let's figure it out together shall we?"

   "brownie points for interest!"

   "but we'll see about that higher letter grade."