College Comp I Class Blog

Welcome to our class blog. Here is where I will post assignments and where we will discuss and share ideas.

Thursday, September 18, 2014

And so it begins . . .

Today, my beloved Scribes, we begin our first non-fiction book, The Element by Sir Ken Robinson.  We will spend the next few weeks reading this.

As an introduction, watch the video from the author embedded below.  Then leave three take aways from it.  What is interesting?  What do you agree with?  What do you disagree with? How might it apply to you now in high school?  Does this remind you of anything else you've seen or read?  Why is finding your element so important?  Why is creativity so vital? Do schools really kill creativity?  You get the idea.

THEN, and this is important, please respond to the take aways from three of your classmates.

I will do this too, so you can respond to my take aways or leave feedback to my comments.

I can't wait to see what you have to say.


52 comments:

  1. I think his take on creativity is - as the British say - "spot on." I think schools do tend to kill creativity in the name of "educating" students. But as Robinson notes, it is usually that schools educated kids out of creativity.

    After all, creativity isn't/can't be tested. Can it?

    So it doesn't get a lot of focus, especially after elementary school.

    Why is creativity as important as literacy? Well, as Robinson states, there aren't many professions where creativity won't be vital. We will watch several examples of this in a few days.

    But it's true. Just look at teachers. Mr. Zutz told us, the day we learned we were going to be a full 1:1 school, "If you don't like change, you're going to hate extinction." If we can't change and grow and - here's the kicker - find CREATIVE ways to engage students with technology, then we might as well not even have the technology and just trudge along as usual. And from the 2/38 figure I put on the board today, we know that simply trudging along as we have always done it isn't getting you guys college and career ready.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I believe school unwittingly stigmatize mistakes. That's why Robinson says, "If you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original."

    What that means is that mistakes are the best things that can happen. How else can anyone expect to learn? Yet, when were we ever encouraged to make mistakes and test things out?

    In sports we learn from our mistakes all the time. That's why we practice, yet why are mistakes in school so frowned upon?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As a student, I always hate feeling ashamed of being wrong. When a teacher encourages me as I fail, it motivates me to work more towards success. I think that as students recede into themselves because of their fear in making a mistake, they will lose their determination to succeed or even try at all.

      Delete
    2. Being an athlete is very challenging. People are more worried about your stats and records then they are about how the game is being played. So many skilled athletes have created their own plays or tricks, and often times I believe people forget that it isn't about who can copy the players trick or plays the best. It is about what kind of trick or play you can formulate that will top theirs. And that requires a lot of creativity that isn't being stressed because winning has become more important.

      Delete
    3. I can connect this with volleyball because we have a new head coach this year. The first day we all got a paper saying something about being prepared to change and ready for new. I struggle in volleyball so much because I hate to make a mistake or fail. Also in school I get very worried and stressed if I'm not figuring something out or don't get something. Getting stressed in school has seemed to spread into my sports a lot.

      Delete
    4. If I made a mistake in swimming, the coach would chew me out. It was like walking on eggshells. I tried as hard as I could to get every stroke perfect and I stopped experimenting and getting out of my comfort zone. The constant pressure to be perfect made me stop caring. I stopped trying to improve my times and I ended up quitting.If I wasn't so nervous about trying new techniques, I probably would have done much better in the meets.

      Delete
    5. Teachers and coaches put pressure on us to push us to do our best. If we get chewed out for making a mistake, then we will remember not to make that same mistake. We will never learn from mistakes if there is never any consequences for them.

      Delete
    6. In sports like varsity sports if you screw up in a game you are getting taken out of the game. I feel pressured because if I screw up I know I am coming out of the game and when I go in I am nervous about screwing up and not being able to go back on the field.

      Delete
    7. I can relate to this a lot especially from track. If I fall on a hurdle there's a very good chance I'm not going to win. The positive thing is I will learn from my mistake. The next practices I will focus on good form so next time I won't fall. It's a cycle that we need to go through to get better.

      Delete
    8. When he says you need to make mistakes in order to learn, how come some of the times you make a mistake in a sport or in school you get lectured about it or punished. To me thats not learning, its just telling me what just happened should never happen again. Not showing us how to fix the mistake

      Delete
  3. Talents and passions are buried deep inside students. The best thing teachers can do is give students a variety of experiences that will - hopefully - allow students to uncover their talents.

    This is risky. It means making mistakes. Our culture stigmatizes mistakes. As Seth Godin once said about helping kids discover their love for soccer - "when I coached seven year olds, I realized that the only way to do it was put kids out there on the soccer field and let them experiment. If they scored a goal, great, but the important thing was that they learned something about soccer. The parents fired me. They seemed to think that there is a trophy shortage. Apparently, seven year old soccer players have to win all the time."

    We are handicapping our kids and students and learners by not allowing them to fail and experiment in a wide variety of things.

    As Robinson states, there are many people who think they don't have anything to offer the world because the things that they are really good at weren't valued at school. Schools seem to put the value on three skills: math, reading, and writing.

    But the world demands so much more.

    Who knows what talents you may need to thrive in a flat world. More on that later, though.

    ReplyDelete
  4. "Nobody has a clue what the world will look like in five years time, and yet we're meant to be educating you for it."

    "Creativity is just as important as literacy."

    "Intelligence is diverse...intelligence is dynamic...intelligence is distinct."

    Robinson's view of the current foundation for educational practices seemed to hit the nail on the head. I think that the educational system is somewhat afraid of the future being any different, even though it can't know if it will be, and that's part of why it treats all students the same way. Creativity having the same significance as literacy stood out to me because it's extremely hard to learn without literacy and the same is true if you don't have creativity. It brings out more possibilities for solutions that you may not come to if you avoid going out of the box and breaking the rules. Intelligence being diverse, dynamic, and distinct told me that everyone learns in a different way. There are tons of processes through which someone can be educated, but it isn't always one-size-fits-all. Because intelligence is gained in different ways, through various types of creativity, the educational system needs to educate itself with eagerness to keep kids from falling behind due to its own stubborn ignorance.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. One size fits few. That's the actual title of a book I ordered this summer. I think the next phase of education (through technology and virtual on line classes) will be personalized. Where you get a degree tailored just to you and your unique passions and talents, rather than getting a high school degree where one size fits all and that degree doesn't really tell anyone anything about what skills or talents you have.

      Delete
  5. I believe in his statement about how are we supposed to teach kids who are starting school now and will be living there life 30 years from now. How are we supposed to teach them life skills they will need 30 years from now and we don’t even know what life will be like 5 years from now.
    "If you're not prepared to be wrong you will never come up with anything original." This is a very powerful sentence! It tells you it's okay to be wrong. If you're afraid of beig wrong then greatness will be hard to come by. Greatness comes from the lessons you learn from being wrong.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Riley, I agree completely. We have to make it safe for students to test out new ideas and stretch themselves with no worry about failing. If you never stretch yourself and fail, you never learn anything. It would be like practicing against the middle school football team. You'd never learn anything new about your team and you'd never stretch yourself.

      Delete
    2. You have a great point Riley. Everyone who has done something great has done something wrong and learned from it.

      Delete
    3. I agree that we really don't know how to educate our students now for the future. 30 years from now we don't know what things are going to be like, things are already changing dramatically.Technology is also changing fast, and we have to ask ourselves how advanced will it be in the future; for example, will we be teleporting, if so will we have a use for cars then as we do now? How do we know what to educate kids on if down the road what we have taught them now isn't useful in the future.

      Delete
    4. Nobody that has done anything great did it on their first time. They all had to learn from a process of trial and error. All great inventors for example, failed many times before making a big break through.

      Delete
    5. I agree that if students aren't prepared to be wrong then they will not come up with anything original. I feel like it should be okay for us students to be wrong sometimes, that way we are able to learn from our mistakes and become better leaners.

      Delete
  6. I like the comment on how were are educating kids for the future decades from now. But even with a ll of the expertise and technology in the world, we are still unable to even tell what the future will be a few years down the road. So for some kids, we are educating them in a field of study that may not even be existent by the time they have finished their education for that field of study. Jobs that may be in high demand now may not even be existent by the time some of the kids just starting school finish fifteen, twenty years down the road.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This reminds me of how Mr. Reynolds told us that sometime in our lifetimes education will be all on laptops. To us that just seems weird. We aren't prepared for changes, I think. Education is so focused on getting good grades, students aren't prepared for the real world.

      Delete
    2. We really don't know what the future will hold, or what kind of jobs will be available in the future. Other countries have better test scores, and education, and those students will eventually take over many of the jobs available to us. I think that we have to be educated on a wide spectrum of things because the future is unknown to us.

      Delete
    3. I agree with you completely. The world changes everyday. We can’t even be sure what the world will be like tomorrow let alone thirty years from now. I like the comment about jobs not existing. Technology is becoming more and more advanced, who knows what kind of technology we will have down the road.

      Delete
  7. "If your are not prepared to be wrong, you will never come up with anything original.”
    "We are educating people out of their creative composites."
    "The whole point of the schooling system is to produce university professors"

    I believe that the schooling system these days is so dry cut. We have certain guidelines to follow, and creativeness isn’t on that agenda. The schooling system wants scholars, and doesn’t have many options if you want to follow another path. You also have to be fine with failing because you learn from mistakes, and if you aren’t willing to make a mistake how are you going to learn valuable lessons.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Students get stressed so much to not fail, but yet we get told making mistakes are okay. I haven't really thought of it before but schools are really only aiming at making scholars. Most students will get great grades and won't make mistakes, but are they even getting a good lesson out of it?

      Delete
    2. I completely agree with you, Jenna. Schools don't value creativeness as much as academics. Academics are important, don't get me wrong, but creativeness is just as important. With creativity, all culture would deteriorate. Some kids were not born to become the next doctor, mathematician, scientist or lawyer. Kids need to also make mistakes to learn from them. Without making mistakes, no one would learn anything. Education would be worthless with kids making mistakes and learning from them.

      Delete
    3. I agree with what you said about having to follow the strict guidlines. Teachers expect us to be creative with our work then give us a guideline that we have to follow. How does that work?

      Delete
  8. "We don't grow into creativity; we grow out of it, or rather we get educated out of it."

    This statement states a lot. I'm the person who doesn't think I can be creative or I don't have a very good imagination. I strongly think school has taken it away. Of course I can be creative, but it's difficult. I think, as we get older, we have to focus on the future and how to become an adult. We get taught out of imagination. This really sucks.

    The story of the ballet dancer...
    I kind of question this story. How come someone can't just tell me what I should be. And than I can be amazing at it and become a millionaire. He said someone else would have gave her medication and told her to settle down. I think he meant someone at this time. No one is creative like that anymore. It really sucks, a lot! I sometimes feel like i have no special talent and that I'm not going to find the perfect career. That scares me!

    I agree with the quote about insects becoming extinct against humans becoming extinct. This seems so true. Life is taken for granted by so many. They go through their everyday routines. They are just here. To keep the world spinning we need to be more than ordinary. We need to be great and do great things. We aren't going to be like that if we are all taught the same things, and can't make mistakes. Everyone is different and need to be treated different; in a way so that we can grow into our special talents. We should be able to grow into our creativeness and love everything that we do.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I feel like we really do grow out of our creativity. Kids in elementary school do art projects almost every day, and as you get older you start doing less and less. When you get to high school you don't do anything that involves art in your classes, unless you take an art class. I think that we get caught up in our day to day lives, and forget you can cut loose sometimes too.

      Delete
    2. Cassidy,

      Your reply is interesting. Especially this line - "How come someone can't just tell me what I should be. And than I can be amazing at it and become a millionaire.

      That is a natural instinct for students your age and at this point in your life. I felt that same way. I just wanted to know what I was going to do and make a living at.

      However, from this point in my life, I now realize that the discovery of what I am meant to do was one of the best parts.

      The simple truth, Cassidy, is that no one can tell you what you're good at because what you are good at now may not be what you're good at in 10 years. For example, all the good ticket agents at airports and travel agencies had their world rocked into extinction when the world wide web came into existence, for airlines realized customers could just go to a machine and get a ticket printed out (and later even print them out at home). This meant that the ticket agents were out of their jobs.

      The same is true for the book store chain B. Dalton. They saw the web emerging and thought, "Who on earth would ever want to buy a book on line?" Thus, they didn't take amazon.com as a threat. Now amazon is thriving and B. Dalton (and book stores in general) are almost extinct.

      So the skills you acquire will constantly have to be improved upon and adapted throughout your life.

      And remember, just because you're amazing at something, doesn't necessarily mean you'll be a millionaire. Or famous. The most, I believe, we can hope for is to make a positive impact on the lives of others. And hopefully earn a living by that.

      Excellent points.

      Delete
    3. I believe a reason so many people get scared about going to college or picking a career is because when we are children we are taught that making a mistake isn't a good thing. So for the future we are taught that if we make a mistake it will not be a good thing.

      Especially as a Junior now I can relate to your statement that "I sometimes feel like i have no special talent and that I'm not going to find the perfect career." it is really scary for me as well. I am afraid I will do something wrong and screw up the future.

      Delete
    4. I agree with you so much on your second point "How come someone can't just tell me what I should be" Why don't we all have personal assistances that tell us what we are supposed to do when we get older, what we're going to be good at, what path will make us the most successful? I'm scared to think about college because I'm scared that I'll make the wrong choice. I don't know what I want. I don't know what I want to be. I don't know where I want to go if it's close or far away from home. Why can't someone just tell us what to do?

      Delete
  9. I agree that some kids are educated out of what they really love to do. Yes kids should still be educated in the basics like math, English and other subjects. But they should also be able to be educated in something they love. The ballet dancer is a great example of this. She was given an opportunity to do something she loves. Everyone should get this opportunity.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I feel like kids should be allowed to do what they want. If they're given the opportunity they could do great things. Especially if they're very passionate about what they want to do.

      Delete
    2. If all people were given the opportunity that this girl was given, then they could also be very successful and happy with their life. If she would have been put on medication and told she needs to start behaving normal, then she would not have had near as successful of a life.

      Delete
  10. I really like the story of the dancer

    Thought is was cool how he said ADHD was ‘invented’. It’s an invention by the pharmaceutical industry.

    Schools teach everyone the same things. I do believe people need to learn basic math, grammar, and some history, but everyone is different. Everyone has talents and I wish we could be placed in special classes according to those talents

    People who are homeschooled do seem more enlightened. Their parents see their passions and talents and support them more than the public school system ever would.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree with the fact that everyone has their own talents and special abilities. Yes, they should all get the basics of math, history etc. But they should be allowed to further their education in the field that intrigues them the most.

      Delete
    2. I liked the comment he made about the dancer about how someone gave her an opportunity to do what she loves and be around people just like her and a doctor would her on medication for her “ADHD”.

      Delete
  11. It is definitely true that we don’t know what will happen in 5 years. The world changed dramatically 5 years after the World Wide Web was invented. 30 years ago people didn’t even believe such a world could exist.

    I agree that school is killing creativity in a way. To be creative and come up with something original you can not be afraid to fail. It seems like the worst thing in school is to make a mistake on something.

    I like when he says, “we need to see our creative capacities for the richness that they are and seeing our children for the hope that they are.” This is how we come up with new technology and new ways of thinking. This is also how people find what they truly love to do.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree with that school does kill creativity because people are afraid to fail. But when they do fail and succeed at certain things is when they really truly find their calling for what they want to do.

      Delete
    2. I agree that people didn't think such a world would exist 30 years ago and technology is improving a lot!

      Delete
  12. By the time kids reach third grade they make a transition from creative learning to a more traditional, classroom style learning. Painted pictures don’t decorate the halls or classroom. Instead you see posters of varies things, whether it be of science or math. I believe it is this transition in school that kills or puts kids’ creativity on a back burner. From a young age we are taught that things have a right or wrong and the problem with that is that creativity knows no right or wrong. We should be taught with creativity all the way through high school. The way teachers teach shouldn’t be uniform; it should be unique to every teacher.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree. In elementary school we were doing art projects every week, in middle school we were required to take an exploratory art class with Mrs. Kolden. Now that we're in highschool we never do projects unless we sign up for it, and even if we sign up we have strict guidelines on what we have to create. I never took an art class with Ms. Layman, but I did when Mrs. Adams was the art teacher. We could never create anything that was truly our idea. We just did exactly what she told us.

      Delete
    2. I agree, you learn more being creative and using your imagination should stay without throughout your life. That doesn't happen though because as you grow up you hardly see creativity anymore all you see are people doing the things they don't like and not having fun. Whereas if they were able to come out of their shell and use their imagination things would be much better.

      Delete
  13. If you’re not prepared to be wrong you will never come up with anything original.
    And now schools are running where if you make a mistake that is the worst thing you can do.

    I agree where he says we are suppose to grow into creativity as we grow up but what we are doing is as we grow up we are growing out of creativity which means we’re losing our originality.

    “You have to move to think”

    ReplyDelete
  14. Some teachers put the idea in my head that failure is a bad thing. I have been paranoid on failing in my schoolwork and getting a bad grade that I forgot how to make mistakes and learn from them.
    In orchestra, when I play a wrong note or screw up in anyway, I feel like I committed a sin because I felt that making a mistake was horrible. I feel like I was the worst, so I don't play out or be creative in orchestra; I just do what I think my teacher expects from me. To follow the rules and not take risks.
    The thing about failure is that it helps spark the creativity in children. Schools, I think, don't exactly kill creativity, but some sure don't encourage it to their students. Lincoln, in my opinion, is fairly good at sparking creativity in students, but some children in different schools are not as lucky as us. Some teachers just educate; they don't think creativity is necessary.
    I also noticed that, once you leave elementary school and go to middle school, it is not as creative, as the children are used to. They go into traditional teaching and forget about the use of creativity we used back in elementary school.

    ReplyDelete
  15. I agree that in five years nobody knows what are life will be like, not even people who predict what will happen don't even know.

    Creativity is killed by school, being wrong in school is the worst thing because you answer a question wrong you fell embarrassed. Once you feel embarrassed you don't want to answer any questions because you feel like it will be wrong and you will be criticized for it.

    I also think as I moved from elementary to franklin, and franklin to lincoln, that teachers expect us to answer questions right. Unlike elementary school teachers didn't care if you were wrong. They would just think we are little kids, but for high school we are therefore older and shouldn't answer questions wrong I fell

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I completely agree with one of your later statements, that as we get older it is unacceptable to be wrong. When we were in 1st grade or 2nd grade the teacher would go through every raised hand before helping us all get the right answer. In high school if we don’t get it within a few minutes they tell us the answer and we move on. I think this is more destructive than constructive.

      Delete
  16. Like everyone else is saying, failing in the classroom is a scary thing. If you fail or get something wrong, there are few teachers who will stop and correct you in a way that doesn't make you feel humiliated.

    I totally agree with the speaker that creativity is key for a good education. A mind that isn't creative is a dull mind. Creativity causes people to think and make ideas of their own. Creativity is like a mental workout for your brain. Without it, the brain does not perform to its full capability. Schools taking away creativity from the kids is just the same as taking away our brain power. We need to be creative and think of our own ideas, and the teachers need to be supportive of that. If we have an idea that is wrong or not good, teachers need to help us forget it and move on to the next idea.

    ReplyDelete
  17. I agree with the speaker when he says creativity is as important and literacy. No matter what you you do in your life you have to be creative. Whether you're a school teacher which revolves around creativity or an accountant that sits at a desk all day. Both jobs require them to be creative in some way. Just like we rely on literacy in day to day activities we rely on creativity as well.

    "If we're not prepared to be wrong we won't come up with anything original." Most students don't want to be wrong because they are afraid of the embarrassment. In high school kids can be mean so this scares some people. They don't speak out and it kills their creativity.

    ReplyDelete
  18. I liked it when he said that we are suppose to be teaching kids for the future years from now. But we are unable to do so because we don't know what it is going to be like then. We don't even know what the world will be like in 5 years. We might be teaching kids things that won't be around when they are done with college. I also like how it said that if you are afraid of being wrong it will be harder to succeed. It is okay to be wrong. You learn from your mistakes.

    ReplyDelete
  19. I think that his ideas of creativity and education are on point. I think that schools unintentionally “Kill” creativity by pressing focus on how intelligent children are rather than how children are intelligent. I also agree that kids often feel that they are not intelligent because of how they performed on standardized tests. “Many highly talented and creative people think they are not intelligent based on what intelligence is said to be on a scale.” Many kids are often discouraged by what they receive on standardized tests while their talents flourish.

    One statement that I find really interesting that also makes me think is when he says “Nobody knows what the world will look like in five years yet we are supposed to educate them for the future.” I found this interesting because nobody knows what the future will hold and to expect teachers to prepare us for an unpredictable future must put a lot of pressure on teachers who are expected to change their mindsets. I agree that teachers will need to redevelop how they think of and interpret intelligence into more than just a test score.

    "Creativity is as important as literacy and we should treat it as it is that important”

    Creativity is Vital to every aspect of the future. Most jobs that kids in school right now will have are jobs that do not currently exist. Every child is creative in their own unique way which will eventually translate into a huge range of new jobs and occupations that were once thought to be just unproductive hobbies and interests.

    ReplyDelete