The Value of Waiting In Airports

Being a veteran flyer now, I have come to know that there is a wonderful game of hurry-up-and-wait played whilst waiting for a given flight. So we do things like load up our iPods with podcasts, music, etc. to while away the hours, or in some cases, days. While waiting for my flight back home from the NMC conference, I found it was a good time to clear some junk from my laptop hard drive. I got rid of most of the stray icons off my desktop, which I hate, but I still keep saving stuff that I download there.

Amongst the flotsam and jetsam that I came across, was a video file that came recommended from a couple of blogs I read. I proceeded to load it on the iPod and wondered if it would live up to its billing. It wasn’t like I needed more inspiration because NMC already had me buzzing. Listening to Sir Kenneth Robinson from the 2006 TED Conference speaking of the need to inject creativity into the educational process set me on fire. The story of Gillian Lynne, who couldn’t sit still in class as a child, and the perceptive doctor who told her mother to enroll her in dance school, is worth the price of admission. Lynne, for those who don’t know was the choreographer for Cats. It’s a recognition that some people have to move to think.

I’m still digesting this talk, and it’s good in so many ways. It injects quite a bit of humor into a serious subject, the idea that there needs to be a major restructuring in our approach to education. In addition, I discovered this interview that provides exquisite details of Robinson’s ideas. I’m not much of a reader of books, but I look forward to his book Epihany. Now I know why Gardner is thinking so much about dancing lately.

Facebook
Twitter

5 Responses

  1. We were lucky enough to have Ken Robinson as a keynote speaker at Otis about 4 years ago. He was really funny and incredibly insightful.

  2. I finally watched this, and found it everything I’d been told it was. Great stuff. Thanks for posting it, Andy. A kindred spirit for sure.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

css.php