Dead Poets Society Research Paper

Ryan Green

CPSY 361

Dr. Macari

June 9, 2018

Dead Poets’ Society

A free thinker in a dictators world. When you hear this the first thing you might think is, well that’s not going to go well. Well in the movie Dead Poets’ Society. That’s exactly what happened. Mr. Keating, a new teacher to the Welton Academy for boys who brings a new unorthodox method of teaching to the school. Who pushes the minds of his students to think outside the ways that the school teaches them to. But is he right? Is his way of teaching effective? Or was it a bad way to teach his students. That’s what this paper is paper is about. The effectiveness of Mr. Keatings style of teaching.

At Welton’s Academy for boys, the school holds a high expectation for its students and

its curriculums. They have had the same curriculum since they started and since it has worked they believe that they shouldn’t change how they teach their students. Well all of that is changed when Mr. Keating replaces the English teacher and brings free thinking into his class style. Keating begins a lecture by having the students rip out an introduction by J. Evans Pritchard because he thinks it is an excrement. He says, “We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race, and the human race is filled with passion.” You can’t measure the greatness of poetry by measuring its importance and its perfection in rhyme and meter. Everything he does is against what the school goes for but yet, the students react better to his teaching style. The way he teaches his student’s they actually want to try. In the movie you hear the kids gripe and groan about the other classes, but when it comes to his class, they are actually excited to go to it and hear what he has to say.
Throughout the movie there is a lot of growth within the student’s through his teaching. One student stood out more than the others as his growth was more exponential then the others. Todd Anderson-a shy, quiet student, was influenced by Mr. Keating to come out of his ‘shell’. In the beginning of the movie, we see Todd as a conservative, shy kind of character attending Welton who never has much to say. Though, as the movie progresses, Mr. Keating slowly but surely helps and pushes Todd to come out of his shell and speak what really is on his mind. One of the ways Mr. Keating helped Todd to stop being so shy was when he made Todd make up a poem, in front of the class, on the spot. This activity was quite effective and it gave Todd self-esteem and confidence that brought him out of his shell.
Another reason why Mr.

Keating was an effective teacher was because, from the very start, Mr. Keating always encouraged his students to carpe diem or ‘seize the day’ and become who they really were, rather than how society wanted them to be. One person that Mr. Keating’s philosophy really influenced and affected drastically was Neil Perry, as Neil made many life-threatening decisions based on his advice from Mr. Keating. He stood up to what his father had planned for his life and followed his dream of becoming an actor. But in the end, killed himself because his father didn’t approve of his choices and was going to force him to do what he

wanted.
One of the things that made Mr. Keating such an effective teacher was his ability to relate to the boys in ways that other teachers failed to do. Mr. Keating treated his students with respect and tried to connect with them on a personal level, by sharing things about himself and doing a range of different activities. Mr. Keating did so much more than just share knowledge; he gave the students courage to make decisions on their own. He taught them in different ways and opened up their minds to new ideas by (literally) showing the boys how to look at the world in a new perspective by having them stand on his desk.
As a teacher, he taught as a romantic, following two major quotes that he taught the students early on in his class.

“Carpe diem, or seize the day,” (Horace) and “ suck the marrow from its bone,”( H.D. Thoreau). It is a good teaching style because it teaches the students to think for their own and to follow their dreams, and to not live the lives that others have set for them. Although it is a good teaching style, he only taught the good sides of the romantic style. He didn’t teach them the bad sides of it or the downsides that could come with it. As Mr. Keating talks about later on after something happens because he didn’t explain. “Suck the marrow from its bone, but don’t choke on the bone,” (H.D. Thoreau). Keating’s romanticism led to his downfall. When Neil asks him about what the Dead Poets’ Society was, he replies that they were romantics – that during the meetings “gods were created, women swooned, and spirits soared.” He also says that he wants to forget those times. Keating took precautions to take a different path in his youth by following his career over the woman in London, whose picture was on his desk. However, by doing this, teaching became his new passion. In his attempt to teach others what he had learned in life about romanticism and how it needed to be controlled, he watched Neil, Nwanda, and Knox enter into extreme romanticism, and that not only led to their downfall, but his as

well.