This is a response to Kelly’s post that could be found here.

In Kelly’s post, it was interesting to see how she perceived the movie “To Sir, With Love.” In summary, Kelly believed that respect played an important role in the movie and that it was the key to creating a relationship between the students and Sir Thackeray. By treating the students with respect, he received it also unlike the gym teacher Mr. Bell who bullied students because they were under his authority. Sir Thackeray taught the students about respect for others and themselves. He expressed that a student must “be motivated to learn and express interest in the topics one is learning,” which is what Kelly states in her post.

Along with Kelly’s thoughts, I’d like to add that in this movie, these students weren’t moving onto college, but they were going straight into real jobs. As students go through school, they don’t really learn the essence of what they need for real life. Instead, they learn math, English and history, which are subjects that don’t really interest them. However, Sir Thackeray used his position to teach the students about the basics of life and what they need in order to survive in the real world. He takes them out to a museum and asks them directly what they want to learn. They mention, marriage, resumes and adult life. Sir Thackeray uses the students’ final year, to build a foundation for what they have coming ahead in the future, which is what the students wanted all along. With a strong foundation, you have the potential to carry any task that comes your way.

Through Kelly’s post, it also made me realize how much it relates to Malcolm X. It seems as if he didn’t have a strong foundation since he dropped out of school at a very early age and became a “street hustler convicted of robbery (Malcolm X, 1).” Malcolm X wasn’t aware of how real life worked until he went to jail. While he was in jail he became “increasingly frustrated at not being able to express what [he] wanted to convey (Malcolm X, 1).” This pushed him to create his own education and become his own teacher. It was only through being thrown in jail, where Malcolm X realized what life really was and how much an education was needed. If he were taught the foundations of life in school, he probably would have been able to learn how to read and write earlier. Through both Malcolm X and the movie, “ To Sir, With Love” we see how respect and a strong foundation of rights and wrongs, play a role in young peoples’ lives. It can potentially keep them away from the harms of the real world and direct them to clearer paths.