I feel that the most important thing an education can provide for a child is to form a lifelong learner.  That is to say that I think that the most powerful thing a school can do for a child is give them a desire for knowledge as well as the sources to find the knowledge.  If education accomplishes this but nothing else, a child has all she or he needs to succeed.

What I mean by this is if a student graduates from high school but does not know her multiplication tables.  She will certainly be at a disadvantage.  Also, if she never has the desire to learn her multiplication tables and/or she does not know where to find the answers to her questions, she will never know that information and hence will always be at a disadvantage.  Conversely, if this student does not know her multiplication tables at graduation but has a hunger for knowledge and knows where to go for information, she will eventually learn her multiplication tables and will no longer be at a disadvantage.

In order to accomplish this goal of lifelong learnership, I believe many aspects of education should be in place.  For example, a classroom should be a place where students have fun.  Learning should be enjoyable.  As soon as students associate learning with displeasure or discomfort, we have lost them forever.  I do not mean to insinuate that a classroom should be like an arcade or a theme park; I only mean that learning should be fun in addition to being learning.

Also, I feel strongly that learning should be real.  Although it is you can be assured that children can learn information that is separated from any real life experience, it is hardly preferred.  If students need to know about measuring, they should actually go measure something.  Students should not be insulted by requiring them to measure pictures of real things that are printed in a book.  Not only does a real experience make it more interesting and thus more engaging, measuring a real pencil is much different than measuring a picture of a real pencil.  When actually measuring something in real life, students gain practical experience in actually measuring real things which is really what we want them to know anyway.

Learning should be a firsthand experience.  I think that we are disservicing today's students by telling them everything they need to know.  This is not a representation of real life.  In real life, people who need to know something have to find out; they cannot ask always ask their teacher.  So, children in a classroom should be discovering things for themselves.  A teacher, in my opinion, should be more like a guide or facilitator than a lecturer.  Teachers should very actively create environments that foster students' discovery.  If it is in the curriculum to learn about frogs, the teacher would be better bringing a frog into the classroom than reading to the students from a textbook.  Students should notice and observe aspects and habits of a frog on their own.