Replacement of Formal Education

Gaith Tellisi
600A
February 05, 2009
Draft 4

Replacement of Formal Education

End of the formal education system-when teachers or parents look at this phrase, the first reaction will be “Wow it can be such a big disaster for the schools, universities, and institutions”. People in other words will start asking questions, is it a good idea to end the formal education for the children and young youth? What is the replacement? How can that enhance and develop their lives without the formal system? All these questions can be difficult to answer; however, some teachers have figured out a solution, which is a non-formal education system. This new system considers to be more effectively. It will help the children to learn about their world and the meaning of working together (Holt 61, 62).

First of all, most of parents believe that the formal education system is important for their children to increase their knowledge and improve their intelligent skills, but they have to learn about their outside world and practical life as well. In other words, the children need to get out of the school buildings, and they have to get out of that closed environment (61). Unfortunately, when hearing about the outside learning, people handle it as a crazy idea in the beginning. However, teachers start recently to understand the importance of teaching their students outside the schools, and give them the opportunity to know about their world. For instance, some States in the United States start planning to have public schools without buildings. Even more, they are trying to involve and encourage their students in groups to go to the city and learn as if it were their school. For example, they should go to the museums, industries, businesses, and do some activities in the city to teach them some useful general life skills, which can help them to communicate with the outside world in the future (62).

In addition, the non-formal system encourages the children to work together to teach them how they should support and help each other. In fact, when starting doing some researches about the children, the teachers believe that the children have the ability to teach each other. As Holt said, “Let children work together to help each other, learn from each other and each other’s mistakes”. As an example, some schools start involving their students who are in the highest grader to help the students who are in the first grader and having some studying troubles. After a period of time, they find a lot of improvements. Some other schools are also trying to add a kind of new technique to their system called Paired Learning, which means that the children should interact with each other by giving them the same task and let them work together and share the same tests. Also let them share the same results and goals in order to teach them how that will help them in their real world (62).

In conclusion, the answers for all those questions can be easy for some teachers being far away from people’s mind. They believe that there is no replacement for the formal education system. As a matter of fact, there is a replacement, which is the non-formal system that helps the children to develop their social skills and to be familiar with their outside world. It teaches them also that working together as a team can help them to reach their goal easily. As a result, non-formal education system is a lifelong education, which means it is not something that finishes when the children leave the school.

Works Cited

Holt, John. "School Is Bad for Children." New Directions: Reading, Writing and Critical Thinking. Ed. Peter S. Gardner. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 59-63.