Before watching the videos of Sir Ken Robins’ speech and
Will Richardson’s lecture, I knew schools were boring. But now I see that they
may ironically be failing to educate students. According to both videos,
today’s education system is ““taking all the imagination, all the creativity,
all the initiative, all the engagement right out of [our students].” As Sir
Robins points out, this problem has its roots in the past. According to him, schools as we know it
were formed during the Industrial Revolution to produce a stronger, smarter
class of people who could be better employees. “Schools are still pretty much
organized on factory lines: Ringing bells, sepereate facilities specialized
into special subjects. We still educate children by batches, we still educate
them by age group…It’s like the most important thing about them is their date
of manufacture.”
This mentality shows me that
schools do not exist to benefit students, they exist to benefit CEOs and
company presidents. With this paradigm we can get a clearer picture of why
schools punish insubordination, tardiness, and talking with peers during work;
they want to mold us into nice little worker bees. Schools need to change. They
should be less like mental factories and more mental jungle gyms, where a
student’s brain goes to flex its muscles.
In my opinion, this could be
achieved by listening to Will Richardson. He argues that we need to upgrade our
systems to utilize the wealth of information available through technology, and
tap into our student’s passion for learning in the process. Get it straight:
our students want to learn. However, they’ll fall asleep in their desks if
their teachers teach directly to standardized tests, as too often is the case.
Today’s system robs students of opportunities to engage themselves in the
lesson. Also, forget about students finding anything useful or interesting in a
standardized test either.
So it’s clear to me: stop with all
the standardization!
Here's an author who can give you some other insights on what "education" should mean.
I agree, but I also believe that schools and how it's built with all the rules and requirements helps kids become mature and ready for the 21st century. Even tho it may be boring or what we learn may not stick to our brains, it gives us the opportunity to learn a lot of things that wasn't being taught before. We really benefit a lot and kids now a days are learning fast. For example, technology. Kids as young as 5 years of age know how to operate an ipad or use the computer. What more when they get older. They just need guidance.
ReplyDeleteI liked your worker bee metaphor. Being punished for talking to peers and being late are some good observations. You and the previous comment have encouraged me to email out a YouTube video for the class to watch. It's another RSA Animate of a TED Talk done by the author Daniel Pink.
ReplyDeleteP.S. Your reference link at the end of your post is missing. Go to your Blogger Dashboard and you can edit your post and add it on.