School needs a lesson in growing up.
I find myself having lots of discussion lately about the idea of giving young people a chance to create their own identities and to realise themselves as individuals as they grow up. In the process, I have been wondering why school is so prescriptive in its teaching of many subjects which are for the most part useless in later life and yet doesn't teach the fundamentals, such as how to maintain a healthy diet, or how to take care of a child of your own.
F. M. Alexander who originated the Alexander Technique talked about "end gaining" which is how many people live their lives, constantly trying to achieve their targets and not enjoying the process of living at all. School is the perfect place to drum the idea of goals into children (which in itself is not a bad thing) while at the same time building their sense of esteem on the achievement of those goals. This is a very dangerous model where failure can result in a sense of worthlessness and any real sense of self esteem is either lost or at best difficult to find.
We are educating our children out of their own creative abilities. The joy of seeing life through the eyes of a child is that everything is fresh and new, possibilities are endless, ideas are boundless. There is nothing but freedom to explore. And yet as they grow through the system they learn that there is nothing without the right qualification.
Endlessly seeking out targets that are not their own, but which they have been taught that they need, the self perpetuating reality re-invents itself with them actually needing the qualifications that they were taught to need to get by. Dysfunctional society recreates itself in ever increasing spirals of severity. The value of qualifications decreases as more people seek them out and attain them and everybody expects more. An undergraduate university degree does not have the value in the jobs market that it used to in the past and 'A' levels hardly qualify you for anything at all.
This has to change, if we are to allow creativity to flourish. The education system needs to learn a good lesson in nurturing creativity so that it can mature and with it so can a new generation of school leavers.
F. M. Alexander who originated the Alexander Technique talked about "end gaining" which is how many people live their lives, constantly trying to achieve their targets and not enjoying the process of living at all. School is the perfect place to drum the idea of goals into children (which in itself is not a bad thing) while at the same time building their sense of esteem on the achievement of those goals. This is a very dangerous model where failure can result in a sense of worthlessness and any real sense of self esteem is either lost or at best difficult to find.
We are educating our children out of their own creative abilities. The joy of seeing life through the eyes of a child is that everything is fresh and new, possibilities are endless, ideas are boundless. There is nothing but freedom to explore. And yet as they grow through the system they learn that there is nothing without the right qualification.
Endlessly seeking out targets that are not their own, but which they have been taught that they need, the self perpetuating reality re-invents itself with them actually needing the qualifications that they were taught to need to get by. Dysfunctional society recreates itself in ever increasing spirals of severity. The value of qualifications decreases as more people seek them out and attain them and everybody expects more. An undergraduate university degree does not have the value in the jobs market that it used to in the past and 'A' levels hardly qualify you for anything at all.
This has to change, if we are to allow creativity to flourish. The education system needs to learn a good lesson in nurturing creativity so that it can mature and with it so can a new generation of school leavers.