Check out this link http://www.sirkenrobinson.com/
It’s a clip of Sir Ken Robinson, an “internationally recognized leader in the development of creativity, innovation and human resources”. He claims that we get educated out of our creative capacity, and that “if we’re not prepared to be wrong, we will never come up with anything original.” Very interesting.
There are more clips of him on U Tube if you are interested.
What do you think about what he has to say as it relates to us being made in the image of an infinitely creative God?
Why do you think creativity is more and more being pushed out or undermined in our society and educational systems if it is indeed part of our core identity?
This reminds me of a math teacher of mine who had a poster with a list of sentences like “If pilots were only right 99% of the time, 150,000 planes would crash a year.” Despite being simply wrong (not every mistake leads to a plane crash), the implicit idea that making a mistake in long division is somehow comparable to crashing a plane and killing people is a horrible thing to tell kids (especially ones that would absolutely love to make an 89, let alone a 99). And we wonder why kids lose their innate curiosity and desire to learn.
To answer your second question, I think western culture values economic efficiency over community or grace (or anything else). Mistakes cost time, time costs money, and the sooner a kid learns to fit into this system, the better. In the church, at times, I wonder if we see something similar. We start to value “behavioral efficiency” over grace. But the goal of culture isn’t economic, and the Christian life isn’t focused on behavior. I think this sort of creative freedom from the paralysis of mistake-anxiety is what Luther had in mind when he said to “sin boldly!” Though I’m not a Luther scholar.
Rereading my comment, I should add that we’re called to holiness (obviously). My point is just that the focus should be on our relationship with God, and that right behavior flows out of that, not vice versa. God in His grace has shown His willingness to work with sinful people who hold to Him in faith even in their imperfection.
Kelsi,
I went to the website and listened to several presentations. It’s fascinating and discouraging at the same time. I personally dropped out of high school back in the day in part because of the frustration that I experineced with education that seemed to me to be incredibly impersonal and unimaginative. After listening to Sir Ken I wonder, is it possible for us to make a difference in the various fields of education we find ourselves in as students, teachers or with our own children? I recently adopted a phrase for myself, “Be in the academy but not of it.”
Thanks again, for a very relevant and thought provoking contribution.
I agree with both of you…I definitely sense an aura of stifling insecurity and fear in the educational systems today. Chris I had a very discouraging experience in high school as well, especially when my teachers for the most part seemed to discourage my “out of line” way of processing information or doing assignments. (Ok, some of them were a bit inappropriate, but I gotta say I would give the creativity aspect an A+ ;))
It was especially discouraging when I was beginning to discover my love for writing and my English teacher told a classmate of mine, behind my back, that she thought I was plagiarizing my short stories. This translated to me, “that girl is too stupid to write something good”. Ouch. Rather than encouraging me for (finally) excelling at something in school, she bashed my competency behind my back. To me, that communicated many many disheartening truths about learning and vulnerability in the academic setting.
I agree that the current mainstream education system devastatingly hinders students from critical, imaginative and “bold” thinking. (Lest we be ridiculed either to our faces or behind our back.) It is true that mistakes, quirks even, in this society are often grave, unthinkable dangers. But if we are no longer using our erasers, we mine as well just take them off the pencils and never ever take any risks. I don’t think this is how anything revolutionary and profound has ever happened.