Sir Ken Robinson's Article: Do Schools Kill Creativity?

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Sitting in a darkened classroom, watching a video the professor has planned for us, we are introduced to a lovely British gentleman named Sir Ken Robinson. In this video, particularly, he begins to deliver a speech titled “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” he opens with the joke “If you’re at a dinner party, and you say you work in education — actually, you’re not often at dinner parties, frankly, if you work in education. You’re not asked. And you’re never asked back, curiously. That’s strange to me,” and continues on to say, “But if you are, and you say to somebody, you know, they say, ‘What do you do?’ and you say you work in education, you can see the blood run from their face. They’re like, ‘Oh my God,’ you know, ‘Why me? My one night out all …show more content…

The article goes further by talking about how the United States also has the most teachers imparting such necessary wisdom to children below the poverty line than any other nation. With that being said, one may be able to infer that those such teachers are having to pay out of pocket for their impoverished student 's supplies also causing more of a hamper on the teachers themselves. If you tie the fact in with parents blaming teachers for the mistakes of the administration, along with massive budget cuts on the part of each state in our nation, one can begin to see the predicament that has led to such under-appreciation. Now, it could be argued that the said teachers should just work harder, but I don 't view this as the case. According to an article published by Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post, and written by Francie Alexander titled “Survey: Teachers work 53 hours per week on average” informs “A new report from Scholastic and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, called Primary Sources: America 's Teachers on …show more content…

These tests are pressed upon not only the children, to see their rank in understanding the curriculum that is being thrust on them, but it is also pressed on the teachers. To be more specific, these tests change not only the way a teacher approaches the subject matter, they actually dictate what will be taught. This, in turn, leads to less time- if any time at all- that educators may pursue arts, extracurricular activities, or anything more in depth that could be seen as fostering a well-rounded curriculum. While others may argue that standardized testing is the best education style for children, that is not entirely so. Alicia Anthony of Oureverydaylife.com in her article “The Effects of Standardized Tests on Teachers and Students” further advocates my argument by expressing “Significant time is devoted to test preparation, including review worksheets and practice tests. These activities take away from higher-order thinking instruction, which has been proven to have more long-term benefits for students.” In essence, these tests are creating less time to dedicate to critical and creative

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