The definition the online Oxford dictionary gives for Education is: 1. "The process of receiving or giving systematic instruction, especially at a school or university."
2. "An enlightening experience"
The two definitions almost completely contradict each other, wouldn't you agree that the process of giving or receiving systemic instruction is far from an enlightening experience?
Looking at your own educational experience, or your children's experience, wouldn't you agree that in the most part education has been drifting away from being profound and enriching to being a memorization of instructions followed by an exam and then a grade as an educational or intellectual status to pride yourself with, or shame yourself by.
Seems to me like education has lost it identity.
Albert Einstein once stated that: "Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind."
Wouldn't it be nice if we would learn from the wise man and woman that have walked before us and actually apply their wisdom rather than just learning about them as the historic figures that they were but not pick any fruits from their labor...
Within the education system today there isn't much to say about "training the mind", maybe because that cannot be as easily measured and then how would we be graded and placed on a scale ranging from "bad" to "good"? but i won't get started with my perspective on grading, that just opens up a whole new can of worms... I'll leave that to another post.
Here is another definition, derived from and related to the actual latin roots of the word Education, I found this in the Napoleon Hill book, "Think and Grow Rich", Chapter 5, Pg 106
"That word (Educate) is derived from the Latin word "educo," meaning to educe, to draw out, to DEVELOP FROM WITHIN.
An educated man is not, necessarily, one who has an abundance of general or specialized knowledge. An educated man is one who has so developed the faculties of his mind that he may acquire anything he wants, or its equivalent, without violating the rights of others. "
Education is thus not about giving children information for them to accumulate and spit up, to be graded by based upon exams, only to be forgotten as they move on to the next piece of information. But rather, Education is about giving them the skills and the tools of thought, supporting them in drawing out their true potential through an internal process of growth and expansion.
I suggest we redefine Education, actually, reclaim it, to it's original and true definition.
By doing so, we recognize that we are all in an educational process all the time, it doesn't start at K and end at 12th, it continues throughout our entire life. With this recognition we can humble ourselves and see our children on an equal level with us, as appose to inferior beings as we tend to see them as. We can learn to treat them, within this endless and challenging process of learning, as we would like to be treated, give as we would have liked to receive, and unconditionally offer them the tools that we were not necessarily given, while remaining open to the possibility that they may choose not to take them, as well as to the possibility that they might have a thing or two to teach us...
Our task as educators, parents and decision makers is to research and investigate the tools of thought, explore and experiment until we find how to facilitate and support our children in the best way possible, so they are not only following the system in learning what is already known, but that they have effective critical thinking and common sense to actually create something new and dare I say better. It might be a cliche, but it also happens to be the simple truth - Our children are in fact our future!!!
And so, if in fact our children are the future, we can no longer accept what has become to the education system. We must make sure they are exposed only to the most effective education so we can ensure they have the best tools to go ahead without us, we must proved them with the tools and skills to take care of themselves and of this world in the most beneficial way, because we won't be here forever to look after them and hold their hands.
