'Education systems too narrow': Sir Ken Robinson

ABC 7.30 Report with Sir Ken Robinson. (Broadcast: 16/06/2009)

My favourite quotes from the interview in italics. My two-cent reflection is bold.

"talent is often buried deep; it's not lying around on the surface, but our education systems at the moment are still very focused on a certain type of ability, and the result is very many brilliant people are marginalised by the whole process."

-Our competitive model/framework does not allow for dormant talent to emerge. A system of competition and focus on individual achievement. (System of A/B/C). People learn, grow, develop on different levels. Our developmental psychology is not neccessarily correspond to the institutional framework that has been setup for us. (ie Grade 1-7: Primary School; Secondary: 8-12)...we are all developing at different rates. Talents emerge through in an organic way: a linear model of learning does not allow these talents to be discovered.

"The people achieve their best when they firstly tune into their natural aptitudes - and lots of people I have interviewed aren't musicians, they're mathematicians, they're business leaders, they're teachers, they're broadcasters, you know, they've found this thing that the completely get. But the second thing is that they love it. And if you can find that - a talented and a passion - well that's to say you never work again. And it is true, I think, that our current education systems are simply not designed to help people do that. In fact an awful lot of people go through education and never discover anything they're good at at all."
We need a system that allows people to find their "flow" earlier rather than later in life. (Read Flow from M'C)
"everybody's trying to figure out, you know, as parents and as employers and as students, how on Earth do you educate people to find a productive life in the 21st Century, you know, when all the economies are shifting faster than we've known them. So the economic thing is really important. But it's also about culture, you know, about how do you give people a sense of identity and what do they need to know to be literate and fluent in these extraordinary times as well. The thing is that most reform movements are looking backwards; they're looking back to the old system that was the result of the industrial revolution."

Change is happening so fast. Dissonce between the reality and the actual need.

Read full interview here:

Sir Ken's site: www.sirkenrobinson.com