Sir Ken Robinson TED Talk

Sir Ken Robinson is a British author who used humor, and still stated the facts simply and clearly, to stress his message about literacy and creativity to give an outstanding TED Talk. He started the beginning of his presentation by cracking a few jokes to pull the audiences' attention in and then he begins the intro to his talk. He states that education "runs deep with people", the same way that religion and money do. Everyone's education varies from the next person, so it's unique to each person you ask. This system has a “hierarchy of subjects” including Mathematics and Languages at the top of the pyramid, then Humanities, and Arts are the last priority. Even though this system of education may be viewed as great, it still has its downsides.

The one point that stands out the most, is the effectiveness of the education system to obliterate a child's sense of creativity. Children are taught how to be one type of person that conforms to the educational system with all the information crammed into them, rather than being able to expand and learn things within their own style. Creativity is as important as literacy in education. Just like a child, you cannot be creative if you are not prepared to be wrong, but at the same time, you cannot be literate if you do not try to work within the guidelines. In a play Sir Ken mentions, three children are representing the three wise kings who came to visit baby Jesus. “One child said: 'I have brought gold', another said 'I have brought mirth', but the last one said 'Frank sent this'”. As children we are all prepared to take a chance to be wrong, and we get creative, but the system of education teaches us to be right all the time within the guidelines, crushing our sense of creativity.

The last of his points was that we all have the chance to maintain our creativity. There was a dancer who was kinetic learner, and needed to be able to move/be doing something to learn efficiently. This put her at a disadvantage in regular school, and she was told outright that she would not be successful. When she was moved to a school that correctly catered to her needs, she surpassed all expectations, and is now a famous dancer and choreographer.

Overall I found Sir Ken's TED Talk very informative and applicable to student's daily lives. For the students who are not able to fit into the cookie-cutter shape of the perfect student, they have trouble succeeding in school and are not able to get the good grades that all of the other students receive. I completely agree that creativity is just as important as literacy, and that we should not neglect it. He kept the audience listening and interested with his jokes, and made clear the importance of creativity and other right-brained types of actions. I would defintely recommend this TED Talk to a friend, because of how relative it is to real life, and Ken's great sense of humor.