In Africa, the community takes responsibility for each child’s education.

The adage, "it takes a village to raise a child," acts as the guiding principle in West Africa. Every member of the community contributes to shaping the child’s morals and values. As a result, each child assumes an identity contingent upon the community. Individualism becomes a threat to the community as a whole.

In a West African community, a person does not choose a career. Rather, the youth assumes a role complimentary to that of his or her family’s traditional role. For example, a farmer’s son becomes a farmer. One learns the skills needed to fulfill each role through participation. Though similar to the concept of apprenticeship, this practice differs in that the African child is born into a prescribed apprenticeship.

The child receives no formal education in our present day sense yet, through observation and eventually participation fully learns the necessary skills.

West African education seems relatively informal in comparison to traditional classroom teaching. Education takes place in the community and hence, the community becomes the classroom.

In African-American communities today, private education continues to take an informal shape. One learns basket weaving, cooking, music making, and preaching by apprenticeship. The learning takes place in the community as opposed to the classroom.

Storytelling, another important aspect of West African education and tradition, continues to thrive in African-American communities today. Through oral tradition children learn their cultural history. For example, the child must learn the reasons for making baskets before he or she learns exactly how to make them.