Education vs Learning — What is the Difference?

Education and learning vary in terms of formality, adaptability, and personalities. While the formal education-based curriculum provides intensive research, learning comes from a source, which is curiosity.

Many times, we may have come across people referring to learning as education which is not the same, Most of us may even use these terms interchangeably. However, these two terms have different meanings.

For example, your school, college, or even office training falls under the paths of education. Here, you shall have a human source (a teacher/professor) to teach you a chosen subject. Now, the point of education is to remember what you have learned and portray your knowledge for grades, certificates, and future professional references.

However, learning is different. Here, you can self-research on a topic to provide yourself with a structural amount of knowledge. It can be about the Shakespearean play that your professor has taught during class hours.

What is the Difference Between Education and Learning

The striking difference between education and learning would be the limits of knowledge. When we talk about the difference, education is just one of the many options of learning. It is one path among many others to learning. And, generally, it’s a systematized approach created, organized, and led by persons other than ourselves.

Education appears to be about attending lessons, obtaining qualifications, gaining and proving knowledge and skills acquisition.

Education is more formal, where you receive a pre-scheduled and researched-on understanding of the subject at hand.

However, learning is more of an informal method, where you can receive your first-hand research materials online, or through books and activities, without the walls of formal education. It comes with a desire to know about a subject, understand its discipline, and utilize its practical usage.

Most of the subjects under learning also do not fall under curriculum education. These could be:

• Coding
• Cooking
• Carpentry
• Digital Marketing
• Search Engine Optimization (Part of Digital Marketing)
• Graphic Designing, and more.

Education Vs. Learning: From a Student’s P.O.V.

With the pandemic, the rise in formal education systems online, added with e-learning, has given a boost to a revolutionized learning method that accumulated the benefits of both fields of knowledge.

While learning is free-of-cost on most school learning websites (Youtube, Skillshare, Duolingo, etc.), online education (Zoom Classes, Skype courses, and more) adds a formal understanding and basic knowledge.

Hence, the blend of both can help achieve a complete understanding of a subject.

Now, while formal education might suit some individuals, learning is a more adaptive method for a few. The latter group harbours a continuing yearn to learn outside their box and personalize their skills.

Not to forget, education vs. learning portrays individuals who do not contain themselves within the scheduled curriculum but enhances their knowledge through various formats. They value practicality over theorized research.

Moreover, pace also plays an important role. Everyone has their own pace of understanding and remembering a course’s details. While an education establishment’s scheduled teaching and examinations can help most students progress, some might not excel as much.

And this is as they might require more time to grasp a subject’s proficiency. For them, learning at their own pace can help churn out better-than-expected results and retain their motivation to continue their pursuit of knowledge.

The Revolution in Academic Pursuit

Every child and adult have their unique pace of grasping knowledge, where they utilize their natural talents, timing, and research skills to become proficient on a subject they love.

And the informal grounds of learning can help retain the mind’s inquisitiveness and help build a personal and professional character that suits the individual.

Moreover, the blend of education with learning, through the introduction of regular online classes, has helped shed the walls of limits in research. Learning is not limited to an institution’s walls or a class’s structure. In the flow of life, it exists. It is rooted as much in cognition as in physicality and feeling. When we move to see learning in this manner, it becomes even smoother to consider and take advantage of the countless learning experiences we experience on a regular basis.

It is a beam of hope which might be the catalyst to make education more adaptable, and similar to the methods of learning.