Education For Writers ~ Did Your Teachers Help You Learn?

A writer begins to learn the moment they’re born.

First mom and dad are the teachers—maybe siblings and friends—then, the grades of school…

In an essay I published 15 years ago, about my own education, I wrote:

“As I sit here…surveying the territories my learning and education have each secured, I see the utter dependence of education on the quality of the learning that fills it; and, more importantly, the need for clearly-defined, comprehensive goals of education to insure proper learning. I’m also aware of many other people called ‘bright’, ‘exceptional’ or ‘natural learners’ who are as chaotically confused as I was….

“This is an educational universe in which learning is a tool that acts to expand the potential for humanity’s education. Did that seem like a circuitous definition? Well… It was meant to be.”

Back in March of 2011, I published the post, All About Kids And Creativity…—worth checking out if you feel you got a bad education…

That post has two videos of Sir Ken Robinson who says that his mission is “to transform the culture of education and organizations with a richer conception of human creativity and intelligence.”

The videos are called Do Schools Kill Creativity and Bring On The Learning Revolution!

Seems to me that any serious writer (even if they’re writing is all humorous) either has, or wishes they had, fully utilized their creativity and intelligence…

Yet…

Many of us grew up in educational systems that tried to cram information into our minds—turn us into Good Little Social Units…

If I may be briefly blatant: Good Little Social Units are not creative writers—they may be “good” writers but their work doesn’t inspire or invigorate or vivify.

I had to work hard, for many years, to dismantle the parts of my mind that got indoctrinated in Social-Unit-Education.

Then, I had to learn new ways to release my ability to Learn—Old English leornian “to get knowledge, be cultivated, study, read, think about,” from Proto-Germanic *liznojan (cf. Old Frisian lernia, Middle Dutch leeren, Dutch leren, Old High German lernen, German lernen “to learn,” Gothic lais “I know”), with a base sense of “to follow or find the track,” from PIE *leis- “track.” Related to German Gleis “track,” and to Old English læst “sole of the foot”.

Sir Ken Robinson has a new video called How to Escape Education’s Death Valley.

I would Love to see your thoughts and feelings about what he says, in the Comments :-)

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All About Kids And Creativity…

Here are two videos of Sir Ken Robinson, author, speaker, and international advisor on education in the arts to government, non-profits, education, and arts bodies. They’re from 2007 and 2010 and are about what’s wrong with educational systems:

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