Nikhil Goyal: "Why Kids Hate School?" @ TEDxBFS (2012)

At the age of 19, activist and author Nikhil Goyal (@nikhilgoya_l) has accomplished no small amount.  An activist and champion of self-directed learning, Goyal has spoken at Google (@google), MIT (@MIT), Yale (@Yale), Stanford (@Stanford), and the University of Cambridge (@Cambridge_Uni).  He has appeared on various news stations, has been named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, and has even authored the book One Size Does Not Fit All:  A Student's Assessment of School.  In this #TED Talk delivered at the Brooklyn Free School (#TEDxBFS) in 2012, Goyal begins by speaking about the shortcomings of school.  Although he is perhaps too strident and jumps from topic to topic using quotes, he does offer an organic vision of education that considers not only educators, administrators, and parents but also students themselves as its policymakers.

'Education is a process of living, not a preparation for future living.'  Let me say that one more time.  'Education is a process of living, not a preparation for future living.'  ... Because we have to get over this notion of education prep and move to life prep.  We have to create an educational society where learning is democratized and where kids are natural learners.  Where we're tinkering with the world.  Where they're changing things, they're pushing the human race forward.
...
Around the world today we're watching millions of young people that are under the age of twenty-five collectively protest for self-expression, transparency, and the sweet taste of freedom.  What we're doing to them is we're not giving them a voice.  We're not letting them speak out.  We're putting them on the sidelines.  What I like to say about public education is that we have 'the kids table' and we have 'the adults table.'  At the adults table, that's where all the decisions are made.  It's like Thanksgiving; we're separated.  And really, that's how it is.  We need to have one table where we have kids and adults.  What we offer, most importantly, kids, is a fresh perspective.

Thoughts? Please post in the comments section below.

John Seely Brown: "Tinkering as a Mode of Knowledge Production" (2008)

In his A New Culture of Learning:  Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change, researcher John Seely Brown (@jseelybrown) explores imagination, play, and innovation as they can influence current education paradigms.  In a brief video talk, he breaks down some of his theories:

What could we do better in schools today? ... We have to kind of find a way to get today's kids to embrace change.  We have to get them to want to constantly learn new types of things.  And the catch, to me, is somehow we have to find a way to get kids to play with knowledge.  To play with finding information.  To play with creating knowledge.  Not always believing that it's already known, but basically being willing to believe that maybe they should be able to create knowledge on the fly by experimenting with things.

And...

So I think we can construct new kinds of learning environments.  Not only are we learning with and from each other, not only are we teaching each other as well, but we're actually understanding that authority - to some extent - lies in whether or not this thing I've just built is as good as I think it could be ....

What suggestions do you have for students and teachers who wish to implement more "tinkering" and "playful" scenarios in the classroom and in life? Please post in the comments below.  For Maria Popova's (@brainpicker) article on A New Culture of Learning available on Brain Pickings (@brainpickings), please click here.

Description of image:  A child "tinkering" away.  Photo located at graphics8.nytimes.com.  Kildonan and its IP program claim no ownership over the above picture.