What is Education? From the eyes of the great minds.
Today’s blog is very simple. We will answer what is education through the eyes of our greatest minds. Throughout this peice I want you to really ask yourself how you felt about your own education, your child’s education and what you see today.
Oxford dictionary definition:
A process of teaching, training and learning, especially in schools, colleges or universities, to improve knowledge and develop skills.
One of the greatest minds in the last 100 years, Albert Einstein was asked which subjects were most important to teach in school. He replied by saying that the subject itself is not important, it is the training of the mind and of the mental and manual skill. He gave the analogy that if you train in gymnastics and walking, your body will be prepared for any kind of physical work.
‘Education is that which remains, if one has forgotten everything he learned in school.’ (1)
So maybe education is the space between what we know and what we don’t know?
‘Education would be much more effective if its purpose was to ensure that by the time they leave school every boy and girl should know how much they do not know, and be imbued with a lifelong desire to know it." -William Haley, British Editor
“An education isn’t how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It’s being able to differentiate between what you know and what you don’t.” -Anatole France
Is education critical thinking and not just repeating repetition?
“When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a literary dogma, we become automatons. We cease to grow.” -Anaïs Nin
“The principal goal of education in the schools should be creating men and women who are capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what other generations have done.” -Jean Piaget
“To think incisively and to think for oneself is very difficult. We are prone to let our mental life become invaded by legions of half-truths, prejudices, and propaganda. At this point, I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose. A great majority of the so-called educated people do not think logically and scientifically. Even the press, the classroom, the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths. To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education. Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction. The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically.” - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
“The purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.” -Sydney J. Harris
Is education a political tool and/or a revolutionary one?
"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world." - Nelson Mandela
"Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world for the better." - Marian Wright Edelman
"Knowledge is power. Information is liberating. Education is the premise of progress, in every society, in every family." - Kofi Annan
“Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation.” - Walter Cronkite
Is education the prepartion of life?
"Education is the key to unlock the golden door of freedom." - George Washington Carver
"Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself." - John Dewey
"The more you learn, the more you earn." - Warren Buffett
“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” —Maimonides
And finally I will leave you with:
"The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go." - Dr. Seuss
Why are we really sending our children to school? Ask yourself that question honestly. Are they just holding pens? In my previous blog Shorter holidays and more time in school! Keep up with the times! I suggested that schools are a reflection of what our society needs. And to be blunt and sceptical, society needs parents to work longer hours.
Sorry for my negative spin. But as Lenard Cohen said, ‘there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.’
References
