Matthias Scharlach

Well then, educate us! Matthias Scharlach

"Knowledge without education is a sword in the hands of a madman" (D. I. Mendeleev.) This statement is worthy of attention. But what is actually the education? For centuries, children were abused to be the objects of politics and economy. They were trained to conform to the expectations of older and more powerful people. Their spirits were crushed, regardless of whether the society paid homage to capitalism or communism. Today's reality is no different from the past: the powerful educates the powerless, the permissiveness prevails nowadays, there is the education of "letting everything happen" as the result of "liberation from the apparatuses of power" and many other things. Systems are still afraid to create people who are confident, creative and determined to implement new ideas and gradually change the world, and therefore the system. But these are the kinds of people we need to meet the challenges of the future. Modern education is not an academic experiment on a subject; it must begin with a question, how the adolescents tick according to their age, what are their needs, hopes and wishes? We need people, who enjoy learning, finding and solving problems, creative weirdo, who learn to master confidently what they need in life. It is no longer a matter of pouring knowledge into somebody´s head, but of understanding and being able to apply the right knowledge in the right place in its context and its effect. This requires a new approach to education, based not just on educating parents and teachers, but on smart, experienced and above all reliable companions for teenagers. In this book you can read about what education was, is and can be.