Standing Ovation: Reading Response Four

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Reading Response Four

In Sir Ken Robinson’s lecture School Kills Creativity he argues against the current public education system and how it stifles creativity. Sir Ken Robinson, creativity expert, states “national educations systems make mistakes the worst thing you can make which is educating people out of there creative capacities.” What Robinson is saying here is that school systems shun mistakes however mistakes aren’t bad as they can bring in creativity. Basically students are afraid to make a mistake so rather then being creative and sayings what on their mind they won’t say anything or they will give a picture perfect definition that is unoriginal. Slowly and slowly we lose this ability to be creative and spontaneous since we don’t use practice it during school, of course not everyone does lose this. Robinson also depicts the idea of the hierarchy of subjects in public schools. Robinson acknowledges “Every education system on earth has the same hierarchy of subjects, on the top is mathematics and the languages then the humanities then on the bottom is the arts. Then art and music is above drama and dance in the arts category.” Basically what Robinson is saying is that we strive most of our efforts on mathematics and the languages and almost forget about the other subjects as if they are unimportant. Robinson recognizes however that all the subjects are important and that dance is just as important as mathematics.
I agree with Robinson is that schools are stifling creativity because I can personally notice its effects first hand. Schools take us away from our wants and ability to be creative and opinionated in away. All schools have required classes and the classes you take the most of are science and languages, as seen in Robinson’s hierarchy. Kids are required to take such classes making it harder for them to take other classes or to experience different classes. Now I do think both math and English (in our case) is important as drawing on a resume won’t get you a job. However, I think it’s equally important that kids get exposed to as many subjects as possible so they can find themselves and find their skills. Giving the students choice allows them to be more creative and can also motivate the students to excel. I think lowering the requirements of these classes raises possibilities for students to become free and lets them be a bit more creative. Kids being forced to take these classes also lose motivation; I know I sure did in High School. If it’s a subject you’re not interested you can’t get motivated, end of story. The problem however would take a great deal of reform, students still need to learn basic skills as you don’t know what you want to be when you grow up. Students wanting to be doctors don’t need to know how to draw and students going into drama don’t need to know how dissect a frog, but when exactly does one figure out what they want to do?

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Welcome

Welcome to our Eng 100 Blog “Standing Ovation”! The title of this blog refers to the audience of active readers we are creating by sharing our academic writing for Eng 100 with a larger group of students, instructors, academics, and just about anybody who chooses to follow our blog! When you write and post your reader responses here (and, later, as you write your essays for the course), I encourage you to use this audience to conceptualize who you are writing for and, most important, how to communicate your ideas so that this group of academic readers and writers can easily follow your line of thinking. Think about it this way: What do you need to explain and articulate in order for the other bloggers to understand your response to the essays we’ve read in class? What does your audience need to know about those essays and the authors who wrote them? And how can you show your readers, in writing, which ideas you add to these “conversations” that take place in the texts we study?
As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! I encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later).
Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. I hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it!