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toward my dream of becoming a teacher.
I felt, despite my experiences with my sons' teachers and despite seeing their attitudes shift from positive to negative, that I would be surrounded with others like me eager to spread the news of just how fantastic learning is.

I learned, through a group of 8th grade students whose teacher missed more days than she worked (and who didn't teach much when there, anyway...) that students DO want to learn. The students in her class would at the discovery of me, the substitute, moan, "Oh my GOD! We've seen this video a jillion times already! Can't we do something else?" and, "We don't LEARN ANYTHING!"

Three and a half years into living my dream, I've gone from sort of amused by how little things have changed and incredulous over the changes that HAVE occurred to frustrated by power-starved teachers, lack of access to materials to provide interesting learning opportunities for my students, expectations by administrators that I keep a quiet, robotic style classes, and, the worst part: the students who have passed through, the majority standing out for being over-pressured, over-stressed, and over-worked; OR, on the opposite side-apathetic school-haters.

It's taken all this time, each experience, each feeling of frustration unveiling to reveal another part of the problem to finally reach the core of the issue to provide an answer to this title question.

There are 3 reasons teens don't want to learn:

1. It's one of the few things they can control.

Control over one's life is a basic human need. If you take that away from people, as high-stakes testing and NCLB has, they are going to figure out what they can control. One cannot make anyone DO anything-especially when it comes to something so individual as growing and learning.

2. They are coerced rather than motivated.

"If you fail, you're grounded." "If you get an 'F' on the upcoming test, I will assign you detention..." Grades and parental pressure detract from learning. There's a reason the 'experts' encourage parents not to be authoritarian: Authoritarian structures inspire rebellion. Fear is a bad motivator.

3. Half of them, ironically enough, are "left behind" under standards-based, high-stakes reforms.

Before I knew what the heck I was doing and found ways to teach all students, I felt bad for the kids who weren't average, which was usually about half of each class of kids I taught. The students who were above average were bored after ten minutes and the students who were below average

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