In his acclaimed book, Why Don’t Students Like School?, Daniel T. Willingham, a cognitive scientist, tackles one of education’s most persistent questions: Why do many students find school unenjoyable or unengaging?
Willingham presents nine principles from cognitive psychology to help educators better understand how students think and learn—and how to teach more effectively.
1. Thinking is not the brain’s default
Contrary to popular belief, the brain isn’t naturally wired to think deeply. It’s designed to avoid thinking when possible because thinking is slow, effortful, and error-prone. Instead, our minds rely heavily on memory and previously learned routines. People will only willingly engage in thinking when it offers a reasonable chance of success and reward. This means that students enjoy mental work only when the conditions are right—when the problems are challenging enough to be solvable but not too hard to discourage.
For teachers, this means designing lessons that provide that “sweet spot” of difficulty. Students need to face meaningful problems that stretch their abilities without overwhelming them.
2. Factual knowledge precedes higher-order thinking
In the debate over teaching facts versus skills, Willingham argues firmly that factual knowledge is essential to critical thinking. While it’s fashionable to emphasize creativity, problem-solving, and analysis, these skills cannot function without a strong foundation of background knowledge stored in long-term memory.
Facts help free up working memory. When students don’t have to spend cognitive resources recalling basic information, they can instead focus on applying or analyzing it. Willingham challenges the idea that students can just “Google” facts when needed. While information is widely available, it’s useless without the mental framework to process it. In essence, the more you know, the easier it is to learn new things.
3. Memory is the residue of thought
Students remember what they think about. Memory is not a passive process—it is shaped by the mental engagement students have with material. Students are unlikely to retain anything meaningful if a lesson encourages surface-level thinking or distraction.
This leads to an important teaching implication: focus students’ attention on the meaning of the material. For example, attention-grabbing stories or visuals unrelated to the content (e.g., dancing mascots in a math lesson) can backfire by drawing cognitive resources away from the core ideas. Willingham suggests designing activities requiring students to wrestle with the content meaningfully.
4. Understanding abstract ideas requires concrete examples
The human brain is better at processing concrete information than abstract concepts. This is why students often struggle with theoretical ideas in subjects like math or science. Abstract principles make more sense when grounded in specific, tangible examples.
Teachers should begin instruction with real-world or relatable examples before introducing generalizations. Abstract content should be revisited multiple times, using a variety of examples, so that students can build strong conceptual frameworks.
5. Practice enables automaticity and transfer
Practice doesn’t just improve rote recall; it also builds automaticity, freeing cognitive resources for more complex thought. Students who have practiced a skill sufficiently can apply it in new contexts—what psychologists call “transfer.”
However, the transfer isn’t automatic. Students often struggle to see how something they learned in one domain (like proportional reasoning in math) applies elsewhere (like interpreting graphs in science). That’s why varied practice and multiple contexts are essential.
Drill may not be exciting, but Willingham defends it—when done strategically—as essential for building fluency that supports higher-order thinking.
6. Students are not “little scientists”
Willingham critiques the idea that students can or should learn like scientists—through pure discovery or inquiry. While inquiry-based learning can be valuable, it assumes a background of knowledge that most students don’t have. Experts in science or history use sophisticated methods to explore ideas—but these methods only make sense once a student already has a grasp of the content.
In other words, to get students to think like scientists, we must first help them know like scientists. Effective instruction begins with direct teaching of knowledge and gradually transitions to exploration and analysis.
7. Learning styles are a myth
Research does not support the popular idea that students learn best when instruction matches their preferred “learning style” (visual, auditory, kinesthetic, etc.). Willingham emphasizes that while students have preferences, tailoring instruction to those preferences does not improve learning outcomes.
Instead, instructional methods should be chosen based on the content, not the student. For instance, learning geography benefits from maps (visual), while music is inherently auditory. Good teaching matches the method to the material, not to presumed cognitive styles.
8. Helping slow learners
Willingham stresses that intelligence is malleable. While students may begin at different levels of ability, they can all improve with the right instruction and practice. He warns against fixed mindsets—the belief that intelligence is innate and unchangeable—which can discourage effort and persistence.
To support struggling learners, teachers should provide targeted practice, break down complex skills into manageable steps, and maintain high expectations. Importantly, students need to understand that effort leads to improvement.
9. Teachers’ minds matter too
The final chapter turns the lens on teachers themselves. Willingham notes that teaching is a demanding cognitive task that requires constant decision-making, planning, and responsiveness. Like students, teachers also benefit from practice, reflection, and the development of automaticity in their routines.
He encourages teachers to cultivate habits of mind that align with how learning really works—such as thinking ahead about the cognitive difficulty of a task, anticipating misconceptions, and deliberately shaping the kinds of thinking students engage in.
Key implications for the classroom
- Pose good questions, not just give answers. Questions trigger curiosity and provide a context for meaningful thinking.
- Design for cognitive engagement. Ensure students are doing the mental work you want them to remember.
- Balance novelty and clarity. Use attention-grabbing elements only when they support the content, not when they distract from it.
- Sequence lessons carefully. Build knowledge incrementally, from concrete to abstract.
- Practice deliberately. Focus on core skills, give immediate feedback, and revisit material to deepen understanding.
Final thoughts
Willingham’s central argument is that good teaching must be rooted in understanding how the mind works. Teachers should resist fads and folk theories about learning and instead focus on what cognitive science tells us: knowledge and thinking go hand in hand, and student motivation flourishes when the work is meaningful, manageable, and mentally rewarding.
Though grounded in research, Why Don’t Students Like School? is highly practical. Willingham doesn’t prescribe rigid methods but equips teachers with insights to guide their decision-making. His message is ultimately hopeful: all students can learn—and enjoy learning—when teaching aligns with how their brains are built to think.
