The stand up educationalist!
Sir Ken Robinson was born in the shadow of Goodison park in Liverpool. The home of Everton Football club. One of seven children he had aspirations to play for the football team but was struck down by Polio at the age of four. Although his brother Neil played football professionally for Everton and other clubs. His Father who played semi-professional football was also injured in a work accident on the docks in Liverpool. Although as a child he was confined to bed initially he was able to attend the Margaret Beaven Special School. Then later the Liverpool Collegiate School due to his accomplishments in school. He then attended Breton Hall College of Education were he was awarded a degree in Education. Completing his Phd at the University of London researching drama and theatre in Education.
For twelve years he was professor of education at Warwick University, UK he is now professor emeritus there. He has received honorary degrees from the Rhode Island School of Design, Ringling College of Art and Design, the Open University and the Central School of Speech and Drama, Birmingham City University and the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. He has been honoured with the Athena Award of the Rhode Island School of Design for services to the arts and education, the Peabody Medal for contributions to the arts and culture in the United States, the LEGO Prize for international achievement in education, and the Benjamin Franklin Medal of the Royal Society of Arts for outstanding contributions to cultural relations between the United Kingdom and the United States. In 2005, he was named as one of Time/Fortune/CNN's "Principal Voices". In 2003, he was made Knight Bachelor by the Queen for his services to the arts. He speaks to audiences throughout the world on the creative challenges facing business and education in the new global economies.
In 1998, he led a UK commission on creativity, education and the economy and his report, All Our Futures: Creativity, Culture and Education, was influential. The Times said of it: "This report raises some of the most important issues facing business in the 21st century. It should have every CEO and human resources director thumping the table and demanding action". Robinson is credited with creating a strategy for creative and economic development as part of the Peace Process in Northern Ireland, publishing Unlocking Creativity, a plan implemented across the region and mentoring to the Oklahoma Creativity Project. In 1998, he chaired the National Advisory Committee on Creative and Cultural Education.
In 2001, Robinson was appointed Senior Advisor for Education and Creativity at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, which lasted at until 2005.
He is a popular speaker at TED conferences, He has given three presentations on the role of creativity in education, viewed via the TED website and YouTube over 80 million times. Robinson's presentation "Do schools kill creativity?" is the most watched TED talk of all time in 2017. In April 2013, he gave a talk titled "How to escape education's death valley", in which he outlines three principles crucial for the human mind to flourish – and how current American education culture works against them. In 2010, the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) animated one of Robinson's speeches about changing education paradigms. The video was viewed nearly half a million times in its first week on YouTube and as of December 2017 has been viewed more than 15 million times.
Robinson has suggested that to engage and succeed, education has to develop on three fronts. Firstly, that it should foster diversity by offering a broad curriculum and encourage individualisation of the learning process. Secondly, it should promote curiosity through creative teaching, which depends on high quality teacher training and development. Finally, it should focus on awakening creativity through alternative didactic processes that put less emphasis on standardised testing, thereby giving the responsibility for defining the course of education to individual schools and teachers. He believes that much of the present education system in the United States encourages conformity, compliance and standardisation rather than creative approaches to learning. Robinson emphasises that we can only succeed if we recognise that education is an organic system, not a mechanical one. Successful school administration is a matter of engendering a helpful climate rather than "command and control".
In his own words "I’ve been doing what I do for a fairly long time. Along the way, I’ve balanced various roles: as a teacher, writer, researcher, adviser and speaker. I’ve directed and been involved in many initiatives around the world, with education systems and with corporate, cultural and community organizations."
His writing;
Learning Through Drama: Report of the Schools Council Drama Teaching in 1977 was the result of a three-year national development project for the UK Schools Council. Robinson was principal author of The Arts in Schools: Principles, Practice, and Provision (1982), now a key text on arts and education internationally. He edited The Arts and Higher Education in 1984, and co-wrote The Arts in Further Education in 1986, Arts Education in Europe, and Facing the Future: The Arts and Education in Hong Kong.
Robinson's 2001 book, Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative (Wiley-Capstone), was described by Director magazine as "a truly mind-opening analysis of why we don't get the best out of people at a time of punishing change." John Cleese said of it: "Ken Robinson writes brilliantly about the different ways in which creativity is undervalued and ignored in Western culture and especially in our educational systems."
The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, was published in January 2009 by Penguin. "The element" refers to the experience of personal talent meeting personal passion. He argues that in this encounter, we feel most ourselves, most inspired, and achieve to our highest level. The book draws on the stories of creative artists such as Paul McCartney, The Simpsons creator Matt Groening, Meg Ryan, and physicist Richard Feynman to investigate this paradigm of success.
He has also published three other books Finding your element (2013): how to discover your talents and passions and transform your life. New York: Viking Press.
Creative schools (2015): the grassroots revolution that's transforming education. New York: Viking. In this book he encourages his critics to look beyond his 18-minute TED talk. To his many books and articles on the subject of education, in which he lays out plans for accomplishing his vision.
You, your child, and school (2018): navigate your way to the best education. New York: Viking
I enjoyed recording this audio interview with him below very much. I trust you will enjoy listening to it. As along with tens of millions of others I have enjoyed watching his TED talks!