Education Essay

Jennifer Buchholz
Grammar for College
April 21, 2008
What is Education?

When I was told to write an essay on education, the first thing I thought of was school. After watching the movie The Dead Poet Society, my thoughts on education were more extensive. I had never thought about my parents as my teachers or giving credit to my out of school activities, my job, my friends, or the law for the material that I had learned out of school. When I hear the word education, my mind begins to think about how I grew up.
Your parents are your first teachers. They teach you right from wrong, how to tie your shoe, how to ride a bike, how to be polite, and how to drive a car. Your parents can also teach you bad habits. In the movie The Dead Poet Society, one of the characters’ father prevented him from doing what he loved, and made him go to school to be a doctor. The father wouldn’t let his son be in any extracurricular activities, or let him learn anything on his own.
Your friends are also a huge impact on your life. They teach you important life lessons such as trust and you can learn the easy way from their mistakes and their successes. They are usually the ones that affect your decisions the most. By having well educated and polite friends, you are most likely to learn positive habits from them.
The law is also very crucial in the world of education, if you did not know the law you could get into a lot of trouble, it educates you to stay out of trouble and be safe. If you disobey the law, you will soon learn your lesson to never do it again. For example, if someone drove under the influence, and accidentally hit a pedestrian and killed them, you would hope that people would learn from that to never drink and drive, or be more aware of your surroundings when you’re driving.
I think extracurricular activities also can teach you things. When I played volleyball, I learned about teamwork and respect. When I was in cheerleading I learned about hard work and responsibility. I learnt that what I say and do can, and will, affect other people.
Learn from your mistakes, that is exactly what my dad said when I worked for him at the pallet shop. Education at work is a realistic as it gets. It is about being responsible, organized, and in control of what you are doing. That is something I never really learned in school and I am thankful for being able to educate myself.
Education is everywhere. You learn from the simplest experiences. In the article The Hidden Teacher, just by seeing a spider and a web, the narrator thinks of the world and all of its creatures. He learned that “we were creatures of many different dimensions”. Another article I read called Two Ways of Seeing the River, taught me that not everyone is the same, they see things different, and even though you are sitting in the same classroom with someone, you might learn something faster or see something totally different that how you do.
Now what is education to you? Something you learn at school, or something that is everywhere in your life? Start giving credit to your parents and friends, because they play a major role in who you are. Who you became is because of education.