Creativity in Today's Curriculum: Does Education Kill Creativity?

Sir Ken Robinson 

This blog is solely focussed on Sir Ken Robinson. He is considered an ‘expert’ in the field and is widely recognised for challenging the way we think about creativity.

Phillips (2014) stated that Sir Kenneth Robinson was born on the 4th of March 1950. He is known as an English author, speaker and international advisor on education.

Ken Robinson defined creativity as followed:

Robinson (2013) suggested that to engage and succeed, education has to develop on three fronts, these are:

Firstly, education should foster diversity by offering a broad curriculum and encourage individualisation of the learning process. Secondly, education should foster curiosity through creative teaching, which depends on high quality teacher training and development. Third and finally, education should focus on awakening creativity through alternative didactic processes that places less emphasis on standardised testing, thereby giving the responsibility for defining the course of education to individual schools and teachers (Robinson, 2013, p.1). 

Ken Robinson emphasised the extreme importance of creativity within education in comparison to the academic subjects such as Literacy and Numeracy. 

What are the benefits of creativity within education?

I created an acronym that I believed highlighted the key benefits of creativity within education.

Challenging

Creativity tests pupil’s boundaries and enables them to exceed beyond their comfort zones. 

Relevant

In the eyes of Ken Robinson, creativity is relevant to our educational lives. 'We do not grow into creativity, but rather we grow out of it. We are educating people out of their creative capacities' (Robinson, 2006, p.1). Therefore, we should not be stifling creativity in education, BUT rather promoting and integrating creativity throughout the curriculum whenever possible.

Enlightenment 

Creativity represents educational material through various methods. Therefore, creativity essentially allows pupils to learn through different perspectives, potentially improving pupil understanding. Creativity could also develop and maintain pupil concentration due to its diverse and universal approach.

Active

Using creativity as a tool for education allows a child to be actively involved in their own self- directed learning process.

Thirst

When students are interested and engaged in the lesson they actually enjoy learning. This promotes the use of creativity throughout the learning process.

Involvement

One of the primary goals of a creative teacher is to increase participation by pupils. If a pupil feels more involved in the learning process it will motivate them to work harder to achieve a positive learning outcome.

 Vigour

The teacher is required to improve the creative aspect of learning to engage with pupils thus, the teacher will have an even greater personal investment in the lesson. As a result, the lesson will to be presented with more enthusiasm and energy.

Excellence

Creative teachers ask questions like:  "How can I make this lesson better understood?" or "How can I tap into the needs of my students?" and "How can I engage my students in the process?" Consequently, as a result of constant evaluation, lessons are consistently improving and benefiting the pupils.

  

Drawbacks of Creativity

In my opinion there are 3 significant drawbacks of creativity within education.

1.       Lack of time available in the curriculum

2.       Lack of priority to teachers in comparison to other aspects of learning

3.       Lack of resources

In this Ted Talk video Ken Robinson discussed the intertwined connection between education and creativity. I have listed below some points gathered from the video which I consider to be valuable and relevant to this blog.  

Ken Robinson (2007) stated that 'A real education has to give equal weight to the arts, the humanities and to physical education.' He later explained the importance of curiosity, and that children are 'natural' learners. He emphasised the role of teachers as facilitators to learning. He argued that the dominant culture of education has come to focus on not teaching and learning but testing. He believed that standardized tests have a place within education furthermore; they should not be the dominant culture of education.

NACCCE (1999) stated that:

Creativity is possible in all areas of human activity, including the Arts, Sciences, at work, at play and in all other areas of daily life. All people have creative abilities and we all have them differently. When individuals find their creative strengths, it can have an enormous impact on self-esteem and on overall achievement (NACCCE, 1999, pp. 6).

Personal Reflection

Recently I have been attending a local Primary School as a volunteer. I have observed the role of creativity as a useful tool to learning in a year 1 classroom.  The pupils benefit greatly from freedom and informal methods of learning. The children become excited and enthusiastic about lessons. The children became actively involved in their own learning, an example I observed was the ‘colour game’. The children used counters, pallets and cards to learn how to say, spell and write the various colours. A similar activity was used for numbers.



Evaluation

Ken Robinson argued that creativity is essential within education. I support his ideas and beliefs as I believe there needs to be an emphasis on the enjoyment of learning and to raise the awareness of different methods of learning. Creativity can be used to aid pupils with understanding and other difficulties through a variety of learning styles. Creativity can also allow individual pupils to express themselves through creative means. It is clear to see that creativity has a substantial effect on the development of children throughout education. It is therefore, without a doubt a favourable tool in the curriculum.

Bibliography

NACCCE. (1999) All Our Futures: Creativity, Culture and Education. Creative Potential http://sirkenrobinson.com/pdf/allourfutures.pdf (Accessed: 26 November 2014).

Phillips, L. (2014) Creativity in Today's curriculum: Key Influences.  Lecture 3. pp.3. (Accessed: 16 November 2014).

Robinson, K. (2007) Does schools kill creativity? Directed by Ted Talks [Online Video]. USA: Ted Talks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbt (Accessed: 19 November 2014).

Robinson, K. (2013) How to escape education's Death Valley. TED.com. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Robinson_(educationalist)#cite_note-1 (Accessed: 13 November 2014).

Robinson, K. (2006) Ted Talks: Schools kill creativity. http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html  (Accessed: 16 November 2014).