2014.08.09-1

 

 

所有的孩子都是天生的藝術家

Children are born artists

  孩子們解決了各式各樣的生活問題，再次證明只要大人認同孩子的努力，相信孩子做得到，他們就會表現出來。我們怎能無視於孩子的熱情、活力和雀躍的樣子呢？我要以最能象徵改變力量的人-甘地來做說明。七十年前，甘地一個人，感染了全國上下，靠的是「我們做得到」這股信念的力量。所以今天誰要來做這件事，將感染的種子散播到全國的孩子？所以，我們不做，還有誰來做？現在不做，更待何時？我說，感染是一個很棒的詞。

所以我想談談教育與創意，我的論點是，在我們的教育裡，創意與識字能力同等重要，我們應該給予兩者同等的地位。我最近聽到一個很棒的故事，我喜歡轉述他，有一個六歲的女孩在上繪畫課，她坐在教室後方畫畫，老師說這小孩平常非常難專注在一件事物上，但是她今天很專心。老師非常的好奇，於是老師走向小女孩，問到：你在畫甚麼？孩子說我在畫上帝的畫像。老師又說，但是沒有人知道上帝長得像甚麼樣子。小女孩接著說，那他們很快就會知道。這故事說明了孩子的想像力，有不知道的事就用猜的，他們不怕犯錯。

當然，我不是說犯錯等於有創意，但我們知道，如果你沒有犯錯的心理準備，就永遠無法發揮獨創性。如果你都不準備犯錯，當他們長大成人時，絕大的孩子已失去冒險的能力了，他們會變得害怕犯錯。順道一提的，我們就是這樣經營學校的，我們懲罰錯誤，我們現在也以同樣方式在經營國家教育制度，告訴孩子犯錯是最糟糕的事，而結果是我們教出一堆沒有創意的人。畢卡索曾經說，所有的孩子都是天生的藝術家。問題是如何維持藝術家性格到成年，我堅信，我們不會越老越有創意，我們的成長背離創意，或者說，教育抹殺了我們的創意。為什麼呢？

 

Power with We Can

Children were designing for a diverse range of problems. Basically again reaffirming that when adults believe in children and say, ”you can”, then they will. How can we stay immune to that passion, that energy, that excitement? I have to explain with the most powerful symbol of change, Gandhiji.70 years ago, it took one man to infect an entire nation with the power of “we can.” So, today who is it going to take to spread the infection from children to the all children in the country? So, if not us, then who? If not now, then when? I said “contagious” is a good word.

  So I want to talk about education and I want to talk about creativity. My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it  with the same status. I heard a great story recently, I love telling it-of a little girl who in a drawing lesson. She was six and she was at the back, drawing, and the teacher said this little girl hardly ever paid attention, and in this drawing lesson she did. The teacher was fascinated and she went over to her and she said,” what are you drawing”? And the girl said, “ I’m drawing a picture of God”. And the teacher said, ”But nobody knows what God looks like.” And the girl said, “They will in a minute.” This story is tell me that kids will take an image. If they don’t know, they’ll have a go. They’re not frightened of being wrong.

Children are born artists

Now, I don’t mean to say that being wrong is the same thing as being creative. What we do know is, if you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original. If you’re not prepared to be wrong. And by the time they get to be adults most kids have lost that capacity. They have become frightened of being wrong. And we run our school like this, by the way. We stigmatize mistakes. And we’re now running national education systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make. And the results that we are educating people out of their creative capacities. Picasso once said this. He said that all children are born artists. The problem is to remain an artist as we grow up. I believe this passionately that we don’t grow into creativity. We grow out of it. Or rather, we get educated out if it. So why is this?