“Students must be taught how to think, not what to think.”
I have probably heard the statement above uttered at least 50 times during my career in education. I agree wholeheartedly with the first part of it. I also agree with some people’s understanding of the second part, but not everyone has the same understanding. The second part thus begs for nuance.
Before getting to that nuance, however, it is important to understand the statement’s original context. The statement was originally written by Margaret Mead in her influential 1928 text Coming of Age in Samoa. Mead was an anthropologist who wrote about the sexual liberality of Samoan youth in order to justify her drive to help engineer a lascivious society. In 10 Books That Screwed Up the World, Benjamin Wiker calls attention to the flawed logic that Mead used for her thesis. Rejecting the Genesis account of creation, Mead believed that societies which were more primitive were better representations of the original and natural state of humankind. Thus, according to Mead, since the Samoan society was primitive and lacked sexual restraint, the sexual boundaries known to Western society were artificial; humankind was not supposed to be sexually inhibited at all.
As Wiker points out, however, Mead’s premise was severely flawed:
“One cannot infer that simply because they appear more primitive that they are somehow closer to what is natural and good, and can therefore provide a corrective way to our own life. They might be both more primitive and more perverse. Their societies might have declined rather than advanced. A rogue is a rogue, whether he is armed with a club or an AK-47; there are primitive barbarians and sophisticated barbarians.” (Wiker 179)
Undeterred by faulty logic, Mead unleashed Coming of Age in Samoa on the world and laid the foundation for the sexual revolution of the 1960s.
Now for the larger context of Mead’s famous statement:
“Education…instead of being a special pleading for one régime, a desperate attempt to form one particular habit of mind which will withstand all outside influences, must be a preparation for those very influences…[The] child of the future must have an open mind. The home must cease to plead an ethical cause or a religious belief with smiles or frowns, caresses or threats. The children must be taught how to think, not what to think.” (Mead 177–178, emphasis added)
In other words, what is truly moral is to disavow traditional morality—and religion must certainly go. This context originally framed the “how to think, not what to think” mantra that has become so widely accepted in the educational world.
Secular academics, of course, embraced Mead’s idea with enthusiasm. After all, it was based on anthropological research! And it suited well the atheistic leanings of the academy.
Unfortunately, the notion of “teaching how to think, not what to think” became an accepted mantra in Christian education too. In fact, I have probably heard it more from faculty members at Christian institutions than from faculty members at non-Christian schools.
And here is where the proper nuance is appropriate. I completely agree that educators should not teach what to think with regard to issues that are genuinely and abundantly complex, especially when God’s Word may not offer precise direction. I also acknowledge the danger of teaching so much what that the outcome is a group of learners who are automatons who do not understand or recognize the complexities of reality and instead simply parrot the elements of an overly limited worldview. This error often leads to a failure in teaching students how to think.
However, Christian educational institutions must be careful to not simply Christianize bad secular ideas. Instead, positions such as Mead’s must be evaluated thoroughly; then they must be rejected outright if they are contrary to biblical truth, or they must be properly nuanced and qualified if they contain elements of truth. Unfortunately, Christian education’s use of Mead’s statement is indeed an example of a bad secular idea being Christianized and embraced in whole instead of being properly framed. Because the idea was far too accepted in the general world of education to completely disavow it in Christian institutions, Christian educators adopted it as well, albeit with different justification than Mead’s. During my lifetime, I have often heard it associated with one of the following well-intentioned refrains:
“We should not be indoctrinating students as most secular institutions do. We should take the high road and simply teach students how to think, not what to think.”
or
“It is not the educator’s responsibility to impose on students his or her beliefs about controversial issues. Educators should teach students how to think, not what to think.”
These justifications are shortsighted, however. First, one of them explicitly admits that secular institutions are teaching students what to think while at the same time declaring an unwillingness to counter secular indoctrination attempts. That’s a problem. For decades, college professors across the country have been peddling anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-sanctity-of-life, anti-free-speech, anti-free-market, anti-American, anti-Western, anti-merit, and anti-common-sense dogma to millions of students. The secular academy has most definitely taught students what to think, and I fear that too many Christian institutions have, in the spirit of avoiding controversy, failed to push back with the same level of determination.
For anyone who believes I might be overstating the issue, consider a peer-reviewed article by scholars Lester W. Wright Jr. and Jenifer M. Cullen. Wright and Cullen’s article is titled “Reducing College Students’ Homophobia, Erotophobia, and Conservativism Levels through a Human Sexuality Course.” The title alone demonstrates the authors’ desire to teach students what to think. The authors spend much time writing about the dangers of sexually conservative attitudes, yet they never acknowledge the dangers and negative effects of sexually liberal attitudes—sexually transmitted diseases, divorce, broken homes, etc. Wright and Cullen conclude that a human sexuality course taught at a large Midwestern university resulted in students being more accepting of nontraditional sexual attitudes and behaviors (and other researchers report similar findings). In other words, these scholars developed a course that was intended to change the minds of students who held traditional beliefs about human sexuality. Secular colleges and universities indeed spend plenty of time teaching students what to think. Consequently, to fully embrace Mead’s statement as a Christian educator is to accept secular culture’s attack on Christian values without offering resistance.
Another reason that well-intentioned support of Mead’s mantra is shortsighted is that it’s actually essential that Christian educators teach students what to think when what to think forms the foundation for how to think biblically. For example, Christian educators have a responsibility to teach students about the person and work of Christ, the authority of Scripture, God’s sovereignty and character, the creation of humankind, the nature of humankind, God’s plan for salvation, the affective work of the Holy Spirit, the importance of holiness, the sanctity and value of human life, God’s loving boundaries for human sexuality, the sacredness of the Church, and the return of Christ. Christian educators also have a responsibility to communicate biblical instruction about a host of moral and behavioral issues about which Scripture is clear, regardless of whether people find that instruction objectionable. Some things are true and simply must be taught in a Christian educational environment. To neglect to teach them because they might be controversial or unpopular is to be complicit in building the type of society that Margaret Mead envisioned.
So while I understand and respect the well-intentioned sentiment of Christian educators who have embraced the “teach how to think, not what to think” mantra, I argue for a revised statement: the Christian educator’s job is to teach students how to think in the context and pursuit of biblical truth.
Mead, Margaret. Coming of Age in Samoa: A Psychological Study of Primitive Youth for Western Civilization. Morrow, 1961.
Wiker, Benjamin. 10 Books That Screwed up the World: And 5 Others That Didn’t Help. Regnery, 2020.
