“The fact is that given the challenges we face, education doesn’t need to be reformed — it needs to be transformed. The key to this transformation is not to standardise education, but to personalise it, to build achievement on discovering the individual talents of each child, to put students in an environment where they want to learn and where they can naturally discover their true passions.”
― Robinson, Ken, The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, 2009
I was very sad to learn of Sir Ken Robinson‘s passing.
His 2006 TED Talk and subsequent work had a profound effect on my educational outlook and practice; and featured significantly in my M.Ed.
Schools should be places where young people have room to breathe and grow; able to explore ideas and make mistakes; where creativity is not only encouraged but actively nurtured. Those of us at the chalkface can honour his memory by working every day to “inspire and engage the imagination and creativity of the students” we teach.
If you haven’t read ‘Out of Our Minds‘ or ‘The Element‘, now would be a good time to do so; not least given the disruption that the pandemic has wrought on schools over the past six months.
Perhaps there is another way – free from ‘one size fits all’ and ‘standardised tests’, where children are not “educated out of” creativity.
