I couldn’t have said it better … NO REALLY! I COULDN’T HAVE SAID IT BETTER! So I’m not going to try. Here is a post from my friend Deb Haneke’s blog. I will take credit for inspiring her to write this post because I placed the link to this video on our group page on Facebook, Rural Education and Community Development Collaboration. And credit Jerry Butler for sending me this intriguing video by Sir Ken Robinson. Sir Ken hits school change right on the nose!
Deb’s Post …
I’ve heard other presentations by Sir Ken Robinson, but this eleven minute video does a great job of really summarizing many ludicrous things about our current design in education. From the myth that a college degree will guarantee you a job, to the idea that the most important thing about kids is the date of manufacture (meaning we group them and run them through the system based on their birthdate) Sir Ken shines a flashlight on many myths and outdated practices, that are not serving kids nor the economy of this country.
In addition to the profound quote I included below, I also appreciated the research he shared about divergent thinking which he clarified is not the same thing as creativity, but rather an essential capacity for divergent thinking. This longitudinal study clearly showed all persons have the capacity for divergent thinking but it deteriorates over time. According to Sir Ken, education is likely a key factor in these results.
“Our children are living in the most intensively stimulating period in the history of the earth. They are being besieged with information and calls to their attention from every platform, computers, from iPhones, from advertising hoardings from hundreds of television channels; and we’re penalizing them now for getting distracted. From what? Boring stuff at school, for the most part.”
Sir Ken recognizes that it is not teachers who want things this way. Rather he refers to the “gene pool of education.” I hope you enjoy this insightful, and thought-provoking video as much as I did.
During a conversation about school change an individual made the comment that we’d be fine if, “The kids would just bear down and be responsible like they used to be!” Interesting thought. This individual went on to say that students from foreign countries, especially emerging countries, come to America and kick our kids butts in school.
As you might guess, I have a different point of view on this. I think that if our kids got their drinking water from a hole next to their house they would be equally motivated to do what ever it takes to change their station in life. Fortunately this isn’t the case.
In an affluent society such as ours we are never going to return to the student behaviors of the past. It’s incumbent upon us as educators to create a system that meets the needs of society in such a way that it also engages our students as they’ve never been engaged before.
The other day while speaking at the University of Kansas to a group of teachers in the process of obtaining their certification to become building level administrators, I was asked if there has ever been a time in our history that our students were authentically engaged on a regular basis. The answer obviously, is no. But it didn’t matter. Our students were being prepared for a completely different society than we have today.
In fact, that’s part of our problem. We are still preparing students for a world of factories and mass production. A world where the most important skill was compliance. If you want to succeed in today’s schools, be very compliant, and act like you care. Guaranteed success.
Unfortunately, graduating from that system doesn’t guarantee success in life. In fact being compliant is the path to a job that has, low pay, high potential for being outsourced, or automated using technology.
The school change we need to make needs to be a thoughtful transformation to schools that prepare kids for their future in the 21st century. For us to attempt to make our kids adapt to our schools is utter nonsense! – Steve Wyckoff
As I think about school change I’m always searching the current literature on the 21st century for theories of how the world works. I recently read the book, The Power of Pull by John Hagel, John Seely Brown, and Lang Davison. Fascinating stuff. They do a great job of describing the world that is emerging [...]
My friend Allan Milbradt sent me a link with information about the 2010 Midwest Great Lakes Regional Conference Virtual Conference. In the information there were two videos featuring Prof. Stephen Heppell. He’s talking about school change in a very compelling way. But what really got my attention was one quote. He said we may be seeing, [...]
I’ve written many times about our obsession in K-12 schools with preparing every student to attend a four-year liberal arts college. The data are clear, we need less than 25% of all of our students to have a four year college degree. In fact only about 23% of all jobs require a four-year degree. In [...]
Of all the things I speak about, the slide I use that lists 10 behaviors that I identify as “21st-century behaviors” is one of the most popular. I put this list together over the last many years from various sources. To be added to the list a behavior must be frequently mentioned in many sources. [...]
Why can’t schools change? It’s an interesting question. If you ask many educators they would say that schools have changed dramatically. I disagree. I think what goes on inside some classrooms has changed dramatically, but not schools. We do use more technology in classrooms; projectors, computers, smart boards, etc. But what we’re doing inside those [...]
