A Passover thought. Yes. In August.

 I was looking at the Chabad website this evening and saw a brief thought about the relationship between teacher and student, and it closed with the following statement:

"A real teacher is one who goes to the student, awakens the student, and demands, “Why don’t you bother me, my student? Ask me! Speak to me!”"

It makes an important point -- a teacher's job should be to inspire questions. When we have to guess at what students need to know we miss stuff, so the most important skill we can teach is critical thinking empowered by critical questioning.

It called to mind the idea of the 4 sons related at the Passover Seder. There are these 4 sons -- the wise one, the evil one, the simple one and the one "she'eino yode'a lish'ol." This is often translated as "the one who does not know how to ask" or even "one who does not know to ask."

These are nice translations but I think that they miss a more important point. I think that this son is the one who does not know that he is allowed to ask. He assumes that religion has to be taken as unquestioned dogma. He sits back, expecting to be told what to do, never understanding that challenging, raising objections and then listening to explanations and answers is a vital part of the teaching and learning process. The mother is instructed, in response: "At p'tach lo" you (female) open up for him. But open what? Open the floor for questions. Teach him to open his mouth and ask! The entire seder is driven by the concept of "so that the children should ask." The goal isn't to sit there and watch the world go by, but become an active participant.