Global #Kidwish Project

"Great moments are born from great opportunity." - Herb Brooks

It's been an incredible week.  Every week seems pretty incredible since I switched jobs this year from being a 5th grade teacher to a Curriculum Support Coach.  I still often miss having my own class and being able to act on moments of serendipity without having to convince someone to let me borrow their students, but it's exciting to have the job of helping teachers and students do awesome things every day.

This week was exceedingly incredible, though.  First, I was able to work out the details with our local newspaper, The News Eagle, to allow our 5th grade students to start writing blog posts for their website.  The paper was looking for the perspectives of students in the area, read the blog posts our students have been writing, and asked if we could partner up.  There's no better way for our students to learn to write than to actually be journalists, so we were happy to accept.

Next, after about a month of research and planning, the our 5th grade students put on their first US History Living Wax Museum.  Each student researched a figure from early American History, wrote a monologue in the first person, and came up with a costume that was as historically accurate as possible. We invited younger students and community members.  Each student stood or sat frozen until "activated" by a visitor.  They then came to life and delivered their monologue before freezing again.  It was a whole lot of fun, our students learned a great deal, and the comments from our visitors were overwhelmingly positive.

The most exciting thing about this week is the launch of an fantastic global collaboration project that I have been lucky enough to be working on with three absolutely amazing teachers from across the country.  A few weeks ago Dyane Smokorowski, Andrea Keller, and Karen Wright-Balbier contacted me and asked if I'd be interested in collaborating on a project intended to connect classrooms.

One of the great things about being a networked educator is the inspiration that comes from seeing the things that others do with their students.  Having been connected to these teachers for years, I was so excited and humbled that they thought of me to help out with this.

Our intention is to connect regular ed, special ed, special needs, and mainstreamed classrooms across North America so that students can share their wishes for 2014 with each other.  They'll do this by exchanging holiday cards and meeting face-to-face to share their wishes via videoconference.

I believe that school should be less about what you know and more about what you can do to make a difference.  Instead of telling students to sit down and listen, we should be empowering them to stand up and facilitate the change they want to see in the world.  Instead of complaining about what's wrong, I want my students to start becoming the members of society that make things right.

My hope is that this project is a way to help students start those conversations.  If the four of us can assist teachers all over the world in helping their students share their wishes and dreams for the upcoming year, maybe those students and teachers can start making them come true.

To learn more about the 2014 Wishes Project, and to sign up, visit the website we created.  You'll find information about the project, a map of classrooms that have already signed up, and possible extension opportunities.  If connecting with other classrooms like this seems overwhelming to you, don't worry.  We're going to help you with whatever you need to make this successful.

I opened this post with a quote from Herb Brooks, a hockey coach most famous for guiding the 1980 USA Olympic team to the gold medal in the Lake Placid Olympics.  Great moments are born from great opportunity.  I know what an amazing opportunity this is for our students.  I can't wait to see the moments yet to come.  I hope you'll join us.

Friday's Five - My Favorite Lessons

Every teacher has a few lessons that they get excited to teach every year.  I'd bet that for the majority of teachers these are lessons that do not come from a textbook, are engaging, and get students excited to learn.  They probably have nothing to do with preparing students for standardized tests.  In today's post, I'd like to share five of my favorites, and encourage you to share your favorites in the comment section.

1. Pasta Mining - I love this lesson because it allows me to combine social studies, writing, math, and science into one lesson, makes my students use higher order thinking, and gives me an excuse to dump 16 pounds of pasta onto my classroom floor.
2. You Be the Supreme Court - Every year when we finish learning about the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights, I give my students the opportunity to listen to overviews of actual court cases dealing with each Amendment (except #3, which has never been relevant in a Supreme Court case).  They then get to vote on what they believe the Court's decision should be based on the facts.  I then tell them how the Supreme Court actually ruled.  The case overviews come from a beat up, highlighted, and written on book that I bought for 25 cents at a garage sale about fifteen years ago.  It's the best quarter I ever spent.
3. π Day - On March 14th we celebrate π Day in my math class every year.  The activities vary from year to year, but there's always an abundance of pie, excitement, and learning.  You can see what we did the past two years here and here. 
4. Book Reviews - I always hated book reports, both as a student and as a teacher.  There didn't seem to be a purpose for either reading or the report that came afterward.  Since I've started having my students write book reviews and publish them to our class wiki, I've seen a great deal more interest.  Since many of my students refer to book reviews from past years when they are choosing books to read in their free time, they understand that publishing a book review will help others in the future.  It's also refreshing to them to be able to say, "I really didn't find this book interesting or entertaining at all" if they feel that way.  I simply ask that they back up any of their opinions with examples and details from the book.
5. State of the Union Address - For someone that teachers American History, there is no better event than the State of the Union.  Regardless of who the president is, there is always a plethora of material for students to discuss and learn ranging from the content of the speech to the historical significance and procedure.  My students always love learning about the presidential line of succession and the reason one cabinet member is always hidden in a secure location.

What are your favorite lessons to teach?  Share with us in the comment section below.  Feel free to steal my lesson ideas; I'm sure I'll steal yours if they fit what I'm teaching.  Also, please share the post with others in your network so that we can steal their lesson ideas as well.  After all, imitation is the finest form of flattery, right?  

Friday's Five - My Five Favorite Topics to Teach

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Friday's Five is a feature every week where I pick a new topic and list five items that I think fit best.  Then I ask you to share your thoughts in the comment section.  For an archive of past topics, check the Friday's Five Page. 

Photo Credit:  Merrimack College

I have to admit that I had a tough time deciding on a topic for this week's Friday's Five.  I'd imagine that all writers go through stretches where they just don't feel as creative or motivated as usual.  I finally decided to write about five of my favorite curriculum topics to teach because every time these subjects come up in class I get reinvigorated.  They may not be the most important things for 5th graders to learn, but for me, teaching these things is like a shot of instant motivation.

1. Idioms - I know that you are probably laughing at me right now.  I won't take it to heart.  I've got thick skin.  For the most part, native English speakers never really think about the literal meaning of the idioms we use every day.  When I ask my 5th graders to look at idioms from the point of view of someone learning English for the first time, there are always plenty of chuckles as they imagine someone who's eyes really are bigger than their stomach, actually paying through your nose, and how horrible it would be to actually be bent out of shape.  They love to draw pictures of the literal meanings of some common idioms.
2. The Bill of Rights - If you've read my blog before it shouldn't come as a shock that I believe that educating students in civics is vital to the success of our democracy.  The magic happens when students start believing that their understanding is vital to the success of our democracy.  That seems to happen when we start discussing the Bill of Rights every year.  About 10 years ago I picked up a paper back book on the Constitution at a yard sale for a quarter.  It's got notes and markings all over it.  It's the best 25 cents I've ever spent.  Inside that book are real and hypothetical Supreme Court cases on each article and amendment to the Constitution.  Students love playing Supreme Court - hearing the facts of the cases, debating how the case relates to the Constitution and comparing their opinions to the actual rulings.  
3. Graphing and Statistics - When I was growing up in New York during my elementary school years I loved collecting and trading baseball cards.  I was fascinated by the statistics on the backs of the cards and what they meant.  When we work with data in class I try and inspire that same passion for my students.  Teaching them how powerful data is when trying to get others to see one's point of view always helps.  Introducing graphing to my students also allows me to dump 20 lbs. of pasta all over the floor in one of my absolute favorite lessons, Pasta Mining.  
4. The American Revolution - The events of the 1760's and 1770's in North America make up a great narrative.  Like a great Hollywood movie there are interesting characters and an underdog overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles to emerge victorious.  In addition, the number of resources available about the American Revolution makes it easy to teach students several of the things every social studies students should be learning that I blogged about last week. 
5. Fractions - Many reports have come out in recent years showing that both high school students and American teachers have trouble understanding fractions.  It's because of the way we teach math as a series of rules to be memorized instead of a series of concepts that need to be understood.  The great thing about teaching fractions is how easy it is to have the students work with visual models and manipulatives.  Playing with "stuff" is much more fun than learning "stuff."

Now it's your turn.  What are the topics in your curriculum that you love to teach?  What is it about them that makes them fun for you?  Please share in the comment section below, and pass the post along to others via Twitter, Google+, Plurk, or Facebook so that we can hear their comments as well.  There's also an e-mail button on the bottom if you wish to share that way.  

Friday's Five - What Every Social Studies Student Should Be Learning

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Friday's Five is a feature every week where I pick a new topic and list five items that I think fit best.  Then I ask you to share your thoughts in the comment section.  For an archive of past topics, check the Friday's Five Page. 

Flickr/Topeka and Shawnee Public Library

This week I switched things up by placing a poll on the A Teacher's Life for Me Facebook Page to ask you what you'd like to see me write about.  The four choices were:

• "Great Ways to Use Voicethread in Your Classroom" 
• "Hidden Educational Gems in Walt Disney World"
• "Important Things Every Social Studies Student Should be Learning"
• "Why the 'Traditional Way' is Holding Our Math Students Back"

While every one of the topics were chosen by some, the majority of those chiming in wanted to discuss important skills our social studies students need to learn.  With federal and state focus on standardized testing our students are getting less opportunity to learn vital lessons that are best taught in our social studies classes.  Here are five vital skills and ideas that our social studies students should be learning from early elementary school straight through high school.

1. Identifying Bias - Now that we are in the internet age, we are constantly barraged with information.  Students need to understand that all of that information is being given to them with an agenda.  The same news story on Fox News is being presented differently than it is on MSNBC, and kids (and their parents) need to know how to sift through the opinions to get to the fact.  We often teach Social Studies out of a textbook, but the process in which textbooks are developed leads to books that are so biased that they often do more harm than good for our students.  To combat this, schools are increasingly looking to use on-line content.  Obviously, with the number of people putting information on the internet, identifying the agenda within content is vital in order for our students to understand history.  
2. There are very few absolutes.  The United States (or any other place) is not a perfect country.  We've done a lot of great things, and quite a few things that aren't so great.  Eliminating the controversy and blemishes makes history dreadfully boring, and robs students the opportunity to learn from past mistakes.  Who would watch a movie where the main character went through life without problems or mistakes?  There's no plot.  At the same time, teaching kids that some countries, or groups of people are all bad is harmful.  There are very few absolutes in life.  Teaching kids to look at all sides of an issue is much more important than any nugget of information we could give them.
3. "Why" and "How" are much more important than "Where, When, and Who." - Often social studies class consists of a bunch of dates, people, and places that kids have to know about and spit back on a test.  The real lessons in social studies are within the "Why" and "How."  Instead of teaching students only that the Bill of Rights was added to the U.S. Constitution in 1791 and what each bill says, ask them to find out why some colonists thought those protections were needed, how some colonists fought against them, and why two of the proposed amendments weren't ratified. (Although one of them did eventually pass and become an amendment in 1992.)  Facts are great for winning Jeopardy, but the real thinking comes from debating the reasons those facts came to be.
4. Identifying Sources and their Validity - Our students should be taught to question everything that is told to them.  This is something that is greatly lacking in today's society.  How many times have you received forwarded e-mails, seen Facebook posts, or heard someone talking about something as fact that is clearly fabricated?  Students should be encouraged to ask teachers "Why?" and "How do you know?"  They should learn to find who is responsible for the website they are reading, the source of the information in the Wikipedia article to which they are directed, and the motivations of the cleverly named organization behind the political campaign ad they just watched.
5. It's OK to disagree, but you better bring strong facts to the debate.  Students are usually taken aback when I ask them their opinions for the first time.  When they do answer, it's usually by parroting what their parents have told them, or what they think I want to hear.  They need to start thinking for themselves.  We should be asking them whether they agree or disagree all the time in our social studies classes.  We also should be demanding that they back their opinion with fact.  Students need to understand that to truly debate a position, they should be able to argue the opposite side of the argument as well.  Only then can they be sure that it is not their emotional bias that is blinding them.  The more we demand that students take a position and back it up, the better they will be able to cope with the bombardment of opinions they face outside our classrooms.  

Flickr/Sprengben

Now it's your turn.  What skills do you think we should be teaching our students in our social studies classes?  How do you teach the skills and ideas listed above?  Are there any that you disagree with?  Please share your ideas in the comment section, and pass the post along on Twitter, Google+, Plurk, and Facebook so that we can hear their opinions as well.  Also, if you aren't a fan on Facebook yet, stop by the Facebook page and click the "like" button so that you can chime in on future Friday's Five topics, discuss ways to improve education, and receive new posts in your news feed.

Friday's Five - Creative Ideas for This School Year

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Friday's Five is a feature every week where I pick a new topic and list five items that I think fit best.  Then I ask you, my readers, to share your thoughts in the comment section.  For an archive of past topics, check the Friday's Five Page.  If you'd like to make suggestions about future topics or discuss topics I bring up on the blog with others, make sure you click the "like" button on the right hand side of the page to join A Teacher's Life for Me on Facebook.  Don't be shy about sharing the blog and Facebook Page with others.  Each post has a "Tweet" button on top and buttons on the bottom that allow you to share in several ways, including e-mail, Facebook, and Twitter.

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When discussing the skills out students will need after graduation, creativity is always near the top of the list.  In order to nurture that skill in our students, it's important that we model creative thinking in our teaching.  A teacher who rarely takes risks and fears failure is unlikely to inspire students to attempt out-of-the-box thinking and innovative methods to solving problems.

With that in mind, here are five ideas that I've been thinking of trying out with my 5th grade students this year.  These endeavors may end up being wildly successful or spectacular failures, but I can guarantee that students will find them more relevant than 40 problems in a textbook.  I can also guarantee that any failures, on my part or the students, will be celebrated as learning experiences.

1. Create public-service commercials - Each afternoon our 5th grade students create a 5 minute news broadcast that is played the following morning.  I'd like to have my class get into groups of two or three students, choose a cause that they feel passionate about, and create a 30 second public-service video that will be played at the end of a morning broadcast.  In addition to 21st century skills like creativity and collaboration, this will certainly force students to meet several language arts standards in our curriculum.
2. Create math "how-to" videos for each of the four operations - It's important to me that my math students truly understand math.  I expect them to do much more than get the correct answer to calculations.  I demand conceptual understanding to the point that they can truly explain not only "what" they are doing as they solve a problem, but also "why" they are doing it.  Often, my students tell me that it's the first time they have really understood math.  To help others we will create a series of videos explaining the concepts of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.  They will be shared on our class wiki.  We've already done a few addition videos.  Last year's class set the bar pretty high with their multiplication video, although they didn't make videos for the other 3 operations.  
3. Partner with a local business to have students create an ad campaign -  I've just started thinking about this one and whether it could work.  I'd like to approach a local business or two and see if they would be interested in sponsoring an activity in which a few teams of students compete to create the best quarter or half page print advertisement.  If it works out, the business would pay for the winning group's ad to run in the high school play's playbill or something similar.  
4. FedEx Days - In Daniel Pink's TED talk video, he talks about how companies have sparked amazing productivity from employees by giving them the autonomy to pursue their own passions for a period of time.  Google famously allows its employees 20% of their time to do this.  Pink mentions how the software company Atlassian has gotten amazing results from what they call "FedEx Days."  Basically the company gives it's employees 24 hours to work on whatever they want and develop a presentation of what they have accomplished.  The term "FedEx Days" comes from the fact that employees have to deliver overnight.  I'd like to give something like this a try and see what happens.
5. I don't know what to call this last idea, but it's something I want to try.  I'd like to give my students a social studies test before we begin a unit.  I won't ask them to actually "take" the test.  I'm just going to hand it to them.  I'm then going to tell them that they have a week or two to create the best wiki page study guide that they can for the test.  I'll grade their study guide based on a rubric I create instead of grading the test as usual.

Now it's your turn.  What are some creative ideas you want to try this year?  What creative ideas have you tried that failed spectacularly?  Which ones were brilliant successes?  What's holding us back from being more creative as teachers?  Let us know your thoughts, and please share your stories in the comment section below.  Also, pass the post along to others on Twitter, Google+, Plurk, and Facebook so that we can hear their opinions and anecdotes as well.

First Reflections

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flickr/faungg

At the conclusion of a school year, it's natural and professional to look back at what you did right, what you did wrong, and what can be improved.  An honest reflection of our practices is the one of the most powerful tools we have in improving our craft as teachers.  Below are some things I've thought about in the past few days, now that I'm on summer vacation.

Here's what the standardized testing data says:  84% (16 out of 19) of my students passed the state reading test.  One student missed passing by one question.  The same student had passed in 4th grade by one question.  100% of my students passed the state writing test.  I was slightly surprised and very happy about that.  It's not a surprise that all of my math students passed the math test, but 2 students fell from "advanced" in 4th grade to "proficient" in 5th grade.

I've been pretty vocal (or whatever the blog equivalent is) about the evils of standardized testing.  The way we use tests to evaluate teachers, judge schools, and drive every aspect of our school day from recess to pedagogy has been devastating to our educational system.  However, standardized tests do have a small purpose in education.  Using the data generated to see students' strengths and weaknesses, and then help those students overcome their weaknesses has been done successfully for decades.  State assessments don't measure what's most important, but the data they generate shouldn't be totally ignored.

This year I think I did a good job at expanding my use of technology to effectively teach collaboration and creativity.  Our class wiki received over 15,000 hits during this school year alone and now has had visitors from 122 countries.  Most of those hits came from people searching Google or Bing for information and getting it from the content my students created.  That's a pretty powerful thing for a bunch of 10 and 11 year olds in a tiny town in Pennsylvania.

I demanded more critical thinking from my math class and saw more learning from this group than any other math class I've taught.  The results on the math final exam were excellent (all but one student scored a 91 or higher), but what really exited me was the one question I gave them after the final was over.  It basically asked, "Joe Smith ran his best mile in 6 minutes.  Later that month he ran his first 26 mile marathon.  How long did the marathon take him?"  Almost every one of my students resisted the urge to multiply 6 by 26 and added on time to account for fatigue.  They thought about the problem instead of just manipulating numbers.  (Thanks to Dan Meyer for that problem.)

As the Head Teacher in the building, I'm proud of the way our discipline program has continued to evolve and the leadership role that I've been allowed to take.  Our office discipline referrals fell 30.1% from last year.

I'm extremely proud of some successes that I've had with students in tough situations and personal triumphs that I've seen in some of our students in different aspects of their lives that I can't mention here.  If you are a teacher, you can imagine the types of situations to which I refer.

I continue to feel unsatisfied, however, with my pedagogical practices when I'm with my reading class.  I love teaching math and American history.  I can't say the same for reading, and I think that comes across to my students more than it should.  In math, I have the confidence to let the textbooks gather dust while I focus on good teaching and learning.  In reading, I don't have that same confidence.  I'm hesitant to stray from the textbook, although at the end of the year I used our wiki to create book clubs based on interest that went very, very well.  You can see the results here.

Since I am well aware that the best way to teach reading is in the content areas, I'm a bit disappointed in myself that I did less direct reading instruction this year within American History that I've done in the past.  Those subjects had a lot more separation between them than I would have liked.

I need to get better with passing control in the classroom to my students.  This is difficult for me.  I want my students to be able to work the way adults do.  Right now I'm typing in a comfy chair with my feet up.  Most of the time when I read it's while relaxing on the couch or lying on the floor.  When I do my taxes, I usually have a snack and a can of diet soda next to me.  But in my classroom, I demand that my students sit in those ridiculously uncomfortable blue plastic chairs for much too long.  They may have the snack they brought only at 9:30.  I think my students would learn more if I gave them more freedom, but I've found that hard to do.

The Need for Narrative

Our students think we're boring.

There's lots of reasons why that we have no control over.  Students are bombarded with stimuli from every direction from the second they step out of our classrooms to the second they enter in the morning.  It seems like they're playing games on portable devices, texting, watching TV, playing video games, listening to music, or all of the above just about every minute they are awake.  This is a product of the culture we live in.  We can argue about whether that's good or bad, but it won't change it, and it won't help us teach any better.

There is one thing that can't be argued, though.  Bored students are emotionally unengaged, and emotionally unengaged students don't learn.

Our real dilemma is that there's nothing especially exciting about most of the material we teach.

When I teach narrative writing and how to create plot to my students I often start with this short story:

One sunny day I went to the store.  The store was three blocks from my house.  When I got to the store I decided that I really wanted a pretzel stick.  The pretzel sticks cost 10 cents each.  I reached into my pocket, took out a dime and bought one.  I ate it.  Then I walked home.

I then ask them what they thought of my story.  They always tell me it's terrible.  When I ask why, they tell me it's because nothing happens.  It doesn't have a plot.  There's no problem, and thus, nothing in which to get interested.  It's impossible to make an emotional connection to the main character.

Too much of what we teach resembles that pretzel story.  Nothing interesting happens.

In his book, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, James Loewen explains that textbook companies, in their quest to sell as many social studies textbooks as possible, have eliminated many of the stories that make history interesting.  Two that come to my mind quickly are the real story of Thanksgiving and Christopher Columbus's actions, but there are many, many more accounts of events in textbooks that range between skewed and downright false.  There's little doubt that real history would be less politically popular, tougher to sell for those textbook companies, and much more interesting to our students.

When we eliminate the controversy the plot is destroyed, and the narrative of our history is reduced to a series of boring facts.  Students are uninterested, and emotionally disconnected.

Math class needs narrative just as much.  Too often we give students procedures and hints to memorize along with pages of calculations, but no real reason to connect with the material.  It's not real to them.  Even the "word problems" in textbooks and on standardized tests are absurd failed attempts to make math "real."  Take the following problem that was on a recent state standardized test I administered:

You go to the store and buy a block of cheese that is a perfect cube.  How many faces, vertices, and edges does the cheese have?

Are we really expecting students to believe that this would happen in their lives?  Or that they would ever care how many faces, vertices, or edges their cheese would have?  It's what Jo Boaler describes as psuedocontext, and it's doing our students a disservice.

Let's stop giving students a multitude of calculations and stop giving them ridiculous problems that lead them to believe that math is something only used for obscure, unrealistic situations.  Like the great story, let's give them narratives where the main character, which in this case is them, has to overcome an interesting problem.  In the process there's a good chance we'll make math relevant to our students.

In the past few years, I've tried to make an effort to build more of these types of problems into my math class with varying degrees of success.  Some, like our Pi Day activity this year, have gone great.  Others, like a shipping problem I created, haven't gone nearly as well.  With each attempt, though, I've gotten better at forming the type of problem that both allows for great understanding of the topics we're learning and gives students a sense of purpose and emotional connection to the math.  There's no doubt from my experiences that students are more engaged with these types of challenges.

Student engagement in other subjects can be increased using many of the same ideas.  In reading, we often ask students to read informational and persuasive pieces in which they have no interest and no emotional investment.  Why not tell them a story, and then give them a problem they have to solve through research instead?  After all, there are only two real reasons we read outside of schools:  because we enjoy the material, and because we need to in order to get information for some real reason.  Shouldn't our reading classes in school start to reflect that?

The most interesting parts of life usually make great stories.  The most interesting teachers are usually great storytellers.  The most interested students are usually those who are most engaged with the material they are learning.  Let's bring the great narratives that make our lives interesting into our classrooms, and watch our students flourish.

The Most Important Word to Use in Your Classroom

One of the toughest jobs that a teacher has right now is to overcome the culture of standardized test prep.  The pressure to pass state tests has lead us to a place where more importance is placed on memorization of factual nuggets, learning test taking tricks, and following memorized procedures than real critical thinking.  For many teachers, it's tough to remember that we entered this profession to inspire the next generation to greatness when we spend the majority of our time filling our students' heads with unrelated facts.  The term "problem solving" used to mean the ability to actually come up with practical solutions to real problems.  It has evolved to mean "coming up with the right answer to a math problem that is written with words." 

That's not problem solving.  That's not critical thinking.  That's the ability to read and make a calculation.

It doesn't take real thinking.  It won't help you figure out how to solve the problems that will face you in life.

When it comes to reading and social studies, our demands on students are no better.  We still ask for the main idea of a passage that students have no interest in reading, but never insist they read something they feel strongly about and give them a change to motivate their fellow students to action.  We ask for the date of the American Revolution and the cause of the Civil War, but never insist that they find parallels to current world events. 

It's as if those in power want us to pump out automatons that blindly follow orders instead of innovators who can mold the future. 

Can we rise above these pressures to inspire students, demand critical thinking, and at the same time prepare our students for state tests? Is there something that can be done which doesn't take a ton of professional development, training, or an overhaul of current practices?  Is there something we can do right now?

Yes.  Start asking "Why?"

When your students tell you the answer they came up with on your math assignment, don't tell them whether it's right or wrong.  Ask them why that's their answer.  When your students tell you that the main character in the story was "friendly", don't let them off the hook.  Ask them to prove why he was friendly.  When your students tell you that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, ask them "why?"  Make the use of "why" so ubiquitous in your classroom that your students know it's coming before you even ask.

Your students will hate it at first, and for a while it will probably be uncomfortable for you.  They'll look at you with blank stares, speechless at the fact that you are making them think.  After all, they've been convinced by our standardized testing culture that this type of real thinking is unnecessary.  They'll hope that staying silent for long enough will convince you to give them the answer.  They'll tell you "because the textbook says so."  They'll hope that telling you, "I don't know" will shut you up.

Don't let them get away with it.  Demand an answer that shows real understanding. Do this until the culture in your classroom is one where critical thinking is expected.

Do this, and your students will be able to do more than just pass "the test."  They'll start to evaluate and judge.  They'll start to wonder and debate.

Something else might happen, too.  You may start to remember "why" you chose the profession that creates all others.  Along with inspiring your students, you may find renewed inspiration yourself.