I've written about The Creativity Gap in the past. Recently I read that for every child in the USA who takes piano or violin lessons, 6 in China are taking those musical lessons. In the USA, we have devalued music and other fine arts, but the truth is, having those fine arts in our lives helps our creativity. Here's a couple of links about this: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/52349.php
http://www.educationoasis.com/resources/Articles/building_babys_brain.htm
Now comes yet another study, saying that employers don't just want folks who can do math, but folks who can creatively figure ways to use that math. What is being said now is that, instead of just STEM, we need STEAM- adding fine arts back into our schools as an important part of the school day. That creativity doesn't come from doing page after page of math problems, it comes from having creative arts in the curriculum- music, art, drama. The Waldorf Schools probably do the best job of this, as Waldorf education incorporates music and/or art in just about all lessons in some shape or form. The creativity in Waldorf schools is off the scale and it is really exciting to take a tour of a Waldorf School & see what the students are doing. In my daughter's 5th grade class last year, she got music once a week and art once a week, for about 30 minutes- not exactly enough time for the teachers to even begin to teach all that the State of Texas says students should be able to learn in their classes and certainly not enough time to teach any child music who didn't already know it. Our daughter has taken piano for years, starting in Kindermusik at age 3, and then gradually transitioning to all keyboard. By age 5 they were almost entirely on piano and now, at age 11, she plays better than I did in college. She is no prodigy, but she practices every day and loves her music. It is a part of our lives, yet many public schools, driven by "No Child Left Behind" and State Legislative mandates, cut fine arts to the bone. This year in our school district, because of budget cuts, 6th graders only get 1 elective, so instead of being able to take band and drama, as our daughter wanted, she will only be able to take band. I must admit, too, I'm beginning to question how much "creativity" our kid are getting in band these days with all the emphasis on contests, rather than on teaching music and exposing children to many different pieces of music, but that's another blog.At this point, I encourage you to read the liked articles and to advocate to our Legislature for fine arts to be considered "core subjects" in public schools. As the article says- imagine Apple without its creativity- it would be...IBM, which is a good product, but it doesn't elicit the excitement of a new Apple product. If the USA is to compete worldwide, we need that creativity, and we're more likely to have it when our children get meaningful fine arts in public schools.
