Dead Poet Society Notes

Good Teaching

Mr. Keating joked around to try to relate to his students and brought them out to the hall in the beginning. He used humor so that his students understand. He also uses analogies from other classes so that they understand. Mr. Keating embedded the phrase “seize the day” into the minds of his students so they could ponder what that meant and figure it out in their own lives. Mr. Keating tells the students to rip the pages out that he thinks is crap, basically. Again he uses humor to connect to his students and to teach them in a way they want to be taught. Mr. Keating inspired them to do something they didn't think they would be interested in just by being their teacher and teaching them what he was supposed to teach. He constantly cracks his students up to keep them interested in poetry. He pushes them to look at literature in different ways. He also gives them an assignment to write their own poem. He uses soccer as a way to get them to like poetry. He encourages his students. Even if they don’t want to, making them believe in themselves too. For example he makes Todd stand up in class and YAWP to try and push the poem he wrote out of him.

Bad Teaching

            One of the other teachers at the school didn't care for the students and their interests like Mr. Keating and got irritated at them all the time, constantly telling them to shut up and sit down. Also the other teachers were stiff and didn't really believe in the students.