14 AUG 2015
Our Pick of Ken Robinson's Favourite Talks on Education [VIDEOS]
TED is a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks. There are over 2000 to choose from, and the vast majority are engaging, inspirational and educational all in one!
TED is a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks. There are over 2000 to choose from, and the vast majority are engaging, inspirational and educational all in one! Watch their whole collection here: www.ted.com/talks We do love a TED Talk and today we've got some corkers for you! We have picked out the most intriguing, creative and entertaining talks from Education legend Sir Ken Robinson's all time favourite ones on Education (find the others here.) Whether you want to be inspired, to learn something new, or simply have some spare time on your hands, these are well worth a watch!
1. Sugata Mitra: Build a School in the Cloud
A MUST WATCH - Sugata Mitra's inspiring (and very entertaining) story of creating a 'learning lab' in India, starting off with a computer fixed in a slum wall where children could explore and learn from each other — using resources and mentoring from the cloud. The results were truly astonishing, and show what can be achieved when teachers set a challenge, stand back and leave the children to figure it out!
2. What do babies think? Alison Gopnik
"Babies and young children are like the R&D division of the human species," says psychologist Alison Gopnik. Her research explores the sophisticated intelligence-gathering and decision-making that babies are really doing when they play.
3. Arvind Gupta: Turning trash into toys for learning
In this charming talk, Arvind Gupta shares his simple yet stunning plans for turning trash into seriously entertaining, well-designed toys that kids can build themselves. When kids can turn single plastic straws into kazoos, or batteries and paperclips into simple motors, they can have fun while learning basic principles of science and design.
4. Kakenya Ntaiya: A girl who demanded school
Kakenya Ntaiya made a deal with her father: She would undergo the traditional Maasai rite of passage of female circumcision if he would let her go to high school. Ntaiya tells the fearless story of continuing on to college, and of working with her village elders to build a school for girls in her community. It’s the educational journey of one that altered the destiny of 125 young women.
5. Salman Khan: Let's use video to reinvent education
In a brilliantly witty talk, Salman Khan talks about how and why he created the remarkable Khan Academy, a carefully structured series of educational videos offering complete curricula in math and, now, other subjects. He shows the power of interactive exercises, and calls for teachers to consider flipping the traditional classroom script — give students video lectures to watch at home, and do "homework" in the classroom with the teacher available to help. We think it sounds a smashing idea! Have you given it a try?
6. Charles Leadbeater: Education innovation in the slums
Charles Leadbeater went looking for radical new forms of education — and found them in the slums of Rio and Kibera, where some of the world's poorest kids are finding transformative new ways to learn. And this informal, disruptive new kind of school, he says, is what all schools need to become.
7. Shane Koyczan: To This Day ... for the bullied and beautiful
By turn hilarious and haunting, poet Shane Koyczan puts his finger on the pulse of what it's like to be young and … different. "To This Day," his spoken-word poem about bullying, captivated millions as a viral video (created, crowd-source style, by 80 animators). Here, he gives a glorious, live reprise with backstory and violin accompaniment by Hannah Epperson.
8. Shukla Bose: Teaching one child at a time
Educating the poor is more than just a numbers game, says Shukla Bose. She tells the story of her groundbreaking Parikrma Humanity Foundation, which brings hope to India's slums by looking past the daunting statistics and focusing on treating each child as an individual.