A Student's Definition of Education

Textbookshttp://www.smcmbooks.com/site_incoming_students.asp

Hello readers and welcome to my blog! So here's a formal introduction: my name is Akshita Rao and I am a sophomore in high school this year. This blog is dedicated to my history class this year, and, hopefully, will be filled with bunch of words, thoughts, and opinions related to what I do in class. And now to my first blog post concerning the most school-related topic in school: education...

     According to dictionary.com, the definition of a teacher is "a person who teaches" (Well that's specific, thank you Google!) Sure, that is the job of a teacher, but in my opinion teaching is much more than just an occupation for many. There are two major categories that almost everything falls under- something good and something bad. These categories even apply to teachers- there are good teachers and, unfortunately, there are bad teachers. Sadly, the latter seems to have a slightly greater population among the teacher community. My definition of a good teacher is someone who, along with their knowledge and intellect, respects every student in the class, and is warm, kind, and open to all the younglings in their class. I also feel the most important trait of a good teacher, and all my other favorite teachers in the past, is one who still has a love for learning and shares that passion to everyone. I feel nowadays it's rare to find teachers who are enthusiastic in teaching; they don't seem to have that passion anymore. Based on my observations, as the grade level of a student increases the passion and enthusiasm decreases in teachers- either it's the boring learning material that sucks all these traits out of them or we're just growing up and everybody is decides to be "serious". Personally, I get very bored learning drab material that are taught in drabby ways. I love it when teachers change up the class agenda often and come up with creative ideas to teach, it keeps me (and probably many other students) motivated.
     As stated by rusty-trusty dictionary.com, a student is defined as "any person who studies." (Wow, so descriptive!) This is, overall, the duty of a student, but there must be something more to this extremely specific explanation. So I dwelt in further and with a little help from my teacher, found an interesting video about this whole school-student topic. I watched 'An Open Letter Students Returning to School' by famous author and Youtuber, John Green. (the video is below if you're interested) Here, Green wonderfully describes the job of a student- we are taught by amazing teachers who give us knowledge that will help us in the future. This knowledge that we acquire may be thrown out by a few students, but many use this to make the future a better place. I most definitely agree with John Green. Education is provided so we don't live in a world of stupid people!
     So starting this new year, I wish to become a better student. I also hope to get involved in school- by either joining sports teams or clubs. Naturally, in order to do plenty of things, like me, it is very advisable to be organized, or you'll be sitting up till 3 in the morning. (It's happened before) So, following on this, my overall goal this year is to stay on top of things and be prepared and planned. I am looking forward for my 10th grade in this wonderful education system I tried my best to describe above, and I hope to accomplish all my goals this year!


An Open Letter to Students Returning to School by: John Green