Discussion 4 Public Speaking

Schools Kill Creativity by Ken Robinson

Robinson challenges the education system we have for our children. He champs a far-reaching reconsideration of our education system, to promote creativity and allow different types of intelligence. Robinson begins his speech by capturing the attention of his audience using humor. He makes everybody to feel like they are of a similar group and applies humor to develop a strong rapport. Within few seconds of his talk, he has already made his audience to laugh several times. The audience enjoyed the talk and jokes made by Robinson. He makes the topic about changing the education system humorous and this is observed in several parts of his speech.

First, he makes a self-belittling joke about being a student (01:10). Robinson begins with telling a story about being at a dinner party, thereafter he states that if you are educated, you are invited into dinner party or at least not called back. Since he is also in education, this makes the audience to have a positive view on dinner parties. He goes ahead and sates that people are bored with other individual’s education experience but they like talking about their education. Secondly, he talks about the famous figure from Stratford to Los Angeles (06:21). He talks about the transition of Shakespeare who was seven years old and caused trouble to his father as well as teacher. Even though this did not have a strong message, it prepared the audience for the next message where he identifies himself with Shakespeare’s birthplace. Additionally, he talks of personal experience on his son’s girlfriend (07:34). He tells how his 21 year-old son was not willing to go to Los Angeles because he had a girlfriend in England. Robinson tells the audience that he was leaving England for the reason being his son’s girlfriend. This makes the audience to laugh more as they could picture the situation in their minds. Robinson states that the education system on Earth could have similar hierarchy of subject irrespective of where you move in the world (08:27).

Mathematics and languages are given more priority than humanities, and humanities are rated higher than the arts. Furthermore, art and music are given more priority than dance and drama. Robinson believes that the education system is only based on children’s mind and not their bodies with the objective goal of getting university professors (09:51). According to Robinson, this education system is based on two major ideas; first is the value of a person for the system; i.e. the subjects where one is able to top. The other idea is based on a student’s “academic ability” (11:02). Because of such system, the result is that we have many highly-talented, bright persons who do not fit in the system nor realize who they are (11:41).

Robinson sums up the challenges which we will experience in the near future; first, according to UNESCO, more people will be graduating in the coming 30 years more than since the start of education (12:06). Furthermore, the technological development results into substitution of jobs done by people. Additionally, there will be huge explosion on human population that will result into academic inflation since degrees will become worthless (12:23).

Robinson states that we need to change our thinking about intelligence; it is diverse, we think visually, kinesthetically, in abstract terms and movement (12:56). Additionally, intelligence is dynamic and our thinking comes from different ways we observe things. The last thinking about intelligence is that it is distinct (14:50). Robinson gives the example of Gillian Lynne, a well-known choreographer who was thought to have learning disorder because she could not concentrate in class. Robinson concludes his speech by appealing to all of us to observe our creative capabilities for the richness they are and to help develop an education system that promotes creativity (18:33).

Reference

Robinson, K. (2006). Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity. Talk. [Online]. TED-Talks. Retrieved on May, 17, 2019.