Our English Syllabus

Our English Syllabus mainly talks about learning and education. C.S. Lewis saw learning and education as two separate things. Learning is just the common thirst for knowledge and education is when you are becoming a real human being, a good man. I had a hard time trying to differentiate the two because I have always thought about it as two similar, related things. The article then talks about the importance of living a life of learning and how are you going to apply what you have learned to your own life.

There is a quote that I thought it was really interesting. The quote goes like this: “The proper question for a freshman is not ‘What will do me most good?’ but ‘What do I most want to know?’ For nothing that we have to offer will do him good unless he can be persuaded to forget all about self-improvement for three or four years, and to absorb himself in getting to know some part of reality, as it is in itself.” I am a freshman in college and I have no clue what I am going to major. It says to think about what I want to know instead of what will do me most good. I do think it is really important and necessary to forget about self-improvement and do what I want to do. Learn what I want to learn. But I think that forgetting about self-improvement is one of the hardest things you could ever do especially when the society/culture you grew up in keeps emphasizing the importance of self-improvement.

Later on in the article, C.S. Lewis talks about the need to know as much as you can because “a perfect study of anything requires a knowledge of everything.” We talked in class about the attitude we need to take towards the boring core classes that we are all taking in Calvin. Although those core classes might seem unnecessary, the knowledge that we gain in all those classes will be useful in the future.

I learned from this article that the best I could do right now is to do good and try my best in the classes that I am taking right now because that is my duty as a student and because everything I learn there will somehow be useful in the future.