Young-ha Kim

As one who is aspiring to be a teacher, an instructor -- a mentor, my aim is to honor my students as human beings and nurture their development into people who will make the world a better place. It seems a lofty goal, but I want to argue that it's simpler than it seems.

Young-Ha Kim, a teacher and author in South Korea, gave this lecture for TEDTalks, a group centered around the same goal I mentioned: how to make the world a happier and fuller place for future generations.

I previously posted a video, also from TEDTalks, by Sir Ken Robinson, which examined the industrialization of education, a method that molds children into "productive" and "functional" members of society by teaching them reading, writing and 'rithmetic. Sir Robinson and Young-Ha Kim resonate the same message: the naturally creative and genius side of children of this generation is being suppressed by the requirements of this society. Society demands that children are educated to a standard so that they can get into college only to get focused into an even smaller standard so that they can do this one mundane thing for the rest of their lives.

Young-Ha Kim uses his personal experiences as a teacher/professor to give viable credit to this belief. He relates several experiments conducted - getting college students to "crazy write" and drama majors to try a different element of theater than they're used to - and when put in situations where they are forced to be creative, these students blossomed beyond expectation.

The "little artists" in everyone, Kim says, are suffocated by the "devils" of the world that demand that anything a person does must pay the rent, pay the bills and put food on the table. Creativity suffers in the world that constantly asks, "What for? Why the hell would you do that?"