Walt Whitman's Impact On Education

Whitman’s students lay in grass to watch lady bugs and waded through ponds to catch frogs. Why?—Because Whitman did not see the merit in students learning through second-hand methods. “…But each man and each woman of you I lead upon a knoll” He wanted to truly show his students the world, as closely as possible, recognizing he could learn as much from them as they could from him. In many ways, Whitman helped the American education system along, though he would surely still criticize it today. In Whitman’s poems, Song of Myself, number forty six and forty seven, he boldly states many of his radical ideas which continue to be profound insights, and have helped many rethink our current education systems. Walt Whitman believed firmly in the idea of hands-on learning and the
exercise of thought and creativity in both the student and the teacher. “You are also asking me questions and I hear you, /I answer that I cannot answer, you must find out for yourself,” he declares in song number forty six. “We see that Whitman puts himself forward as a teacher of the solid prizes of the universe, but more than this, he affords them to the pupil; but the pupil must be worthy.” states Mike King in Pure Consciousness Mysticism. Whitman promoted the idea of hands-on work and students learning for themselves—Whitman as a teacher merely acting as a guide. Whitman also felt that learning never ceased. He felt that often lack of learning could be either the student’s or the teachers fault. “For Whitman, bad pedagogy was a product of an unnatural understanding of children [students]” He was often harshly criticized for his radical teaching ideas, however. “Walt Whitman was a terrible teacher, at least when judged according to the pedagogical standards of his day…[His] pedagogical inventiveness earned him the enmity of his peers…” His radical ideas harnessed much criticism from other teachers and writers of his time. However, he stood firm in his pedagogical philosophes. Whitman went beyond hands-on to the idea that only the student could travel the road the teacher directed them to, and the relationship between student and teacher was mutual along the way.
“Not I, not anyone can travel that road for you, /You must travel it for yourself,” Whitman avows. Clearly and firmly, Whitman believes that he is the guide, and the student in many ways teaches themselves. He also recognized a mutual relationship between the student and the teacher. “If you tire, give me both burdens…and in due time you shall repay the same service to me.” He also “will you be a bold swimmer,” avoiding a word such as dare or force, saying he wishes, or guides or prods, but does not push. Finally, he takes this ideology a step further. “He that by me spreads a wider breast than my own proves the width of my own, /He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher,” willing his students and readers to out-do him, and even destroy him. By destroy, however, he most likely means able to defeat in whatever task has been taught in a thorough way. Walt Whitman obviously felt the student should be able to go further than the teacher in the end, if the student so chose to travel the
road. In the course of education reform, even today, Whitman has played a distinguished role. “Anti-intellectualism in American life still prevails at least to some extent today and during the nineteenth century accounted for the state of public education. Whitman described it thusly: low teacher status, poor pay and lack of job security, and poor and persistent working conditions such as dilapidated school buildings, insufficient ventilation, and overcrowded classrooms,” proclaims Bernard Hirschhorn in Views on Education. His reforms have helped improved our system, though he would surely still criticize how things are done today. John D. Pulliam states in Walt Whitman’s Contribution to American Education Theory: “Although Whitman is not counted as one of the great educational reformers of the nineteenth century, he was unremitting in his attempts to bring about improvements in public education.” Whitman took his radical ideas, and throughout the decades and centuries, and a prominent author, many have at least been attempted to be applied in our school systems. Walt Whitman was an extraordinary philosopher, idealist, writer, and teacher. His ideas, though much criticized, have become greatly influential and continue to challenge individuals and society today. Certainly, however, his educational ideas can be observed and applied even today, quite possibly with more success within our education system.