An Essay on Purpose of Education
What is the purpose of education? We seldom think of this. Briefly, the purpose of education is to bring about physical, mental and social development of an individual. Education, if simply stated, means the process of gaining knowledge, inculcating forms of proper conduct and acquiring technical competency. It involves the cultivation of an innocent mind, the instilling of values and principles in the minds of children. It includes the development of skills along with the achievement of one 's physical, mental and social development. To put it in technical terms, education consists of defined phases starting from formal education that consists of primary, secondary and higher education and ideally it never ends.
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Education helps an individual to thrive in society, to interact with other social animals and helps a person attain and maintain a certain degree of social well-being. During the process of education, one is always a part of a group, be it school or college. The process of education thus contributes to one 's interpersonal intelligence. The fundamental purpose of education is to teach a person to read and write. Reading goes a long way in life, providing the reader with experiences of life and training him/her to lead a meaningful life.
Bill Beattie, one of the famous authors and writers believes that education should teach us how to think, rather than telling us what to think. Eric Hoffer, an American social writer, believes in the main purpose of education being the implanting of a will and facility to learn. He believes that the purpose of education is to produce learning individuals and not necessarily learned ones. Bishop Creighton, on similar lines states that education should aim at creating people who continually ask questions. By this he means to say that education should nurture the inquisitiveness and curiosity in