The human race is a social one; they are interacting and learning from people all the time. The people that others associate themselves with influence their personalities, views, and morals. Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird is a book involving learning experiences for many characters. None more than Jean Louise Finch (Scout); Scout is influenced by many characters throughout the events of the book, making her a more mature and rational person. An examination of Scouts interactions with Miss Maudie, Mr Gilmer and Calpurnia show their major contributions to Scout’s development into a mature, intelligent and rationally thinking person.

Through Scout’s experiences of during the trial and she is given a first hand experience to the evil in men. …show more content…
When Scout asks her whether she believes Boo Radley is alive or not, she does not speak to her like a child, saying something similar in tone of; “Oh no sweetie, I’m sure he’s just fine and is having a great time!”. She rather bluntly says “What a morbid question. But I suppose it’s a morbid subject. I know he’s alive Jean Louise, because I haven’t seen him carried out yet.” (Lee 57) By painting the subject in a very black and white fashion, she is not patronizing Scout, but is rather giving her an objective view on things, using information based upon what is known, rather than having a childs imagination distort and create inaccurate scenarios. Furthermore, while Maudie's house is still a smoldering pile of soggy ashes, she is telling Scout about what useful event it it, rather than a tragedy as it would be to most. “Grieving, child? Why, I hated that old cow barn. Thought of settin’ fire to it a hundred times myself, except they’d lock me up.” (Lee 97). Through these scenarios and examples Miss Maudie is showing Scout to be a positive and rational person. This is not destroying Scouts innocence, but is rather preparing her for the impending swath of racism and intolerance she will soon …show more content…
As a young child growing up in the racist 1930’s southern United States, Scout has a black housekeeper, Calpurnia (Cal). Cal teaches Scout respect and understanding. It only takes her presence to give Scout the understanding that she is no worse than white people, if not better than some. However, when Scout visits the black’s church, she learns some more about racial intolerance from a different perspective after Cal replies with this quotation after Scout asks why Jem speaks differently depending which race she is around. “It’s right hard to say... Suppose you and Scout talked coloured-folks’ talk at home it’d be out of place. Now what if I talked white people’s talk at church, and with my neighbors?” (Lee 167). This introduces Scout to the idea of black hating whites, as much as whites hate blacks. It is helping Scout see events from another’s perspective. Additionally, when Walter Cunningham attends the Finch’s for dinner and behaves oddly, by using copious amounts of syrup on his dinner, Scout points this out to Cal. She launches into a furious rant about how people are different but are all important, with notable points being, “Don’t matter who they are, anybody who sets foot in your house’s yo’ company..” and “Yo’ folks might be better than the Cunninghams but it don’t count for nothing’ the way you disgracin’ ‘em...” (Lee 33) Because of Cal’s presence and role as Scout’s maternal figure, she infuses her