By Anne RinaudoTuesday 3 Jul 2018Open House InterviewsLifeReading Time: 2 minutes
Listen: John Buchanan in conversation with Stephen O’Doherty.
A comprehensive new report on the state of education sounds a warning for educationalists to be wary of an obsession with creative problem solving. It also calls for employers to be more engaged with education for the majority of children who will not attend university.
‘Preparing for the Best and Worst of Times’ – is the wonderfully titled report released this week on the skills needed by our children in a changing and challenging world. The report was commissioned by the NSW Department of Education and produced by the University of Sydney’s new Sydney Policy Lab.
Skills for a brave new world
The report’s title is from the opening lines of the Charles Dickens novel set during the French Revolution, ‘A Tale of Two Cities’Of course, these days we are not so much worried about political revolution .. its more about the science and automation revolution.
Creativity and problem solving need context
It is a report of strong opinions that looks at the skills needed by today’s school children if they are to thrive in a world of Artificial Intelligence and rapidly developing technologies. Professor John Buchanan, from the University of Sydney Business School, lead the team who produced the report. He told ‘Open House’ that it is all very well to want to teach children creative thinking and problem solving skills but there is a danger we lose sight of context.
“If you have a fire on a deep sea oil rig even the the most wonderful thinker and problem solver from a pre-school is not going to be much help. Equally if you put a mining engineer in a room full of three year old children having a melt down they are not going to have much idea either. It is context that is important.” says Professor Buchanan.
To listen to the podcast of this conversation click the red play button at the top of the page, or you can subscribe to Open House podcasts in iTunes and they will appear in your feed.