“We are facing a transition, and we must take this opportunity to provide today’s students and entrepreneurs with the tools and the thinking that is required for the future. Collaborative technologies can fundamentally transform both how we teach and learn. We need to harness the power of the Internet and these new technologies for creating and sharing knowledge that will prepare students with the skills to compete in the 21st century.” – John T. Chambers, Chairman and CEO, Cisco.
My son loves the book series – Dogman. On international world’s book day, part of his school activity was to do one of the following: design bookmarkers, design his favourite book cover or write about his favourite author. Of course, he chose the simplest of them all – to design bookmarkers for his favourite Dogman book – Dogman Fetch 22. However, while we were deciding on which activity to get done, I had instantaneously told him to write about his favourite author. We checked online together and what I read almost made me cry! As a child, Dav Pilkey (author of Dogman) was diagnosed with dyslexia and ADHD. Dav was so disruptive in class that his teachers made him sit out in the hall every day.
Luckily, Dav loved to draw and make up stories, so he spent his time in the hallway creating his own original comic books. In the second grade, Dav Pilkey created a comic book about a superhero named ‘Captain Underpants’. His teacher ripped it up and told him he could not spend the rest of his life making silly books. Fortunately, Dav was not a particularly good listener. Dav has gone on to create award-winning and bestselling books for children. His Captain Underpants series has more than 80 million copies in print worldwide and has been translated into more than 28 languages. In 2017, DreamWorks Animation brought the character to the silver screen in the feature film adaptation Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie. Netflix is now streaming ‘The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants’ TV show. Dav’s latest creation, Dog Man, continues to be a number one New York Times bestselling series with more than 13 million copies in print worldwide and translations available in more than 21 languages.
Dav is also the creator of the Dragon series, the Dumb Bunnies series, Dog Breath, and The Paperboy, which is a Caldecott Honor Book. Isn’t that amazing? However, what do you think about the teacher who ripped up and probably squashed his comic book? I am so glad Dav was not a very good listener otherwise his dreams would have been squashed too!
His story is no different from the likes of Thomas Edison who was dyslexic and became the genius of the century or Albert Einstein who could not read until he was seven and was expelled from school – There are many more examples too! There are millions of young people around the world, disengaged from formal schooling with terrible consequences.
Educators must realise that ‘One size does not fit all’ when it comes to learning. The importance of multiple learning styles must be considered. According to the World Economic Forum, recent advances in the neurosciences suggest that human learning is far more complex than previously understood, and that mass educational systems may even work against certain innate learning impulses. With the understanding that every child learns differently, giving them the space to experiment and develop an entrepreneurial mindset so that they can have big dreams and options for the future is one sure way to go.
The classroom needs to become a place where kids like Dav Pilkey can unleash and express their creative abilities without fear and outside the confines of classroom conformity.
Akiode (MBA) is an Education Disruptor, Author of Kids can entrepreneur too and Entrepreneurial stories for kids’ picture book series. She is also the initiator of the award winning Kidpreneur Klub®. She resides in the United Kingdom.
