Cultural and technological developments are changing the way we see and value teaching today. For many, what matters now are certain results teachers achieve, the instrumental utility of teaching. Why Teaching Matterstakes a broader view. Teaching is as old as culture and will persist in some form as long as diverse cultural traditions, practices, and ways of life are preserved and renewed with each new generation. As an essential and problematic human activity imbued with both risk and promise, the work of teachers matters in more ways than we typically recognize. That is why teaching warrants special attention for its own sake and not only for the immediate purposes being served.
As a philosophical guide, Why Teaching Mattersprovides a basic framework for understanding the elemental kinds of engagement that make teaching possible and also problematic. These elements of engagement include:
- Conveying Care
- Enacting Authority
- Cultivating Virtue
- Interpreting Subject Matter
- Rendering Judgment
- Articulating Purpose
- Establishing a Sense of Place
- Engaging Presence

Each element is complicated, contentious, and impactful in its own way, and when combined in practice, contributes to the complexity and significance of teaching. Both those who teach, and those who care about, manage, or strive to influence the work of teachers, have a stake in better understanding teaching as the essential, problematic, and impactful form of human activity that it is, and the many ways it matters to us all.