Kids can innovate, create, and imagine in ways that are fresh and inspiring — when we “allow” them to do so, anyway. Although parents may be frightened by their children using technology more frequently in school and schools tend to put restrictions on such use, there is a strong argument for letting them think and create.
The video’s kids are cutting-edge, it is not surprising. The results he mentions in the video are impressive.
If you can’t or don’t want to watch the clip, here’s the quick version:
Many people think the Internet and technology are scary places for kids. But did you know about …
Martha, who is from Scotland.
She kept a record of the school lunches every day.
Jamie Oliver saw the trend and took a liking to it.
Although the school advised her to stop, after much press, they decided to do the right thing and changed the lunch program. Martha! And she raised $200,000 for food-insecure people.
(Yes, Mr. Bean is in frame 4.
There’s Josh, who is in middle school in Iowa.
He decided to record Pokemon walk-through videos.
He is so skilled at it that he was able to walk into college with six figures in ad revenue from those videos (!!).
There’s Tavi, who created an online magazine called “Rookie” with her friends.
It has a large following and has reached far into teens’ culture.
John was 15 when he created the app.
It was sold to Yahoo by John at the age of 17 for $30 Million. Can you even imagine?
Lauren sent a Hello Kitty doll 93,000 miles into space and recorded it.
She did exactly that.
There are a few teens living on the Rosebud Sioux reservation, South Dakota.
A special on ABC News showed their lives as being dominated by drugs and crime. They created a video to reveal who they were as kids: people with passion, integrity, self-respect, and love for their families.
All of these are kids who are creating and innovating — but not in school. Instead, it’s at home.
Schools are far too restrictive to allow children to do things like these. This needs to change.
I think the last quote sums it all. “Get out of their way and let them be amazing!”