When Will the Education System Catch Up with the Times?
“We shouldn’t be putting them asleep. We should be waking them up to what they have inside of themselves.” ~ Sir Ken Robinson
Here is yet another very interesting view on today’s education system courtesy of TED (Technology, Education, and Design). Sir Ken Robinson discusses our current state of education and where it needs to go if we are to see all students fulfill their true potential through their creativity and multiple intelligences. Robinson challenges the way we are educating our children, arguing that our current education system is the problem, not the solution.
He questions why our education system, which was born out of the “intellectual culture of the Enlightenment and the economic circumstances of the Industrial Revolution,” is still being used today. Why, in our modern times of information explosion and rapid technological advances, are we still teaching our children via these archaic systems?
In his discussion Robinson scolds today’s educators for their methods. “Our children are living in the most intensely stimulating period in the history of the earth. They are being besieged with information that calls for their attention from every platform – computers, from iPhones, from advertisers, from 100s of television channels. And we’re penalizing them for getting distracted from what?” From the boring content courtesy of our archaic schools, education system, and teaching methods, says Robinson.
An especially good point that he makes is that in school you are told that the answers are in the back of the book, but A.) You’re not allowed to look there and B.) No talking to your neighbor about the answers.
Yet outside of school, in the workplace and everywhere else, that would be called “collaboration.” Robinson argues that collaboration is the stuff of growth.
Between his excellent points and unique presentation style, this is a must watch video: Ken Robinson: Changing education paradigms
