‘Playful learning; why we all need cheering up.’

Stephen begins his presentation with an anecdote about his friend’s son’s first day of school. The night before the big day, the child’s father found him in his bed, fully dressed in his uniform – backpack on – ready to go. He was SO EXCITED about starting school, he just couldn’t wait….

Stephen begins his presentation with an anecdote about his friend’s son’s first day of school. The night before the big day, the child’s father found him in his bed, fully dressed in his uniform – backpack on – ready to go. He was SO EXCITED about starting school, he just couldn’t wait….

What takes us from this joy of learning to the dismay experienced in our teen years and beyond? In this presentation, Stephen explains how play & joyfulness can bridge this gap.

The model of learning in the last millennium, Stephen suggests, was a model of “met-before” learning. Children would arrive to sit with their exam and think: “Oh, I really hope there are no surprises here.”…

But the world is full of surprises. Natural disasters, economic collapse… As you will have seen, when these big surprises come along, we are generally paralysed for about a week! We are incapable of reacting instantly and thinking of a solution.

Stephen has been involved in setting up a number of schools around the world, using a whole new system of education. One that is based around playfulness and joy, not the expectation that you can ring a bell and all students will be hungry at the same time, or that you put children in a classroom just because it is a certain day in January.

By using this innovative new approach in the Caribbean, they have succeeded in changing the education system of an entire nation – with the children’s performance doubling over a 4-year period.

This is a delightful & engaging presentation addressing the importance of playfulness: bankers playing with toys in their pin-striped suits, board members swimming in lakes with shark fins on their backs, and hijacking ideas from primary school curriculums in our workplace.

If our system is going to cope with the unexpected surprises ahead of us, we absolutely need to put play right back at the heart of learning.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/17550989[/vimeo]

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In this presentation, Professor Patrick McGorry (Australian of the Year 2010) addresses how we get to a 21^st Century model of mental health in Australia.

Our health is our greatest natural resource, and there is currently an huge issue surrounding the serious neglect of appropriate mental health care.

Why is it so important? Some of the statistics will astound you:

4 – 5 million Australians are affected by mental illness every year. 1 million of these are aged 12 – 25. Someone will die from suicide in Australia every 4 hours… and every 8 minutes someone will attempt suicide. It is the greatest killer of Australians up to the age of 40 – that’s 40% bigger than the road toll. Even more amazing is that most of it is preventable.

90% of people with physical health problems will get pretty good access to pretty good quality care in Australia, while only 1/3 of people with mental health problems get access to any sort of care at all.

Professor McGorry describes in his presentation the imbalance between physical and mental health care, and how we must engineer the mental health system properly for the right age groups, making it relevant and accessible to those who need it most.

There is a tremendous capacity to solve this issue in Australia, but it requires serious political commitment and community will to make it happen.

Watch this presentation for further information on what needs to be changed in the current health system and why, as well as practical ways to make these changes.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/17210794[/vimeo]

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If questioned today, many people would say the biggest problem facing humanity is Climate Change. According to de Bono, this is not true. The biggest problem facing humanity is our poor thinking… The only bigger problem is that we don’t realise this.

The way our minds work today is simply to recognise and respond to patterns. As our education system was based in religion from the time of the renaissance, we have been taught to think in ways that would be useful to the church, ie. truth, logic and argument.

This system has been excellent and worked for us in many aspects, namely scientific and technological pursuits.

Though however excellent, it is not enough. Historically, we have not been taught creativity, design and perceptual thinking. We are able to identify a problem with ease, however we are not able to effectively create new ways to fix it.

There is no magic to this way of thinking… There are a number of very simple methods we can use in order to achieve this.

Watch the wonderfully entertaining Edward de Bono in his presentation at Creative Innovation 2010 to discover how you can add to your current way of thinking and increase your ability to design and create.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/17207094[/vimeo]

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