Category: Misc

Is our education system 200+ years behind?

I don’t read much about education – and I started reading the following because I was interested in the style of the video, not the content. But the more Sir Ken Robinson said, the greater my interest grew. Consider:

  • Children’s ‘short’ attention spans should be no surprise given our stimulus-filled world – but medication, and dulling creativity, is not the answer;
  • Working in groups has proven to be the most productive form of organisation, so why are schools not set up this way?;
  • Why do we still organise schools by the ages of children, rather than by their individual strengths, weaknesses or interests?

    • Because, says Robinson, we’re using a model developed during the west’s industrial revolution.

    Watch the video.

    Watch this movie – ‘Inside Job’

    Poster for Inside Job
    Watching this movie reminded me of a review I once read of ‘London Calling’, by The Clash. “Makes you feel like beating up a used-car salesman,” it said.

    I don’t know why the reviewer chose a used-car salesman, but the album did generate that kind of fist-clenching energy that made you want to rush outside and start sweeping aside the rotten, old establishment.

    I felt something similar watching Inside job: disgust at what Wall Street and its White House cronies got away with – and continue to get away with – and a wonder that it looks like nothing will change as a result.