An impassioned plea for inspiring education. It’s up to educators to act.
Much-needed systemic change starts in schools.
After acclaimed British educator Ken Robinson died in 2020, his daughter, Kate, resolved to honor his legacy by creating this volume, a distillation of his core ideas about how to reimagine education and schooling so that young people could flourish. “Dad’s work,” she writes, “was a love letter to human potential.” Education reform is central to Robinson’s exhortation for a wide-reaching revolution that “calls for a global reset of our social systems” and a “new, wider conception of human ability, and an embrace of the richness of our diversity of talents.” This revolution is urgently needed in order to face a rapidly changing world and an increasingly vulnerable planet. “As a species,” he writes, “we have progressed to the point where many of our systems are now outdated or entirely obsolete. The good news is that it is within our powers to do something about it.” Comparing current schooling to industrial farming, Robinson critiques education that is focused on disciplinary distinctions, a narrow definition of intelligence, and learning that is assessed through testing. He believes “there is no such thing as an academic subject, only academic ways of looking at things. It is not what is being studied, but how it is being studied.” Education should promote young people’s engagement with the world around them as well as the world within them; improve their understanding of their own cultures and respect for the diversity of others; and give them resources to become economically responsible and independent and “active and compassionate citizens.” To achieve these goals, Robinson identifies eight core competencies: curiosity, creativity, criticism, communication, collaboration, compassion, composure (“a sense of personal harmony and balance”), and citizenship. Rather than offer a blueprint for reform, Robinson urges teachers, parents, policymakers, and students themselves to imagine a school ecosystem that empowers, encourages, and nurtures all of its participants.
An impassioned plea for inspiring education. It’s up to educators to act.Pub Date: March 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-14-313416-9
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.
A compendium of charts, time lines, lists and illustrations to accompany study of the Bible.
This visually appealing resource provides a wide array of illustrative and textually concise references, beginning with three sets of charts covering the Bible as a whole, the Old Testament and the New Testament. These charts cover such topics as biblical weights and measures, feasts and holidays and the 12 disciples. Most of the charts use a variety of illustrative techniques to convey lessons and provide visual interest. A worthwhile example is “How We Got the Bible,” which provides a time line of translation history, comparisons of canons among faiths and portraits of important figures in biblical translation, such as Jerome and John Wycliffe. The book then presents a section of maps, followed by diagrams to conceptualize such structures as Noah’s Ark and Solomon’s Temple. Finally, a section on Christianity, cults and other religions describes key aspects of history and doctrine for certain Christian sects and other faith traditions. Overall, the authors take a traditionalist, conservative approach. For instance, they list Moses as the author of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) without making mention of claims to the contrary. When comparing various Christian sects and world religions, the emphasis is on doctrine and orthodox theology. Some chapters, however, may not completely align with the needs of Catholic and Orthodox churches. But the authors’ leanings are muted enough and do not detract from the work’s usefulness. As a resource, it’s well organized, inviting and visually stimulating. Even the most seasoned reader will learn something while browsing.
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2005
ISBN: 978-1-5963-6022-8
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
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