Last night, TED Talks Education premiered on PBS at 10:00pm EST. For those of you who may not know what TED is:
"TED is a global set of conferences owned by the private non-profit Sapling Foundation, under the slogan “ideas worth spreading”. [TED Talks] address a wide range of topics within research and practice of science and culture, often through storytelling. The speakers are given a maximum of 18 minutes to present their ideas in the most innovative and engaging ways they can" [1].
For more information on TED, visit ted.com. TED Talks Education’s first session occurred last night, and was hosted by John Legend. Speakers included Bill Gates, Geoffrey Canada, Rita F. Pierson, John Legend himself, as well as the renowned educationalist Sir Ken Robinson. They addressed a variety of topics concerning the current education system in the United States. I highly encourage the entire Wantagh community, and of course beyond, to watch these talks. They can all be found on ted.com after 11:00am today.
When I first found out about TED Talks Education, I immediately searched to see if Sir Ken Robinson was speaking. He is the most watched TED speaker all time, and has presented on a variety of educational issues including creativity, has encouraged a paradigm shift in education, as well as an educational revolution. If you go to my website (petermountanos.org), under the videos section, I have posted three TED talks presented by him. He wrapped up the session last night as the final speaker, to no surprise. He discussed three main notions that all humans can identify with – being an individual, creativity, and curiosity. He argued that the current model of education is squandering all three of these concepts, and we need to change the way we educate the youth in order to preserve our grasp in global leadership. This was a truly inspiring talk, and I highly encourage all of you to watch it.
As a community, we need to improve the education that we are providing to our youth. We cannot blame a sole group (i.e., the teachers, administrators, parents, etc.); we have to take collective blame. We need to work together as a community, state, and nation to shift the paradigms of education. As a BOE member, I would like to help bring this community together so we can move our education system fully into the 21st century and beyond. Thanks!
- PM
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TED_conference
