According to him, this is highly problematic. He sees each student as a reserve of creative energy whose potential is often left untapped because our education system, as it currently operates, doesn’t allow for the prospecting let alone the excavation of such individual talent. The same goes for the academic tests to which students are subjected at the conclusion of their schooling lives: they don’t target a full range of abilities or aptitudes.
Robinson believes this calls for a major shift in the way we approach and enculturate teaching and learning practices in our country. He proposes that we should move away from standardised methods, and instead customise teaching and learning on an individual-by-individual basis to more effectively access and cultivate students’ personal talents. In other words, we should shift away from our current ‘industrial model’ where students are processed through factory-like schools towards an ‘agricultural model’ where teachers work instead like farmers, creating and facilitating the conditions by which their students’ personal abilities are able to best take root, flower and prosper.
According to Robinson’s theory, such a paradigm shift will better serve our students: by helping them discover their inner talents at school then helping them cultivate and master these talents, teachers will hopefully guide their students along a learning pathway that will later on lead to a passionate, fulfilling and satisfying life across both their private and professional worlds.
Furthermore, Robinson believes that such a change will also pay dividends for the progress of our society. We live in a time of unprecedented change; the world is evolving at such a rate around us that it is difficult to envision what the future will hold for the next few generations of people. The demands of operating such a world, Robinson suggests, will require the full and diverse range of talents offered by today’s students – talents we can only utilise later if we change the way we do things in the classroom today.
If you’re interested in Sir Ken Robinson’s innovative views or would like to learn more about his philosophy on modern education, he is delivering an exclusive talk on revolutionising education from the ground up for STEM 2020 On Demand.
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