Aug24

goodnight, good sir.

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RIP to *Sir Ken Robinson, an eloquent and indefatigable defender of the role of the arts and creativity in education. His TED talks made him world-famous—his presentation called “Do schools kill creativity?” remains the most popular TED talk of all time, and he wrote widely, including major books on creativity in 2001 and 2015. Robinson was knighted in 2003 for his distinguished career in service to the arts.  He was a staunch critic of standardized tests and compliance-based classrooms, and an unapologetic champion of every kind of creative endeavor—from theater, to music, film, painting, dance, and everything in between. He died peacefully yesterday at the age of 70, after a brief battle with cancer, surrounded by his family. His voice will be greatly missed. – Edutopia

“the answer is not to standardize education,

but to personalize and customize it to the needs of each child and community.

there is no alternative. there never was.”

-Sir Ken Robinson, (one of my heroes in the field of education)

 

 

*Sir Ken Robinson was an author, speaker and international advisor on education in the arts to government, non-profits, education and arts bodies.

 

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credits: edutopia, pbs.org

59 responses »

  1. Thank you for posting this Beth. He was a dear friend of my son’s who was working on a project with him. When we got the news, we all gathered for a moment of silence. That evening we lit candles and watched one of his best Ted Talks together. Maybe he fly with the angels, and inspire THEM, as he did all of us.

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  4. I was very shocked and saddened when I heard this news on Twitter yesterday, Beth. Sir Ken is one of my education heroes. I don’t know how many times I have watched the creativity video you have shared here, or how many times I have shared it. I intend sharing it again in my readilearn post on Friday. I never tire of the message which is so important. What a loss, not only to the education community, but to the world. He was a great advocate for everything important to education.

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  10. Pingback: goodnight, good sir. — I didn’t have my glasses on…. | Rethinking Life

  16. his talks and his books were eye-opening. For years, I used to show his TED video to my classes, and I am sure some of them were wondering what it had to do with the world of business. But to me, it was the most valuable 20 minutes of the entire semester…

    I am sad to hear of his passing, but his words and ideas will last forever.

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  18. While I miss a lot of things about teaching, the thing I miss the least is standardized tests. I’m a big fan of math generally, but things go amiss when we try to put everything into statistical terms. Where’s the stat for the kids who understandably don’t give a crap about testing because their lives are a mess? Woo! I haven’t vented like that in quite some time.

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  24. Thanks for posting this. I believe I’ve seen him before and agreed with him completely. The best way to teach anything and have people ‘get’ it, is with humor and he has it in spades. I was told early I didn’t color correctly so I stopped doing it. A lifetime later, I’m learning about art from scratch. I am always delighted to see teachers promote free art in children as well as music. My daughter wants to watch this with me again when she’s done with her workday. (in her room). 😉 Minds like his attached to his heart will be sorely missed.

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  25. Hi Beth, this is an interesting article. This is a wonderful concept and would be idea, but it isn’t practical given the numbers of kids that require education. In third world countries, the schools don’t even have pencils and paper and have over 50 children in a class.

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