I Want To Make Them Free Thinkers Analysis

"I want to make them free thinkers" says Mr Keating to Mr McAllister. This essay will define the meaning of "free thinker", its importance to the young men of Mr Keating's class, the meaning of Mr Keating's statement and finally the different impacts that this new way of thinking has on the boys.

A "Freethinker" as defined by The Macquarie Dictionary is "someone who forms their opinions independently of authority or tradition, especially in matters of religion". Therefore a free thinker is someone who can produce ideas for themselves and is not solely reliant on the thoughts and actions of others to predetermine their life path. To pass from childhood to adulthood is usually an adjustment from following the rules and regulations of figures …show more content…
J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D. Evans explains Poetry by being able to be graded on a graph to determan if a poem is good or not. Mr Keating gets the boys to understand that you can not tell if a poem is good or not by a graph but by how much it means to you and the way it makes you feel. This is becoming a free thinker not using a set structure but actually understanding and appreciating it. He also believes that you can not set an age where free thinking should begin and it should be something that happens all throughout life. For the boys to learn and accomplish the things that Mr Keating wants them to within his class, they must think with there minds and not using a book. However he does not want the boys to become foolish and pull off stupid stunts which can affect their chance to learn and miss out on his class,. For example when Charlie does the stunt in the assembly where he rings a bell and holds up a phone towards Mr Nolan and says that it is god and he thinks they should have girls at Welton. All the boys believe that Mr Keating would be happy but to their …show more content…
For example Neil starts acting and finds that he has found the best way to express himself and to be his own person, but once his father decides for him that the acting must stop Neil takes a turn for the worse and commits suicide. This sudden act that Neil decides could be brought back to Mr Keating teaching the boys to think freely to young. Another student Mr Keating has an impact with is Todd, Todd is a very quiet boy who does not enjoy expressing himself in front of people but Mr. Keating helps him get over this fear by making him think out loud in front of the class and by doing this Todd finds a voice within himself that he never knew he