TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is a U.S private nonprofit foundation best known for its conferences, now held in Europe and Asia as well as the U.S., devoted to what it calls "ideas worth spreading". In this 2006 presentation, Sir Ken Robinson address the essential question of the title of this article. I found his talk thought-provoking and I'm wondering if you will, too.
Please watch this video that you can find at this link. I'd like you to tell me what YOU think that this AP class, Social Studies classes, or the school as a whole can do differently to address about what Sir Ken is speaking. A response is required by the end the day, February 26 and will be graded.
(Sir Ken Robinson is an internationally recognized leader in the development of innovation and human resources. He has worked with national governments in Europe and Asia, with international agencies, Fortune 500 companies, national and state education systems, non-profit corporations and some of the world’s leading cultural organizations. They include the Royal Shakespeare Company, Sir Paul McCartney’s Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, the Royal Ballet, the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, the European Commission, UNESCO, the Council of Europe, the J Paul Getty Trust and the Education Commission of the States. (Wikipedia))
16 comments:
So this video me think about what classes people chose to take in school and why. The general message that I took out of it was the idea that schools should encourage a student's development in any area that they pursue, not just in traditional math or English classes. I think that one thing that should be done in our school to help this would be changing the way that electives are graded and structured. Currently almost all electives are L1 classes. This means that students who choose to take them might be pursuing something that they are really good at, however it can make it more difficult for them to have a competitive GPA, as apposed to someone who chooses to take extra math or science classes which are offered at higher levels. The other issue with electives is that personally, they don’t ever fit into my schedule. I currently have only taken one elective (not counting health and gym) however other than that, I don’t know when if ever I will take an art or technology class. I find in general that our school sees extra curricular activities and electives more as fun side things in a student’s day. For many people this is probably true, but if you are a student who wishes to be an artist, or work in computer design, or be an electrician, then you would want to take those electives the same way that a student who wants to be a writer can take English classes. While our school is trying to prepare us for the future, it doesn’t always seam like they are trying to prepare us for our own personal future.
First off the little jokes that he felt the need to put into his talk every 30 seconds or so, just got to be a little to much. I enjoyed listening to his views on the education system around the world, he had the right idea but never said anyway to help this. The story about the dancer really made me listen. Sometimes schools and doctors just say that kids need to be on meds just because they cant pay attention. I know kids who are on ADD meds who probably don't need them because they are the same off them as they are on them. I think children are misdiagnosed with ADD or ADHD quite a bit these days, and instead of trying something like sports or dance parents just give their kids drugs. These things need to be checked out more before putting kids on mind altering drugs.
Also while watching this I though about Watertown's school system, and how we don't have a creative writing program. Not just that though, its that the English classes seem to teach only to the test, no matter which test it is. There is little to no room for creativity in our writing with the current way our English classes are formatted.
For the most part, I agree with Sir Ken Robinson that the current school system is killing creativity, which is is especially true in our history class. Because of the AP test, we have to follow a strict cycle to get everything done, and until May there is no time to do any non-book assignments, with Day 2s as the exception. As for schools needing more emphasis on subjects like music, art, and dance, I think that is a good idea since they are a nice break from what you normally do in school, but they should not be mandatory since not everyone enjoys them. In my opinion, Gym classes are a huge time waster in our school. In other nearby schools such as Belmont, you only need to do Gym as a Freshman, and after that if you do a sport you can get Gym credits for it. If our school did this, students would have more free space in their schedules, and be able to take more electives. As for "core" classes such as Math, Science, History, and English, they can still encourage creativity depending on what you do in them. An example of this would be the Yo-Yo project from last year, since you had to think outside the box.
Robinson started off fairly early in his talk with explaining how the unpredictability of the next few years makes it hard to pinpoint what exactly needs to be taught; a crucial message that he later goes in depth about. Because of this, the same educational hierarchy is being taught and applied endlessly. He went on to talk about how as kids, nobody ever fears being wrong about something because it's not something that's condemned. But, as you grow older, you grow out of creativity for the fear of being wrong and being penalized for it. I think public schools in general are structured in a way where there is little room for everyday creativity because of a rigid curriculum that needs to be followed (especially in AP classes, since there is a major thing that students are being prepared for). Even students who choose to pursue electives in the arts are also given direction and rules that need to be –at most times- strictly followed. Although I understand the importance of structure in any school system, I think that it is also a cause of the oppression of individual's capacity for innovation. As far as how it can be changed, I think a more lenient curriculum is in order. To not provide a set of rules and regulations, but to give outlines and basic steps and have each student explore and learn in their own personal way.
I realize that our generation is different because we have so much competition from around the world. However, that does not mean that we should be told what to do, which classes we should take, which grades we should get...Childhood is the time of your life when you have the purest and probably most noble dreams. Why is it that people who wanted to be firefighters and doctors become salesmen? The reason is because we are given limitations-of the things that will make you money and the things that won't as well as jobs that are considered modern and those that aren't. We can blame society for this, but we are a part of society and we contribute to it. When we take exams like the MCAS and SAT, we are tested for English and Math, so it is logical to assume that those are the key elements to your future. We are simply not given enough opportunities to discover our talents.
There were a bunch of key ideas that stuck out as I was watching the video, the first of which was the hierarchy that all school around the globe set up in their systems. The most common solution I suppose would be to refocus educational classes, but that would then cater to different students, and leave the one's who were succeeding in the past system to struggle. There are always going to be some students who are creative, and others who are not. In my opinion, money providing, it would be wise to have different schools with different curriculums that can be ideal for every type of student. The dance school is a perfect example. Another idea that came to me during the video which I have though about before is the abolishment of grading, testing, and standardized testing. It's very controversial and would lead to less stress on all of the students, but what other system could replace it, the new system would have to reward good students, and punish the bad ones. Robinson also brought up how much of public education popped up around the industrial revolution, when students needed to be educated strictly for the jobs that were available and needed. I think that this idea has carried through to today when students are still taught in a way so that they can get to college and find a job afterward where their will always be openings. The idea of academic inflation was also cool in my opinion, as it brought up a good point, that as time goes on and teaching methods improve, students are expected to learn more and compete in a more challenging "field" every year. Another parallel is students who go to vocational schools, who are usually forced into trying every type of job. (A friend of mine spent a day paining nails.) This should be done at a younger age with broader categories so that kids and teachers can learn the interests and talents of their students. The whole idea of what might happen in the future with our new generation of learning reminded me of the 1960's (random point). And, I also thought about animals other than ourselves. We are the only creatures on the planet who go to school, get jobs and make money. I'm not saying we should all become tarzans, but I think it might be a good idea to explore what animals do as they grow up. They explore and practice doing things without a paper and a desk, the parallel is between hunting and dancing. They're something you don't need a classroom to learn, but only your interest, care, and experience.
I agree with Sir Ken Robinson, he brought up very important topics that go on in our high school. I take orchestra and my teacher lets us leave if we have to do something for another class, but when we have to do something for orchestra very little teachers will let us go, and they treat music classes as if they are not as important. People these days have this idea that if you are good at classes like math, science, history and english you will find a great job, and that playing an instrument or dancing is something you do for fun and wont get you anywhere in life. They have this idea that the main subjects are the only important ones. I agree with Kevin that classes like gym take up room in peoples schedule. I know people that tell me if you did a sport you did not have to take gym. This will get more people doing sports and gives people more chances to take new classes like cooking, wood, art, and even music. In my opinion playing a sport or doing extra activities after school help peoples creativity. I believe that recess was a very important time for young kids. It was when kids could take a break from all the school works and when students could express themselves for who they are. Also that AP tests are bad for kids creativity. Many people learn better by interacting or by doing things hands on. Taking AP tests leave no room for that. Everything is done by the book. Robinson talked about many important topics but he did not give any advice on how to deal with these problems, but at least people are starting to acknowledge this and that is the start on how to deal with these problems.
As I was listening to Sir Ken Robinson's presentation, I was thinking of Lakeville North High School, the school I was attending in Minnesota. If I had stayed in Minnesota, I would have been taking an International Dance class for a Physical Education credit. I would have been in AP Art History next year, instead of AP European History. I would have taken classes like Theater Arts and AP Psychology. I could have taken classes like Ceramics, or Guitar. As I listened to his speech, I could not help my pride in Lakeville. I still would have had to take the "core" classes, but we had a lot of options within those boundaries, and could match our learning to our interests, not the other way around. Another thing that made me proud was when I was listening to the story about the dancer. I cannot count the number of kids I know who have been diagnosed with ADD/ADHD, including myself. Most of the kids I knew in my school who had it didn't even take their medication, because they didn't want to, or couldn't afford it, or whatever. Each of them flourished. They could work with their interests, which made it easier to focus. ADD/ADHD gives the gift of focus, or so I've been told. As I watched my friends spend hours working on projects, focusing to the point of exclusion, they practically glowed. Even kids without ADD/ADHD have issues focusing on uninteresting tasks or subjects, but I noticed how few the complaints were when they received homework in their favorite class. Kids still complained about going to school, but it was half-hearted. If more schools were to expand their classes, I believe that instead of stifling creativity, they could help it blossom. If you ever go Lakeville North,as you walk around the school grounds you will notice all the paintings, photographs, and sculptures. Most of these were student made artwork. Half of the student population is in one band or another, and a large chunk of it auditions for the school talent show. I believe the only subject that would have issues expanding is Math. Even the science department was diverse! I could have chosen from a wide range of classes, from AP Environmental Science (APES) to Forensics to Anatomy to Honors Geology and Space Systems.
My point is that not all schools are killing creativity, and a fair number are reworking their systems to accommodate the new emphasis on original thought and action. We just need a bit more momentum before everybody can enjoy the same variety of choices Lakeville North offered.
When I saw this video, I thought that he was right about how schools focus too much on academic subjects and not enough on more fun subjects and skills that you could use in everyday life. An example of this was last year when cooking class was almost canceled even though it is one of the most popular classes. Our school needs to offer a wider variety of these kinds of classes. I know that we already have wood, photography, art and other classes, but other schools like the one Kethry talks about have so many more options. I especially agreed with the part where Sir Ken said that people always tell you that you will never get a job doing something you like. This is a problem that I have. I don't know what I want to do when I get older because I can't choose between the things that pay good money or the jobs that I would enjoy doing. Most of my friends are starting to choose the jobs that pay more. In my opinion, Sir Ken was right when he said that people are driven away from doing the things they like so that they could get a better job.
Sir Ken Robinson was hilarious, an excellent speaker, and his anecdotes were all perfect. However, unfortunately we are now in a time of economic cutbacks, schools are getting less financial aid from the government and extracurricular programs are not going to be expanding, they’re going to be shrinking. It would cost billions of dollars to make the school systems more favorable to the arts, to give each child the individual attention of one teacher, as Robinson is suggesting. People will always be good at different things, as it says in the book "Multiple Intelligences" by Dr. Howard Gardner.
“Be the change you want to see in the world” - Gandhi
In our school, one major problem that I see, and that Sir Ken Robinson was touching on, is that some students care more about is getting A’s than anything else. They aren’t interested in the subject so much as the praise they will receive for getting a good grade in it. In our AP U.S. History class I feel that we should be having debates on historical controversies, and deeper discussions of how things relate to current events. The Wall of Shame is a chance for us to show how certain people affected the US for the worse, what terrible events they caused, and why, to the people of the US, they are villains. The people on the Wall of Shame should be people like Benedict Arnold, Nixon, John Wilkes Booth, and Jim Jones, not serial killers, who represent less than 1/1000th of the population and have no great impact on the history of the country.
We live right next to Boston: we have huge opportunities to enrich our education with museums, theatres, history, and many of us do. The core subjects are chosen because they are the ones that we will be using for the rest of our life, they are the deepest and could be the most interesting, but I think the joy of learning them can be taken away by the thought that your classmates could be better then you at them. I have heard several friends say that they would be interested in taking a class like AP English, but don’t think they could do it because they think they would be the worst in the class. A mistake that our school makes, particularly in the English department, is a student who is a voracious reader is put in the same class at someone who has not read a book in the last two years and is proud of it. This brings the entire class down and makes the class boring to those who would have otherwise been very interested in it.
The video overall was wonderful; I thought all the things Sir Ken Robinson talked about were valid. While watching the video so many things ran through my mind. At the beginning be talked for a second about how when kids are little there is nothing wrong with being wrong. But as a person gets older the worst thing you can do is be wrong, and I felt like that was so true. Whether it's in English class or history class a lot of kids feel like they can't express how they feel about something because they are afraid they will be wrong. Schools today always honor kids for their academic achievements but not for anything else really. School I feel these days is almost like a race, its all about who can get better grades, what kids beat the other kids in order to get a better ranking in their class. These things don't make kids want to learn and do well in school because they don’t want to learn, because instead it’s a competition. Kids will do anything to get an A in a class, things like cheating. I also agree when Sir Ken Robinson said that some of the things that the students are interested in aren't available at schools. For example Watertown high school doesn't have that much of a broad choice of courses and electives to take. These days’ students have so much stress coming to them from their parents and school, that it hurts the student mentally and emotionally. The point of school should be to learn and enjoy what you are leaning. Schools are also very strict with what they teach, everything is told to them, and there is nothing creative about it. like in our history class we have to read of the text book everyday almost, and have to study a lot all for a test at the end of the year, why? Because we all want to pass it so colleges will think we are greatly qualified for their school. If music and arts were put into the curriculum better, then not only would kids be successful in life but it would help them enjoy school and learning, it would bring some kind of passion. School then wouldn’t be a drag like it is for most kids during this time. I hope that made sense, I found it difficult to put into words how I felt.
First of all, I found Robinson hilarious, but more importantly, right all accounts. I liked Calista's idea of placing more importance in the arts, although I feel like the GPA importance of classes does sometimes slow creativity due to the fear of being wrong, something Robinson talked about. I now by personal experience the fear of being wrong. Also, I have seen a great amount of students who are highly competitive with their grades. While I do think that some level of competition is good, and we must all try our best in school, I do understand what Robinson was talking about when he described how schools are trying to get all students to be professors. In the case of our AP class, I think Robinson's ideas are applied in our testes, were we have to create an argument based off of a question. I wish we could have more in class activities to fuel our creativity and learning rather than solely focusing on the tests we have every day 7.
Thanks,
Ben
thanks
All a lot of what Sir Ken Robinson said rung true with me. Our education system is currently built to teach to the test, and enforces a strict idea of what it is important to learn, but also what constitutes as "smart". Most schools, and the classes they offer cater only towards a very specific type of learner, and are a difficult place for people with types of intelligence that fall outside of that to feel as though they are succeeding. Because of this a lot of kids who are really smart have very low self esteem around their intelligence and their ability to do well. It would be amazing if their could be some changes to schools so that we had more classes like dance and theater and puppet making and such, but I understand that with the budget the way things are that's pretty much impossible. Still, their are some things that could change. For instance, MCAS. This year we spend almost the entire year in English class preparing for the MCAS, a test that doesn't actually measure anything important, and by learning around we don't gain any useful skills. I'm not saying all tests are useless, and I don't want to work hard in school. I like the rigor that an AP class provides, and sometimes motivation, such as grades, is necessary to get kids working. But I don't think it's necessary to form our entire education around tests and academics.
I would first like to say that Sir Ken has brilliant ideas and is a extremely convincing speaker. His main idea of schools educating people out of creativity is one that I completely agree with. Our school like other schools, focuses on the main subjects such as math, science, language, etc. Other classes such as orchestra, band, and chorus are valued less than the main subjects. An example of this in our school is when the drama class was eliminated a few years ago. Now kids that are interested in or good at acting have no opportunities to participate in any classes related to acting. One thing that I find very strange is that American culture is so focused around celebrities, movies, and music. And yet the education system puts skills and classes that would help you be successful in these areas as unimportant. Sir Ken's final idea that intelligence is diverse, dynamic and distinct is one that every school and class should focus on. Every student is good at different things and learns in a different way. Finally to make our school and classes better, we should stop making creative classes as less important!
From Jeff:
I myself think there should be more opportunities for creativity, and besides adding more classes that focus on the arts, I’m not sure how to achieve this. As Calista said, the fact that all classes dealing largely in creativity are level one classes, many students don’t take them when they would otherwise. Since (most) colleges are more interested in math and science classes, you can’t give more credits for classes dealing with the arts, but this makes it so that many kids have no place to fuel their creativity during school. I also agree with Kevin that three required semesters of gym seems like too much, and that if there was more free space in their schedules, students could take other classes, such as ones for creativity to accompany their classes meant for practicality. Though the A.P. history class is much more an outlet for creativity for creativity than it could be, (wall of shame, etc.) as someone before said, the creativity aspect of the class can be a little lacking. However, I don’t believe there are many ways to solve this while still teaching a lot of material in a short amount of time. One of the few things I can think of to improve creativity in the school is to make sure classes of the arts don’t coincide with other major classes. I’m not sure how often something like this happens, but my sister had to quit orchestra in order to take Spanish (I think). Lastly, Kevin brought up an excellent point when he said that the “core” classes can still promote creativity by doing things such as the Yo-Yo project.
From Gus:
Thank you, everyone, for many thoughtful and interesting comments. I'm looking forward to reshaping how we, both you and I, look at our APUSH curriculum and our task during this year.
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