In a talk riddled with humourous twists, words associations and fun analogies, Sir Ken Robinson reminds us of the relevance and importance of creativity in education. Beginning with how children have the capacity to be imaginative and innovative, he gives examples of how they are not afraid to make mistakes.

A teacher asks a girl what she is drawing during a drawing lesson and was met with “I’m drawing God” The teacher then says, “But no one knows what God looks like,” to which the little girl replies,”they will in a minute.”

Children are being taught to live and work in an unpredictable future – a future that is hard to imagine even just 5 years away. So if creative capacity is a key element of innovation, there is a disconcerting imbalance of the arts in educational hierarchy. The arts are consistently at the bottom of the priority list. As a result, children are being prepared for jobs and creativity is educated out of them. Mistakes are stigmatized as the worst thing to do, consequently creating fear of taking risks, of being wrong and ultimately resulting in creatively talented people who don’t know that they are creatively talented.

Sir Ken Robinson makes a deeply engaging case for rethinking the way that children are taught, so that they may make something of their future. Watch the video here.

I’m ALMOST DONE! WEEE!
Animation has been completed, and now I am just refining the sound and music mix. I expect to wrap it all up tonight. Teaser video to come (currently uploading).

Here are a few images of scenes I’ve built.

Tomorrow, I will have John Pura look at the foley studio to make sure it’s in working order. Aki will come to the college after work again for another attempt at recording her narration. And just in case, I might book out a camera + microphone as a backup measure.

Many of his images require a closer look. First you may see a pattern or an image. But up close, 1million plastic cups make up a stylized image of a factory spewing out pollution. Coincidentally, the same amount of plastic cups is used on American airline flights every 6 hours. Even more staggering in numbers is 40 million paper cups are used every day for hot beverages, which a couple days worth can pile up to stand 40 stories high. No doubt it’s a lot of waste.

Numbers in the hundred-thousands, millions and trillions – they’re such enormous statistics that for individuals, they are hard to make meaning out them. Chris Jordan’s work attempts to takes those numbers and translate them into a visual language that can be more easily interpreted to mean something to viewers, thus bridging statistics and art. It is a call for change to each individual that observes his work.

It’s a daunting challenge to take on, but if simple, unconscious behaviors can create staggering statistics, then simple, conscious ones can also make great changes.

Click here to watch the presentation.