By: Robert Hunter
In the tenth century, Harald Bluetooth united Norway and Denmark, ruling as king for almost twenty-eight years. Inspired by this astonishing feat, IBM created “Bluetooth”, a short range communications technology which united various mobile devices under a single protocol. As the next installment of the Bluetooth legacy, creativity should be united with education. More specifically, education should allow creativity to prosper because doing so would enable students to learn in more engaging ways and solve real world problems innovatively. After all, creativity is an important quality, for it has been one of the driving forces behind almost every major, groundbreaking accomplishment in the history of the human race. However, without an adequate, sufficient, and reliable way of passing this innovative enlightenment on to future generations, there is little hope that they will be able to achieve and overcome challenges surrounding the contemporary age.
The current system of education is not at its finest, which is concerning “partly because it's education that's meant to take us into this future that we can't grasp. If you think of it, children starting school this year will be retiring in 2065. Nobody has a clue, despite all the expertise…what the world will look like in five years' time. And yet we're meant to be educating them for it." (Robinson). With such limited information about the future, it is imperative that young adults are prepared to take on whatever challenges arise. Unfortunately, students are being trained in the art of trigonometry and chemical reactions rather than being taught how to pay taxes or how to apply for a job; although trigonometry and chemical reactions are necessary for some jobs. It is at this basic level that education starts to fail. The average student will forget what grade they got on their first calculus test, but they will never forget how awkward their first job interview was. The point is, education does not even train students to take on the basic challenges of life.
Interestingly, looking at education, there tends to be a “hierarchy” of subjects from most to least important starting with math, science, literature, history, and ending with the arts: the essence of creativity. The arts are the subjects that require more emphasis on independence and commitment while studying the higher intellectual subjects, such as STEM, require more dependence on formal instruction. In fact, "The assumption that learning always requires formal instruction, an assumption that is central to most schooling, communicates profoundly low expectations to students about their capacity as learners. Internalizing these low expectations is debilitating, making learners passive and dependent. " (Wheatley 28). With this being said, it is not the best idea to simply eliminate formal instruction altogether. After all, students still need someone to teach them the arts, especially when they are just starting out. However, these low expectations are the main reason that it gets increasingly difficult to mobilize students to become independent and solve problems on their own. As children move forward, they start expecting to be spoon-fed information instead of becoming actively engaged in their own education.
After a while, another problem arises. The system "doesn't animate them. They're not like all of you who can sit in rows and hear things said to you for hour after hour. They want to do things, they want to get their hands dirty, they want education to be for real." (Mulgan). Perhaps this is the main reason why society has such difficulty with education. Schools expect children to sit in neat rows and absorb information in a quiet and respectful manner. Unfortunately, this might be considered a utopian vision because there is no world in which such a system would be effective for everyone. In contrast, some people tend to think that active teaching and mandatory instruction will help students when in reality, "If their basic needs are met, children are excellent learners, but by changing learning into something called education that is forced on children, formal schooling undermines healthy development and learning." (Wheatley 27). Modern education almost completely ignores the basis of natural curiosity by using the traditional classroom technique and immersing students in an almost artificial schooling system. All these facts lead to one main point: society has education wrong.
The existing system of education hardly allows for creativity to prosper and sometimes even suppresses it. However, people must first understand that creativity can be hard to define and comprehend at times, for they tend to think that "creativity defies definition, and yet is recognizable, speaks to the ineffable yet self-evident magic that seems to underlie the creative spark. As creativity becomes an important part of education, however, it is imperative that we move beyond such generalizations towards a more precise definition." (Mishra and Henriksen 10). For generations, man has walked the face of the earth knowing the concept of creativity, yet not knowing any specifics about it. With such an imprecise and abstract idea of what creativity is, there is hardly any way that society will see the logic in its integration. This is partly due to society’s inability to recognize it as an important characteristic to human beings. After all, “for all the historical basis of valuing creativity (a basis which stretches back to antiquity, with Plato’s concept of ‘the Muse’) the emphasis on creativity has never been as pressing, or as academically discussed, as it is in present day. " (Mishra and Henriksen 10). Being such a difficult topic to define, it seems obvious as to why an accurate definition has never been thought of until its value to education increased. The world needs more creative thinkers in order to keep pushing the limits of what can be done. Over a hundred years ago, people thought that flying would be impossible, yet now, commercial jets have become integrated as a part of society. In order for that drastic change to occur, there had to be someone who was willing to put in the creative energy to prove people wrong. Schools often unconsciously suppress this creativity because education focuses too much on what is right and what is wrong. The fact is, "if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original … And by the time they get to be adults, most kids have lost that capacity." (Robinson). Kids lose this capacity not because they grow out of it, but instead because schooling does not value the trait as much as it values something such as the ability to retain large amounts of information for long periods of time. As a result, the trait is left unexercised and suppressed long enough for the student to think that they have lost it entirely.
Despite all this, some may argue that the current system does its job well and prepares kids for their future careers. However, this is not true. In fact, "if you were to visit education, as an alien, and say 'What's it for, public education?' … I think you'd have to conclude the whole purpose of public education throughout the world is to produce university professors." (Robinson). Schools aren’t educating to prepare students for their futures; instead, they focus on having kids know every detail of everything that once was or is. As a result, education trains students to succeed in school rather than to prepare for the real world and all its unpredictability.
The entire concept of education should be reimagined and designed to integrate creativity. For example, learning out in the real world will help students to have a better experience and boost their creative problem solving skills. This is because "when children spend their days learning outside the four classroom walls, they can learn from fertile, moment-to-moment real life in a way that schools cannot match. For example, a wonderful opportunity for learning from life can be found in examining the erosion on a beach on a Tuesday in October, rather than reading about it in a textbook." (Wheatley 28). Simply changing the scope of education from the confining classroom walls to the open world will have drastic results. From the dawn of humanity, evolution has wired people’s brains so that they learn best through experiencing the world to its fullest potential. After all, there were no mass systems of education back in the cavemen days. People learned from trial and error: what worked and what didn’t. This is why children “learn best by doing things, they learn best in teams and they learn best by doing things for real — all the opposite of what mainstream schooling actually does." (Mulgan).
In addition to this, the arts, which use high amounts of creativity, should be emphasized more. In fact, they could even be used to foster creativity in other areas of education. By integrating it in to math, for example, children would be able to create intricate geometric sculptures and calculate their surface area and volume instead of doing a typical worksheet. Some may say that the arts are at the least priority because they pose no real value to a student’s education. However, this is not the case, for "In the present educational and political climate that stresses high-stakes accountability, using the digital humanities can open up new directions for updating and revitalizing education policy. The arts, traditionally regarded as a subject with a high disposability quotient, may acquire new significance when paired with technology." (Choi and Piro 32). The arts can be a basis for implementing creativity in to education, for their strong reliance on it will enable students to grow and develop mentally in ways that were impossible before. In addition, the arts can open up gateways when pairing them with new forms of technology.
If the current education system proves to be too much to fix, an alternative solution is to invent an entirely new system from the ground up. An ideal education system would start with students learning the basics, as they do in the current. However, even at this stage, teachers should encourage students to discover their creative potential. This will encourage teaching on a more personal level which will ultimately lead to a more memorable and engaging experience. There are many different types of learners and consequently, they perceive information in different ways. For this reason, assessments of the student's’ performance should be specific to each student and their creative potential in order to provide a more accurate representation of the student’s understanding. Since the ultimate goal of education is to conceive generation after generation of skilled and capable individuals, the system should immerse children in an environment that mimics the real world. This will promote the art of creative problem solving which is vital to overcoming real world issues. By learning in this exploratory setting which emphasizes creativity, students will have the chance to grow and develop in a more natural way contrary to the traditional classroom approach. Overall, using a child’s inherent creative learning abilities will prove to be more effective than any other form of formal education.
The prosperity of creativity in education is vital because doing so would allow students to learn in more engaging ways and solve real world problems innovatively. This is important because the world needs creative thinkers and people who are trained at solving real life problems. If creativity is not integrated in day-to-day school activities, eventually the world may face an entire generation of people who only know how to fill out worksheets and answer multiple choice tests instead of knowing how to survive in the real world. After all, the ultimate goal of education should be to prepare students for the unpredictability of the modern era.
Works Cited
Choi, Haeryun, and Joseph M. Piro. "Expanding Arts Education in a Digital Age." Arts Education Policy Review 110.3 (2009): 27. Edb. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Mishra, Punya, and Danah Henriksen. "A NEW Approach to Defining and Measuring Creativity: Rethinking Technology & Creativity in the 21st Century." TechTrends: Linking Research & Practice to Improve Learning 57.5 (2013): 10-13. Academic Search Complete. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Mulgan, Geoff. "A Short Intro to the Studio School." TEDGlobal 2011. Scotland, Edinburgh. July 2011. Geoff Mulgan: A Short Intro to the Studio School. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Robinson, Ken. "Do Schools Kill Creativity?" TED 2006. California, Monterey. Feb. 2006. Ken Robinson: Do Schools Kill Creativity? Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Wheatley, Karl F. "Unschooling: An Oasis for Development and Democracy." Encounter 22.2 (2009): 27-32. Academic Search Complete. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
In the tenth century, Harald Bluetooth united Norway and Denmark, ruling as king for almost twenty-eight years. Inspired by this astonishing feat, IBM created “Bluetooth”, a short range communications technology which united various mobile devices under a single protocol. As the next installment of the Bluetooth legacy, creativity should be united with education. More specifically, education should allow creativity to prosper because doing so would enable students to learn in more engaging ways and solve real world problems innovatively. After all, creativity is an important quality, for it has been one of the driving forces behind almost every major, groundbreaking accomplishment in the history of the human race. However, without an adequate, sufficient, and reliable way of passing this innovative enlightenment on to future generations, there is little hope that they will be able to achieve and overcome challenges surrounding the contemporary age.
The current system of education is not at its finest, which is concerning “partly because it's education that's meant to take us into this future that we can't grasp. If you think of it, children starting school this year will be retiring in 2065. Nobody has a clue, despite all the expertise…what the world will look like in five years' time. And yet we're meant to be educating them for it." (Robinson). With such limited information about the future, it is imperative that young adults are prepared to take on whatever challenges arise. Unfortunately, students are being trained in the art of trigonometry and chemical reactions rather than being taught how to pay taxes or how to apply for a job; although trigonometry and chemical reactions are necessary for some jobs. It is at this basic level that education starts to fail. The average student will forget what grade they got on their first calculus test, but they will never forget how awkward their first job interview was. The point is, education does not even train students to take on the basic challenges of life.
Interestingly, looking at education, there tends to be a “hierarchy” of subjects from most to least important starting with math, science, literature, history, and ending with the arts: the essence of creativity. The arts are the subjects that require more emphasis on independence and commitment while studying the higher intellectual subjects, such as STEM, require more dependence on formal instruction. In fact, "The assumption that learning always requires formal instruction, an assumption that is central to most schooling, communicates profoundly low expectations to students about their capacity as learners. Internalizing these low expectations is debilitating, making learners passive and dependent. " (Wheatley 28). With this being said, it is not the best idea to simply eliminate formal instruction altogether. After all, students still need someone to teach them the arts, especially when they are just starting out. However, these low expectations are the main reason that it gets increasingly difficult to mobilize students to become independent and solve problems on their own. As children move forward, they start expecting to be spoon-fed information instead of becoming actively engaged in their own education.
After a while, another problem arises. The system "doesn't animate them. They're not like all of you who can sit in rows and hear things said to you for hour after hour. They want to do things, they want to get their hands dirty, they want education to be for real." (Mulgan). Perhaps this is the main reason why society has such difficulty with education. Schools expect children to sit in neat rows and absorb information in a quiet and respectful manner. Unfortunately, this might be considered a utopian vision because there is no world in which such a system would be effective for everyone. In contrast, some people tend to think that active teaching and mandatory instruction will help students when in reality, "If their basic needs are met, children are excellent learners, but by changing learning into something called education that is forced on children, formal schooling undermines healthy development and learning." (Wheatley 27). Modern education almost completely ignores the basis of natural curiosity by using the traditional classroom technique and immersing students in an almost artificial schooling system. All these facts lead to one main point: society has education wrong.
The existing system of education hardly allows for creativity to prosper and sometimes even suppresses it. However, people must first understand that creativity can be hard to define and comprehend at times, for they tend to think that "creativity defies definition, and yet is recognizable, speaks to the ineffable yet self-evident magic that seems to underlie the creative spark. As creativity becomes an important part of education, however, it is imperative that we move beyond such generalizations towards a more precise definition." (Mishra and Henriksen 10). For generations, man has walked the face of the earth knowing the concept of creativity, yet not knowing any specifics about it. With such an imprecise and abstract idea of what creativity is, there is hardly any way that society will see the logic in its integration. This is partly due to society’s inability to recognize it as an important characteristic to human beings. After all, “for all the historical basis of valuing creativity (a basis which stretches back to antiquity, with Plato’s concept of ‘the Muse’) the emphasis on creativity has never been as pressing, or as academically discussed, as it is in present day. " (Mishra and Henriksen 10). Being such a difficult topic to define, it seems obvious as to why an accurate definition has never been thought of until its value to education increased. The world needs more creative thinkers in order to keep pushing the limits of what can be done. Over a hundred years ago, people thought that flying would be impossible, yet now, commercial jets have become integrated as a part of society. In order for that drastic change to occur, there had to be someone who was willing to put in the creative energy to prove people wrong. Schools often unconsciously suppress this creativity because education focuses too much on what is right and what is wrong. The fact is, "if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original … And by the time they get to be adults, most kids have lost that capacity." (Robinson). Kids lose this capacity not because they grow out of it, but instead because schooling does not value the trait as much as it values something such as the ability to retain large amounts of information for long periods of time. As a result, the trait is left unexercised and suppressed long enough for the student to think that they have lost it entirely.
Despite all this, some may argue that the current system does its job well and prepares kids for their future careers. However, this is not true. In fact, "if you were to visit education, as an alien, and say 'What's it for, public education?' … I think you'd have to conclude the whole purpose of public education throughout the world is to produce university professors." (Robinson). Schools aren’t educating to prepare students for their futures; instead, they focus on having kids know every detail of everything that once was or is. As a result, education trains students to succeed in school rather than to prepare for the real world and all its unpredictability.
The entire concept of education should be reimagined and designed to integrate creativity. For example, learning out in the real world will help students to have a better experience and boost their creative problem solving skills. This is because "when children spend their days learning outside the four classroom walls, they can learn from fertile, moment-to-moment real life in a way that schools cannot match. For example, a wonderful opportunity for learning from life can be found in examining the erosion on a beach on a Tuesday in October, rather than reading about it in a textbook." (Wheatley 28). Simply changing the scope of education from the confining classroom walls to the open world will have drastic results. From the dawn of humanity, evolution has wired people’s brains so that they learn best through experiencing the world to its fullest potential. After all, there were no mass systems of education back in the cavemen days. People learned from trial and error: what worked and what didn’t. This is why children “learn best by doing things, they learn best in teams and they learn best by doing things for real — all the opposite of what mainstream schooling actually does." (Mulgan).
In addition to this, the arts, which use high amounts of creativity, should be emphasized more. In fact, they could even be used to foster creativity in other areas of education. By integrating it in to math, for example, children would be able to create intricate geometric sculptures and calculate their surface area and volume instead of doing a typical worksheet. Some may say that the arts are at the least priority because they pose no real value to a student’s education. However, this is not the case, for "In the present educational and political climate that stresses high-stakes accountability, using the digital humanities can open up new directions for updating and revitalizing education policy. The arts, traditionally regarded as a subject with a high disposability quotient, may acquire new significance when paired with technology." (Choi and Piro 32). The arts can be a basis for implementing creativity in to education, for their strong reliance on it will enable students to grow and develop mentally in ways that were impossible before. In addition, the arts can open up gateways when pairing them with new forms of technology.
If the current education system proves to be too much to fix, an alternative solution is to invent an entirely new system from the ground up. An ideal education system would start with students learning the basics, as they do in the current. However, even at this stage, teachers should encourage students to discover their creative potential. This will encourage teaching on a more personal level which will ultimately lead to a more memorable and engaging experience. There are many different types of learners and consequently, they perceive information in different ways. For this reason, assessments of the student's’ performance should be specific to each student and their creative potential in order to provide a more accurate representation of the student’s understanding. Since the ultimate goal of education is to conceive generation after generation of skilled and capable individuals, the system should immerse children in an environment that mimics the real world. This will promote the art of creative problem solving which is vital to overcoming real world issues. By learning in this exploratory setting which emphasizes creativity, students will have the chance to grow and develop in a more natural way contrary to the traditional classroom approach. Overall, using a child’s inherent creative learning abilities will prove to be more effective than any other form of formal education.
The prosperity of creativity in education is vital because doing so would allow students to learn in more engaging ways and solve real world problems innovatively. This is important because the world needs creative thinkers and people who are trained at solving real life problems. If creativity is not integrated in day-to-day school activities, eventually the world may face an entire generation of people who only know how to fill out worksheets and answer multiple choice tests instead of knowing how to survive in the real world. After all, the ultimate goal of education should be to prepare students for the unpredictability of the modern era.
Works Cited
Choi, Haeryun, and Joseph M. Piro. "Expanding Arts Education in a Digital Age." Arts Education Policy Review 110.3 (2009): 27. Edb. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Mishra, Punya, and Danah Henriksen. "A NEW Approach to Defining and Measuring Creativity: Rethinking Technology & Creativity in the 21st Century." TechTrends: Linking Research & Practice to Improve Learning 57.5 (2013): 10-13. Academic Search Complete. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Mulgan, Geoff. "A Short Intro to the Studio School." TEDGlobal 2011. Scotland, Edinburgh. July 2011. Geoff Mulgan: A Short Intro to the Studio School. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Robinson, Ken. "Do Schools Kill Creativity?" TED 2006. California, Monterey. Feb. 2006. Ken Robinson: Do Schools Kill Creativity? Web. 28 Jan. 2017.
Wheatley, Karl F. "Unschooling: An Oasis for Development and Democracy." Encounter 22.2 (2009): 27-32. Academic Search Complete. Web. 28 Jan. 2017.