Sir Ken Robinson

SIR KEN ROBINSON’S TALK

Introduction

He introduces the subject of the conference by saying it is divided into three parts: human creativity, future, and capacity of children for innovation.

Main body

1. To begin with, he explains that creativity is as important as literacy by giving some funny real examples with children. i.e.: A teacher asks a girl: - what are you drawing? and she answers: - It is a picture of God. The teacher replies: - but nobody knows what does he look like. And she murmurs: - they will know in a minute!

He adds that we are educating people out of their creative capacities.

2. He continues the talk by saying that we don´t know what is going to happen in terms of future, since in every public education curriculum Maths and Language are at the top as most important subjects followed by Humanities. Art and Music are at the bottom. He explains that it is like that due to the fact that there was no public education until the XIX century and these two subjects were the most useful ones to work in an industrialized society. Now it seems that the whole purpose of public education is to produce university professors without taking into account all those extraordinary creative people.

3. Finally, he explains the extraordinary capacity children have for innovation illustrating this part with the case of Gillian Lynne, who was a child with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) when nobody knows that this disorder existed. As she failed in school, her mother took her to a doctor who recommended that the girl should attend dance classes. She became a dancer, important choreographer and now she is multimillionaire. Someone gave her a chance to develop her creativity.

Conclusion

He concludes by saying that we have to be conscious of the richness of human capacity and rethink the fundamental principles in which we are educating our children so they can face the future.