Monthly Archives: January 2015

jo

Education is not stressing, but foundation of innovation

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I agree that education puts children into conventional thinking and diminishes creativity or great ideas. However, I think education and schools are needed to learn how to live in our society. From these two opinions, education has to be change, but not to disappear.

First, same as Ken Robinson’s opinion, education is surely an enemy for children to innovate or to find new ideas, because teachers teach them what is thought as a correct idea in the present society. They have to endure to study old-fashioned ideas, to answer the “correct” ideas, or to feel shamed if they said their own thinking which was different from the “corrects”.
For example, in Japanese schools, students study a formula to solve problems of mathematics, and solve them by only using the formula, like a routine.
But as a matter of fact, there is not absolutely correct formula or answer in the world, because everything is changing.
For instance, 20 years ago, when I was born, nobody thought it would be possible to connect and communicate with people over the world in the future. But now, via Internet, we can connect with people even if they are at the opposing side of the earth, by their own small computers called “smartphones”.
Smartphone is a technology which was unthinkable just 5 years ago. We do not know what happen in the future. To make innovations like smartphones, education seems to not have any help for innovators because teachers cannot teach ideas which will be thought as correct ideas in the future. Education teaches students just what is correct or incorrect.

Second, although education is not good for creativity, education also helps creativity by these three things: teaching way to think, giving useful knowledge, and learning communication with others.
First and second reasons seem to be inconsistent with Robinson’s opinion, that education breaks creativity by giving ordinary ideas. However, without any foundation of thinking, children cannot have their ideas and express them, Innovation without any help or knowledge is impossible.
Third reason is connected to live in this society. There are many rules which must be obeyed to communicate with the others or to live with them. These are called morals, ethics or common senses. If we behave without the any rules, we will fight with the others.
These things are what we mainly learn in the schools. Children must learn them to become a member of society, and then they can create their new ideas to the world.

In conclusion, we have to remain the modern education to learn not only foundations of ideas, but also communication. Besides, schools should add a new system to the education, which enables children to think and communicate freely, to make new ideas. The balance between the two is a big problem, so I want to think about it next opportunity.
Thank you for your listening.

(Final audio essay by Jo, autum, 2014)

rika

Audio essay (Autum 2014)

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He insisted that creativity is tremendously important in education in his speech. He said present education killed student’s creativity. I agree with his idea, and I think that is true especially in public education in Japan, because students are required to derive one determined correct answer, and also they make a habit to do that.

He said that now the purpose of public education was deeply attached to develop university professors. That is because, these are good things for students to get great scores in schools and to aim higher position in the industrial society. Currently, everyone who goes to high school in Japan can enter university without difficulties, as he said the inflation of university education has been occurred. Most children think that it is the goal of their lives to enter more intelligent high school, and then more intelligent and famous university. Actually, I also think that is the very right thing, being got such education from my parents and teachers. Definitely, from my point of view, in present society, getting higher position need to graduate some intelligent schools. And it also means that it is a good measure to make excellent grades in schools because of entrance examination systems in Japan.

Lately, however, it is reported that not intelligent but personality decides one’s school records, according to a new Australian study.

 Personality is a better predictor of success in school than intelligence as measured by traditional standardized tests. Specifically, students who were more open and conscientious performed better academically than those who were merely intelligent.

Australian researchers compared measurements of the “Big Five” personality traits to college students’ grades and test scores. The “Big Five” are extraversion, neuroticism, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness to experience. They asked students to complete personality self-assessments, and also asked others who knew the students well to complete assessments of them. They found that the students’ self-assessments were as effective as intelligence in predicting academic performance, and that the reports from those who knew them well were nearly four times more accurate in predicting academic performance than intelligence. The researchers found that openness and conscientiousness factors exerted the largest influence on academic success. Studies have shown openness to experience to be the number-one predictor of creative achievement.

In other words, the findings told that children who may not be considered “smart” by traditional measures may still become highly successful, both by traditional measures and in their own right. And since personality may be more malleable than intellectual capability, helping struggling students to cultivate beneficial personality traits may be a powerful means of improving academic performance. In the field of education, I think all teachers should break away from admire only intelligent students, then give students their lessons which students themselves would really like to learn.

(459 words)

marina

Audio essay

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Reaction to TED talk given by Ken Robinson

Why is education important in our life? It is the question that I had been wondering for almost whole my life. Education means a process of learning skills, information, knowledge, or other common sense that you need in life. In the presentation of Ken Robinson, he stated that now a day’s educational system is not working well. I agree with his idea when looking at higher level of educational system in Japan. However, when I think back of the education I had taken so far, I feel quite satisfied with them.

First educational system was done in kindergarten. In kindergarten, children learn how to communicate with friends, how to manage their time, and how to build up relationship with others. There is not much of studying, but they mainly focus on teaching common sense and skills to live in each community they are belonging to. I remember spending my time drawing many pictures and playing around with friends in a playground.

Next educational system I got was in elementary school. Different from kindergarten, it mainly focused on studying. Teachers never told us which subjects are the most important ones, but I always had a feeling that I have to put more effort on mathematics and languages compare to other subjects. Even though there was some unbalance between each subject, I think the system of elementary school is well organized, because it has a good balance of studying and resting.

Middle school and high school are the next educational system. These two are known as the hardest period for most Japanese students. This is because; many students try to get into a good university in order to get a high ranked job. If you want to get into a well-known university, you need to have a high GPA in middle school and high school. Therefore many students start to go to a clam school and get extra hours of studying. At the same time, atmosphere of the class will start to change into more and more strict about studying. Sometimes, their GPA divides classes and students with higher grade are likely to get more pressure by their parents and teachers.

In the presentation given by Ken Robinson, he said there is less and less opportunity for students to make mistakes in their educational life. I believe it is true, because if you make any mistake you will be left out of the competition. If you don’t try to catch up with others, you will lose the game. As Ken Robinson mentioned, I believe this style of education will eventually kill creativity. The reason why creativity is so important is because creativity has no limit in it. If you have no creativity and have only knowledge, at some time, there will be a limit of knowledge you can gain. However, if you have creativity, even if you have no knowledge about certain thing, you can work with your creativity to solve problems.

As a conclusion, there is no way we can predict the future. Therefore, we never know what kind of knowledge is important in 50 years or 100 years from now. To avoid our descendant to suffer with their new world, I believe not only the education is important but also growing the creativity is as much important as that.

 

daiki, Uncategorized

My Opinion For Education

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I’d like to mention about both pros and cons for Mr. Robinson’s opinions.

 

Basically, I agree with his opinion that teachers should notice children’s talents and try to develop them. There is an idiom “what one likes, one will do best”. The story of Gillian Lynne who is a dancer he provided is a good example of it. So teachers should notice students’ curiosities and respect each imagination. And I also agree with the opinion that score isn’t everything of students.

 

However, I can’t agree with his opinions at mainly three points.

 

First, it’s about the role of a school. He said, “There isn’t an education system on the planet that teaches dance every day to children the way we teach them mathematics. Why? Why not?” Of course, I think “minor subject” called in Japan, such as arts and music should be respected as same as other subjects. But originally schools don’t set the motto to develop children’s specific abilities. I think public education is for all people so educations in the school should meet common needs. One of the common needs is to learn basic and universal knowledge to live. It is natural that reading, writing and arithmetic are focused on classes. In addition, students can enjoy club activities so there is an opportunity to develop their talents except studies.

 

Second, it’s about the way to find your talents. I don’t hope schools make an atmosphere that each talent is the most important. Because if you can’t notice your talents, you’ll spend too much time to find what your talent is. It’s a waste of time, isn’t it? Takashi Saito, a Japanese educator, writes as follows in his work “Lessons from Yukichi Fukuzawa”. “If you think about your talents, it must be difficult to challenge new things.” We can’t find own talents easily so we have to pile up much experience. After that, we can decide own way based on own abilities. Mr. Robinson says “all kids have tremendous talents” but his examples are rare cases so we shouldn’t expect that all kids have special talents.

 

Third, it’s about the kind of talents. “Talent” doesn’t mean only a talent of arts or sports. Mr. Robinson only focuses on them and he didn’t mention about the talent of studies. I think he missed to evaluate the big role of school which develops children’s curiosities for studies. As I said, the score has nothing to do with the worth as a human being. However, students study hard for the score and also find interests of each subject through studies. Hence, I think the system of score shouldn’t be abandoned.

 

As for me, I’ve been playing the piano and the cello, and I tried to be a musician when I was an elementary school student. But after I entered the junior high school, I became enthusiastic at studying history and became to want to be a scholar of history. If I had been provided musical professional education, the curiosity for history would have died for music. To educate them under the special situation at an early age would decide children’s course. It could kill other potential talents in children.

 

Therefore, I think the education which develops each talent is an ideal but extreme special educations would ruin children’s opportunity to study broadly. I expect schools and teachers to understand each student’s talents and respect it but they should let students do many activities including studies. They shouldn’t do special education from an early age. So I agree with keeping the education system in these days.

 

shizuki, Uncategorized

So embarrassed everyone is posting an essay and I’m doing a reaction to “Tax rises on alcohol”

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s2

Some people believe that raising taxes on alcoholic beverage will increase job losses. According to the new findings, however, the result is opposite. Frank Chaloupka, a professor of economics stated money not spent on alcohol may possibly be spent on other goods and services, creating jobs in non-alcohol sector. His team estimates an increase in alcohol taxes will not on only reduce the number of heavy drinkers but also stimulate economy. The study shows the tax increase on alcohol leaded to more employment in California. In response to this research, David Jernigan, the study author remarked alcohol tax increases are an evidence-based approach to help drinkers to health and create jobs. Conversely, some experts are warning those findings are not published in a peer-reviewed journal yet so considered preliminary.

r2

I don’t think this article is 100% reliable. Firstly, there is no explanation about the connection between the tax rising and the job creation. How do they know people spend money not on alcohol but on other goods when the tax is raised? Though it’s showing the study result in California and Louisiana, it is undeniable that it just happened by chance. Secondly, it is doubtful only 10 cents or so tax increase work quite effectively. You can find 10 cents around self-checkout machines in seconds. Such a small rise seems not to be enough for a heavy drinker’s health.

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saki, Uncategorized

Audio essay

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Ken Robinson talked about human creativity and education system. I agree with his ideas. In his speech, the creativity is as important as literacy in education. So we should treat with same status. Children have potential and originality, can show exceptional ability. Even if they don’t know anything, they try to do. If they are afraid that it is wrong, they don’t conceive of the original thing. The current education system eliminates human being original creativity. To study mathematics and language is given priority to art subjects. However, there are not only the children that have academic ability but also the children that have artistic sensitivity. Moreover, human intelligence is various, dynamic and peerless. We should educate that all children can make the best of their intelligence.

 

I want to speak my experience in the following. I studied the subjects like mathematics, science and history very hard in childhood. Strictly speaking, I was made to study hard by my parents. They often said that if I studied hard, I could go excellent university and get a good job. So I have thought studying is the most important in my life. However, only the subject to use brain isn’t most necessary in our lives. If I had tried to do various things in childhood, I would take interested in a lot of things and have extended experience. That’s why I want children to identify their ability and think a great deal of their possibility.

 

Ken Robinson said that many people think that academic ability is superior to artistic subjects in order to work companies. Present education system has a few problems. It isn’t only academic ability to need in a lot of companies. It is important for children to have creativity, cooperativeness and sociability and so on. Adults should teach children to have them. What should we do to improve such power? I have three ideas. First, school should increase discussion in the classes. There are few opportunities to discuss in elementary school and junior high school. To talk about their opinions leads to develop their creativity and positive thinking. Second, it needs to carry out field works. For example, to touch them naturally, to perform an occupation experience, to appreciate traditional arts and so on have them think about themselves. They will learn something that cannot learn in academic classes from field works. Third, reading many books is good for them. Books made them more creative. But now, almost they read few books. I want them to read various books.

 

 

 

Human creativity is limitless and make in the future. So that he says, we have to become the support that children make the future.

 

hiroki, Uncategorized

My audio essay

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http://www.podspress.com/spring14/

In the talk,Ken Robinson says that fear of failure embedded in education kills creativity.
So I propose some ideas to improve this bad situation of education.

First, with reducing time of denial, we should save more time of affirmation.
Ken Robinson say denial makes the fear of action . As a result of that , potential creativity in us is killed. In fact, in the modern education, there seems too much denial. For example, most of the modern exam requires us to give what is called the only right answer set by teachers. If we give a answer different from the answer set by teacher , the answer would be denied. I think, though indirect, these are typical denial. This way of education is not bad, but too much of the way of education seems to do harm to creativity.
So we should save more time of subjects not requesting the only right answer. specifically it is art, music , and so on that apply to the subject.
These subject not always requires the only right answer. Rather, these subject seems to put emphasis on the point of expressing one’s self. So basically, it can be said that these subject don’t deny us.
Therefore, I propose so.

Second, we should change the way of question.
Usually, when people give something as a question, the answer to the quesion always be one. For example, when a teacher gives a question of history, the teacher requires students to answer a word such as Nobunaga Oda , July revolution , World War Ⅱ.
However, the way of question can’t raise creativity. just memorising something don’t lead to raising creativity.
So, when we give something as question, we should avoid such a way to the extent you can, and devise the way of question. For example, we give a quesion of history, we should take the way ” why did the problem happen? and why was it a problem?” ”can you have an idea how the man came up with such a wonderful solution?” ” If you have to solve that situation, what way or policy do you take?” and so on. The point of these is not requesting people to answer what they know, but requesting people to answer the question with what they know.
In other words, I think, If we can teach even the way of coming up with ideas ,and so on, lectures of history will get more interesting , and ,at the same time,raise creativity.
In short, only with just taking note of a way of question, we can raise creativity well.
Therefore we should change the way of quesion in education.

This is all my suggestions.

Hiroki Suzuki

kryota

MY AUDIO ESSAY

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31304627 Ryota Kurosawa

 

My Opinion of “School kills creativity”

 

I’m impressed by Ken Robinson’s talk. Especially, I like his word that no mistakes make us creative. I think so too.

Japanese education tends to bring up sense of cooperation. That sometimes means it is bad to make differences from others. So, we are afraid of this proverb, “stand out from the crowd and you just invite trouble for yourself”. I heard that Japanese students were too negative against saying their opinion. Actually I don’t like that too. It is because I afraid of making mistakes. As he said, national education system taught us mistake is worst. So we can’t discuss freely. And the system has another harmful effect. It is that all creative mistakes are denied either. There are useful mistakes for the future in it, but the system regard it as evils.

In this talk, he introduce about Gillian Lynne who is a director of “the Phantom of the Opera”. He said she was regarded as learning disability, but she could flourish in other stage that it is not necessary for studying, because one doctor discovered her talent for dance.

In this way, prejudiced thinking focused on study may deprive many possibilities. It is not always good that we think educational background is the most important. Today, Japan is society that places emphasis on academic records, so if some people can’t study math, language and so on, they are turned adrift. This trend has a bad influence of talented children. In addition, almost people think educational background is important due to Japanese education system. So, even if the system is changed, the trend will be not changed soon. We must know there are more important things than study.

After I listened this talk, I thought about “a success of life”. Death is equal for all people, so it is important how they live in finite times. Well, what is a success? I think it is to earn much money. I can’t say whitewash. Some people say money can’t buy happiness, but there is nothing that it can’t buy. I think the success can’t be quantified with the exception of money. For convenience, we assume that earning much money is success of their life. So, we can say that to be a soccer player, artist, or famous director is success. So, only study is not the right way. We must acknowledge this reality and change our views which study is justice.

keisuke

My audio essay

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It is essential for us to think of education. No one cannot grow without education. And to think of education is to think of the children in the future. This idea is widely spreading all over the world, including Japan. So, there are many educational reform plans in Japan such as early English teaching, compulsory dancing education and reforming entrance exam.

The TED speaker, Sir Ken Robinson, think much of human creativity, the unpredictability with it and the children’s talent. His contention is that creativity is as important in education as literacy. I agree with his state. But he said that current educational system took creativity away from children and public education kill our creativity. So we should think education over again. I don’t agree with this. Excessively competitive society is the problem, not public education system. I think that public education has more advantages than disadvantages in several points. First, public education give people the foundation for the way of thinking. Over 90% of people live along the experience in their public education. In addition to literacy, all of required subjects in the school is needed for most people. For example, office worker must use correct expression, architect must be familiar with mathematics and even dancer must understand history of the works. Certainly, Ken Robinson said, not so much people don’t teach as university professors. But they live in connection with public education in some way. Second if people provide each children with various educations, the cost of it is much more than the present situation. Our ideal is that each children is given individual education suited for their talents. But this is not economical and not practical in the point of cost and effort. It is appropriate for us to take policy for public education.

The root of this problem that we lose creativity in the course of growing is from competitive society especially in Japan. As Ken Robinson said, public education came into being to meet the need of industrialism before 19 century. This society regarded mainly efficiency as important. When people in that society pursue a profit, they want to think little of the unnecessary subject for industrialism. This idea is bad for our creativity and talent of children. Excessively industrialism is the source of evil for education.

In the future, educational system should present children various future courses and sense of value. For example, in Germany, there are mainly two future courses in the graduation elementary school; Gymnasium and Meister. While the former is usually to go to college, the latter is for craftsman. Traditionally in the country, craftsman are regarded as important as university professor. The aim of public education is to help children line up at the starting line and more independent to some extent.

 

keita

Audio Essay

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I agree with his ideas about education, intelligence and leaning.

The creativity and originality of children are the key to the future. The people who create the future are children. It is the most important thing in education.

However, the contemporary education deprives originality of human. We originally think of original things because we do not afraid of mistakes. But the contemporary education forces us not to take mistakes. The company require us not to take mistakes, too. The contemporary education have created this idea.

Originally, the education should be focused on the generation’s needs. In 19th century, the education was born from needs of industrial society. The superiority or inferiority of subject were decided about two things. First, the useful subject to work was the high priority. Second, the result of school was priority matter. Like this, 21th century education should be focused on creating the originality and creativity of children. But the present condition of education different from this. The contemporary education’s goal is to be a university professor. Is it the needs of the present day? Our education should be changed basically. The education of university is an inflationary tendency.

Ken Robinson said that “Gillian was not sick. She is a dancer.” “People had to move to think.” This is the needs in this generation. The art’s order of priority is lower than math and languages now. It is wrong! We have to bring out the hidden talent in the children. Recently, the elementary school in Japan have introduced dance in the required subject. This is the good tendency to change the education system. But we have to change more than this in the contemporary education system. The teacher evaluate only the result of school. This brings that the contemporary education’s goal is to be a university professor. So, the teacher should evaluate children in more many elements. That is the first step to change new education system. And Ken Robinson also said that “I believe our only hope for the future is to adopt a new conception of human ecology, one in which we start to reconstitute our conception of the richness of human capability.” And “we will do it is by seeing our creative capacities for the richness they are and seeing our children for the hope that they are. And our task is to educate their whole being, so they can face this future. We may not see the future but they will. And our job is to help them make something of it.” Like this, to introduce a new conception will make the brilliant future. And to keep this brilliant world, we should continue to have the creativity and originality.