Sir Ken Robinson's TED Talk

Sir Ken Robinson, a school system revolutionist, gave a very impressive TED talk, with an overlying message that school systems need to change. Robinson says that children are all born with creativity, but as they mature through the school system, they lose their creativity. This is his main problem with schools. Another problem that falls under this category is that public school systems neglect the arts. Robinson states, “Every education system on Earth has the same hierarchy of subjects. At the top are mathematics and languages, then the humanities, and at the bottom are the arts.” These ideas end up being the main focus of Robinson’s TED talk. 

                Robinson got his ideas across pretty effectively through his ability to transition between humor and meaningful ideas. For instance he shares his story about a performance of the nativity by 4 year olds, and how one of them says franksenthis instead of frankincense. He relates this to another philosophical idea, “That if you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” Another strategy Robinson used is story telling. He talks about a little girl who was believed to have ADHD. When she was taken to a specialist, the specialist left the little girl in a room with the radio on. She got up, and started moving to the music. The specialist concluded that she wasn’t sick, but instead was a dancer. This story added to the effect of his message that school systems focus more on other subjects besides the arts. These stories also help because they are real examples, instead of just broad statistics.

I personally felt that Robinson gave a very good talk. When he talked about how if an alien came to our world and asked what public education is for, what kind succeeds in all of this, the answer would be a university professor, this really hit me. It showed that school is not preparing me to succeed in what I want to succeed in. It made me question why I am in school, why I’m learning science and geometry, when I plan on being a chef. He completely convinced me that the education system really does need to change.

                Robinson’s ideas are also very meaningful to the whole world. Constantly people are saying that education needs to be changed, but it’s just not happening, and people don’t seem to have the ideas, or motivation to change it. If more people listened to Robinson, they would be inspired, and they would find the ideas and motivation to change education. In my school, we follow the standard math, science, and English are the most important subjects, while other classes are less important. There isn’t much room for creativity in these fields besides English. Yet it doesn’t seem like there is much change, or questioning of problems. Robinson’s ideas apply to this, because this is just one example of the problems he illustrates throughout his speech. Teachers and administrators need to open their eyes and try to change what’s going on.                

What do you think?