Are Why Questions Bad?

Are Why Questions Bad?

A typical discussion in education circles is that a good pedagogy would present the students with multiple explanations of why certain choices are good. A good pedagogy would show the student why given the limited amount of time a student has in the school day, learning math should be the school’s priority. But as a professor in educational leadership in my graduate school days in the early 1970s, I experienced the opposite. I remember a discussion with a team of faculty from a prominent university teaching the civil rights era civil rights movement. They were discussing what was appropriate to do with the students in their classes. I argued for such a discussion. One of the professors said to me that he disagreed that the civil rights era was an example of the power of positive motivation. I could not argue with that. Yet a moment later he said to me, in effect, that it was pointless to discuss why civil rights workers would have worked without earning money. That was his reason for not discussing the facts and reasons. I was puzzled. So I asked the professor, “Didn’t some civil rights workers receive money in order to complete their assignments?” He replied, “Of course, but not all of them worked on behalf of the civil rights movement for that money. If they did, the students would question them and doubt the positive motivation. They would learn that a good civil rights movement requires money and not necessarily positive motivation.” I was shocked. He did not want to explain his understanding of why a civil rights movement would be immoral and not helpful to students. I had never seen such a discussion in a university education program.

Are Why Questions Bad?

My reaction was to do a review of the literature to discover if this was a common issue. I was surprised to discover that yes, there were studies that showed that students learned less when faced with multiple explanations. These studies mainly showed this with judgments. You see, if you ask someone to give a reason as to why it is okay for a police officer to point a gun at you and tell you that you will go to jail if you do not leave the building, the chances are that a student will ask more questions and think more deeply. I cannot tell you how often I read articles where the student argued with the professor. They knew their interpretation of the law and would never give a reason why it was not legitimate for a police officer to point a gun at them. They also knew that there was nothing good in law enforcement in their estimation. Yet, they argued and did not give the professor a reason as to why it was wrong. Their reasoning was expressed by “some of my friends tell me that it is OK.” But it is an important point. When a student is forced to give multiple reasons to justify why it is reasonable for a police officer to point a gun at you, they may stop thinking and debating. Their effort to think critically will go down. They will ignore the teacher who believes that it is reasonable and start looking for other reasons to justify the law.

Are Why Questions Bad?

So, when a teacher uses “why questions” to stimulate critical thinking, a student does not learn to think critically or be more tolerant of conflicting explanations. The reason is that students come to think critically when they have been given a reason that is reasonable. It is not because they are exposed to multiple explanations but because they have been given a reason that makes sense to them. Students who are taught to reject even the fact of other reasonable explanations for something will be very resistant to learning to understand and accept multiple rational explanations. Therefore, even if teachers say “why questions are good” there is no reason to believe that a student who is taught to think critically is learning how to think logically and use reason. The problem is not that “why questions are bad.” It is that “why questions” are bad for an education program to teach.

Conclusion

I believe the answer is the same as with why questions. The most important question is “Why questions are good.” An education program that includes questioning is one that will be more successful in getting a student to think critically and take responsibility for the work they have done.