From Lab to Life: Truly New Approach to Schooling

For years, we have known the results of a massive study of creativity by George Land and Beth Jarman.  Here is a summary:   98% of 5-year-olds are creative geniuses; 30% of 10-year-olds are creative geniuses; 12% of 15-year-olds are creative geniuses; only 2% of adults are considered creative geniuses, which, within the framework of the study, is the capacity to look at a problem and find novel solutions.

“We are all born as creative geniuses, but only 2% of adults maintain this status.   What causes the remaining 98% to learn non-creative behavior?”

Land concludes: “[It is] … the shackles of excessive rules, conformity pressure, and fear of failure, among others. In a world that never stops changing and where every new problem requires novel solutions, this is tragic.”

Schools everywhere are obsessively focused on teaching kids to excel at tests.   I myself honed this skill at age 17, and won scholarships.  As a university professor charged with publishing new innovative research, I was out to lunch.  It took endless failures for me to finally dump the baggage of focusing on old stuff and instead seek to invent new ideas.  Turns out, many people don’t have the luck or grit to do the same.  It’s a shame.

I and colleagues asked a significant number of students at Technion, a science and engineering university, why they thought creativity declines so severely.  The strong consensus:  Conventional schooling.  Teaching ‘one right way, one right answer’ rather than ‘exploring wild new options’.  Teaching how to pass tests by regurgitating what is already known.

It seems frustratingly difficult to reform our schools.  Public education was designed a century ago to crank out workers able to make things in factories:  Literate, able to understand and following instructions.  It remains thus.

How does one innovate, to stop destroying creativity in schools?  By trying new approaches.  Here is one example.

A private school (K-12) in New York City, Alpha Academy, does the following: “students crush their academics [learning all the old stuff] in 2 hours a day,  yet still rank in the top 1% nationally.  The rest of the day is spent on the life skills and team-based workshops that ignite motivation and teach things like leadership, grit, financial literary & entrepreneurship.  Kids love school!  We’re not just preparing students for tests, we’re preparing them for limitless futures.”

Alpha is a private school, with tuition a high $65,000.  It is easy to scoff at it, serving the rich and privileged.  But what if New York City public school teachers came to Alpha to observe – and adapt what they see in their own schools?   What if teachers in the whole world could watch YouTube videos of Alpha kids at work?

What about grades and tests?  Here’s Alpha’s “Test2Pass” approach.  Six-year-olds at Alpha “have to take dinner orders from people, follow the correct recipes, cook the food and serve it themselves.”

Middle schoolers train for a Spartan race.  They must cross the finish line with every single teammate together, or they don’t pass.

I love this innovative approach to schooling.  But it’s just one possible innovation.  Schools everywhere should be trying a zillion new ways to teach kids in the Age of AI – and sharing the results.

Isn’t this how social evolution works?  Try a zillion ideas, toss them in the air, see which of them sticks?

The world right now is a mess, right?  How will we fix it?  By creative thinking – the very thing our schools seem bent on eradicating.