Controversial Teaching In the movie Dead Poets Society Mr. Keating is a new teacher to his alma mater, a strict all boys school. Along with being the youngest teacher, Keating’s beliefs as of how to teach are quit different then what the academy is use to. Although his colleagues frown upon it, Mr. Keating continues to teach his students to think for themselves and not feel the need to follow conformity. Mr. Keating’s message has a tremendous effect on Neil Perry, Knox Overstreet, and Charlie Dalton; as a result their lives have changed and will never be the same. Mr. Keating not only taught his students the English curriculum he also taught his students how to think for themselves. For his first lesson he had the students rip out pages from the textbook, these pages consisted of instructions for the “right” way to evaluate a poem. Ripping out these pages demonstrated that …show more content…
Keating’s lessons have taught his students that their opinions do matter and they ultimately learned that they should have confidence in themselves. With this in mind Knox Overstreet, one of Keating’s students, was able to find enough confidence to win over a girl that he previously was too afraid to talk to. Without the help of Mr. Keating, Knox would never have even been able to call the girl, let alone skip class and sneak away to go see her. Now Knox is dating the girl of his dreams and has the confidence needed to fight for other things he desires, such as future job opportunities. Along with Mr. Keating providing Knox with confidence Neil Perry also gained enough confidence to follow his lifetime dream of becoming an actor. Although he was afraid to audition, because his dad did not approve, he received the leading role in the play. While practicing for the play and learning how to act was fun, he was clearly having the time of his life during the performance. Mr. Keating’s lessons brought such joy to those two boys and many other students that it appeared his message was a great