Out Of Our Minds Quote Analysis

In this video Ken Robinson touches on three main points. His first point he was talking about the education system and one's creativity. He gave two anecdotes about kids that showed that they are willing to take a chance and be creative. If you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original. He believes that the education system institutionalizes people, and that people lose the creativity they had.

Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that nurtures rather than undermines creativity. I fully agree with everything Sir Ken Robinson discusses in his speech. The importance of creativity, originality, and the arts have been deemed nonessential in the public school system. The emphasis placed on math, the sciences, and test scores have stifled many children from discovering and flourishing at their talents. If children are not exposed to the arts and the ingenuity needed to think for themselves how will they have the ability to produce an original story, even if they are taught writing and grammar.

Creativity is defined as the ability to produce new and unique ideas that diverge from established customs and norms. Over the years, however, it has diminished greatly in today’s society. From a young age, schools as well as some business force people to learn certain skills in order to please others. For quite some time, colleges based a student’s intelligence on their GPA rather than creative abilities. Those who are creative are restricted in their abilities; it is acceptable for a mathematically inclined person to lack artistic skills, but heaven forbid a creative student find a science based class challenging. Currently, Academy School District 20 has not implemented a creative thinking class in Liberty High School. I believe we should include such a program, seeing that creativity in students continues to weaken nationwide. By requiring students to think creatively, we can encourage students to innovate, grow, and learn.

The beauty of creativity is that it is abstract, yet ubiquitous: in art, music or how one decides to compose an essay. However, creativity has recently been declining among the human population. According to an article, named, “The Creativity Crisis,” by Newsweek.com in July 2010, authors, Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman, state, “the Torrance Test … indicates that the public’s “creativity quotient” has steadily crept downward since 1990” (Prompt 1). Bronson and Merryman report that the test, which evaluates one’s creativity, had been dispensed to myriads of people across the globe, and have concluded that creativity has been slowly diminishing. Kyung Hee Kim, professor at the College of William and Mary, also comments that this is most prevalent and grave among students from kindergarten through sixth grade (Prompt 1). Consequently, society, or in this case, the world fears that current students and future generations will not be nourished with the creativity required to thrive as individuals, affecting the world as a whole. Ultimately, this poses the question whether a creative thinking class, which solely focuses on the education of creativity, should be taught in the school. This school should impose a creative thinking class, due to the fact creativity is a vital element for the future and is the solution to the creative crisis.

We also learn that creativity in the classroom has a positive effect on vocabulary, increases creative problem solving skills, increases the enjoyability of learning, and if used in conjunction with technology can help develop skills in the creative use of technology that will stay with them throughout their lives. (p. 237)

“Do Schools Kill Creativity?” by ken Robinson is a very powerful speech, as well as a good insight on the other side of the spectrum. Mr. Robinson begins his speech he mentions the amount of creativity we as humans have and how we have no such idea where we are headed in the future. Ken makes a point that we are educating and have been educating people to be prepared for the future. He asks why. We do not know what the next few years bring, how do we educate people properly for it. As Mr. Robinson continues he makes a point that creativity should be as important as literacy within education. Throughout the speech he gives countless examples where simple creativity and being different has brought people success and lead them down a path that math or literature never could.

If you search almost anywhere on the internet about creativity and public schools you will run into a video by a man named Sir Ken Robinson. He emphasizes that schools kill creativity in every way. On the other hand, President Barack Obama disagrees whole heartedly. Both of these men agree that creativity is important to children and schools but they disagree on whether or not creativity is being implemented in schools. Robinson stated in his lectured at TED 2006, “I believe this passionately, that we don’t grow into creativity, we grow out of it. Or rather, we get educated out of it” (Ken Robinson. TED2006). He goes to say that

"We learn to practice good habits to become less distracted artificial news and technology because, many time our mental processors are not focused on what we are thinking, saying and doing." ~ Jon Barnes

I highlighted a quote on chapter 11, page 60. Just when the boys thought they were finally free from everything and things were finally beginning to change for the better, more pain and suffering occurs. This is just insane. Walking with your barefoot when it is scorching hot outside made me wonder how they are going to make things better or else. Not being a pain or anything but I did tried walking with barefoot before during summer when I was going to a pool, it was 100 degree outsides, the ground was HOT. I couldn’t take it.

In the first English class, I was only there for the last half of it. Before I came into the class, I was worried that I would not find any creativity because English can be a tough subject to add creativity too. The teacher, Mr. Romono, did a marvelous job of teaching the common core and maintaining his students interest, with creativity. Not only did he come up with a creative way to teach his students, or let his students accomplish creativity, his classroom was also creative. He had student’s artwork on his wall of characters from books they were reading. He also had a ton of posters with different ideas behind them. (Quote). This provides the students’ something to look at, and in addition, to develop excitement for learning about these books. (quote form pp). The students in the ninth grade English class are working on

A smart man said “Creativity is as important as literacy and we should treat it with the same standing.” (Ken Robinson-“Do schools kill creativity?”). There are multiple studies on how creativity helps improve a student’s mind. Project based learning is a huge creative booster for students. A math teacher from California uses projects to do math instead of using the text book. From doing this, she’s had more students pass her class then from when she was teaching straight from the text books. Instead of having standardized tests, using more creative techniques for students to enjoy the learning they’ve done and for them to show the higher officials what the students are learning. Creativity is the process of turning real world problems into an understanding by extending the minds cognitive processes. In Alabama, kindergartners are studying different ways to be creative.

Creativity in itself teaches the student to think critically. Does everyone thing alike? Should everyone think alike? It is analogous to taking away all the choice of beverages and narrowing it down to milk or chocolate milk and that is all the children are allowed to consume. That is just misguided. It is not a black and white situation, there is a preponderance of gray. In the world

Creativity is equally as important as literacy, and we need to start treating it that way in schools around the world. According to Ken Robinson’s claim in his, “How Schools Kill Creativity” speech, he believes this to be exceptionally true. All children are creative and talented, however, we have grown up in a world where we believe that it’s wrong to exemplify our creativity. Robinson uses both, pathos, and ethos to help make his claim. He arises emotion in you; he causes you to really think, to trust him, and to question ultimately, how things are being done in the educational system. We as a world have become so consumed with the idea of putting each child into a category of what they’re going to be successful in, regardless of their creativity or passions. You’re either good at math, science, or English; everything is based on your academic ability. What happens then to the people who aren’t academically smart, but are more creative? They are then made to feel that what they have to offer the world simply isn’t good enough, but the truth is, it is good enough. Over time however, we are taught out of our creativity. Schools around the world kill creativity by instilling a sense of fear in the child that what they are doing, and how they feel is wrong, this ultimately discourages them, and they fall victim to the industrialized educational system that we have present day. Robinson believes now more than

Creativity is thought to be something more of a selective gift or personal trait rather than a skill. It is not magic it just needs to be taught and people need to have the time and the right environment. People are commonly found saying, “oh no I can’t help you with that project I’m not creative.” This statement however is similar to people saying they cannot “do math”. In actuality every person has the capability of doing math however to some it comes easier than others. It has been construed for a long time that creativity is a talent that only a few possess in order to physically construct things commonly associated with the arts. However, creativity is not some rare gift bestowed on certain children at birth; it is a mental capability and a skill that must be nourished in order to reach its full potential for that particular individual. It is a skill that extends itself much further than creating acceptable paintings and pleasing songs. It is an essential life skill to have and thus needs to be taught to people at a young age so they can adequately develop this skill and use it throughout their whole lives. The American educational system fails to embrace creativity which consequently produces students with misguided views of the importance of learning and makes student unprepared for college in

Creativity is important not only to the individual, but society as a whole. Creative minds are more likely to be innovators, think of new programs and regulations for our government, as well as being able to create art that can bring joy to others. In modern education, much of the standardized curriculum now taught in schools encourages convergent thinking instead of divergent thinking, which is the ability to have alternative solutions to a situation whereas convergent thinking has only one. These essential pieces of the education system set a basis for what students are expected to know and understand before leaving the grade level. This is important because it allows teachers and admissions to place students in the correct classes for their academic enhancement. Classes such as English Language Development, remedial, and even honors classes cater to the students’ lack of knowledge in particular subjects and help them develop in order to succeed in the next grade level. However, with the increase in standardized curriculum the creativity in children has declined.