Scout's Informal Education

Atticus, the father of Scout and Jem, attempts to deliver the best education possible to his children. He does this informally, because the county that they live in is racist and separated between whites and blacks. His goal is to deliver an education that includes moral and ethics. To Kill A Mockingbird is a fascinating novel of Scout, a girl who is in the process of realizing the world around her. Scout’s father, Atticus, is a lawyer defending an innocent black man in Maycomb County, a very racist Southern county. Throughout the book Scout grows more and more aware of the problems in Maycomb. At first Scout’s informal education is a disadvantage to her. Then it saves her and other characters close to her from some …show more content…
Due to the fact that Atticus teaches Scout proper manners, she saves Tom Robinson and her father from a lynch mob. Scout decides to say hi to Mr. Cunningham, and at first he doesn’t respond. Scout then says that she goes to school with Walter and he starts to remember her. “‘I go to school with Walter,” I began again. ‘He’s your boy ain’t he? Ain’t he, sir?’ Cunningham was moved to a faint nod. He did know me, after all. ‘He’s in my grade,’ I said, ‘and he does right well. He’s a good boy,’ I added, ‘a real nice boy. We brought him home for dinner one time. Maybe he told you about me, I beat him up one time but he was real nice about it. Tell him hey for me, won’t you?’” (174). This shows how Scout is just trying to be a nice kid when she greets Mr. Cunningham but really she made him think about his actions. Atticus had gone out of his way to help him with his entailment, free of charge. This made him think of his son too. This is not how he wants Walter to behave. This is setting a bad example for his son. This shows how Scout is just being a nice person when she approaches Mr. Cunningham, and she unknowingly stops the lynch of Tom Robinson. Atticus tells Scout to not judge someone’s decisions until you walk around in their shoes. After Jem is almost dead for being on the Radley property, he keeps to himself for a bit and Scout takes Atticus’ advice to walk around in his shoes for a bit. "As Atticus once advised me to do, I tried to climb into Jem's skin and walk around in it: if I had gone alone to the Radley Place at two in the morning, my funeral would have been held the next afternoon. So I left Jem alone and tried not to bother him" (65). Jem is scared and not in a good state, but Scout can’t understand why because of her little experience in his shoes. Atticus is attempting to explain to Scout that she does not have to