Does Our Education System Put the “Brain in a Cage”?

Does our education system put the brain in a cage? Dr. Daniel J. Siegel, author of the book Mindsight, thinks so.

Here in Canada our public education system has been suffering exponentially over the past decade or so. As a result of drastic government cut backs, too many public schools are being shut down — students are being relocated to other schools, which increases class sizes and overworks our underpaid teachers. This all makes getting a decent ‘basic’ education more and more difficult.

Despite the obvious challenges resulting from the above changes, for many years now I have felt the model we base our system of education to be severely flawed when it comes to effectively and efficiently preparing our youth for the real world. In fact they are ultimately quite ill prepared for it.

For some reason, the social, interactive and communication skills necessary to function in healthy, compassionate relationships — which are as essential to human interaction, development and well being as breathing is to our survival — have been seemingly removed from the curriculum entirely. It’s almost as though our humanity has been taken out of the equation and substituted by the 3 R’s — wRiting, Reading and aRithmetic.

How does this even make sense? Life is entirely about relationships, whether with family, friends, classmates, co-workers or employers. Not to mention the fact that we share this beautiful planet with 6 billion complete strangers. Thus, it is absolutely crucial that we learn how to relate to one another with kindness, love and respect.

In an inspiring video lecture on TED.com called “The Power of Mindsight“, Dr. Daniel J. Siegel, author of the book Mindsight, explains his brilliant vision and solution for completely revamping the way we educate our youth.

Having done extensive research in the field of neurobiology (a branch of biology that deals with the nervous system and its ability to react, learn etc.) Dr. Siegel says, “The experiences we have shape our brain” and “The way school is now is imprisoning the brain — putting the brain in a cage.”

Through the present government-sanctioned curriculum (Canada and the U.S. are similar in this respect), we are cultivating — generation by generation — the notion of separateness from others. This is hindering of our youths’ capacity to feel empathy, compassion and reverence, not only toward other people but potentially toward all life. These deficiencies ultimately remain with our youths once they enter the ‘real’ world. Unless they learn otherwise, this is something they will struggle with throughout their lives.

We are doing our children, not to mention global society as a whole, a huge disservice by limiting their education to the 3 R’s, with a little science and P.E. thrown into the mix. Although these are important subjects to learn and engage in, they do not reflect what is truly important about our human experience…. relationships… connectedness.

How can we ever expect to share a world with 6 billion other people peacefully without teaching and encouraging, throughout the most formative years of our lives, the very basics of human interpersonal skills necessary to do so? Einstein describes our current dysfunctional mindset as, “An optical ‘delusion’ of our separateness.”

“Relationships are our life’s blood,” says Dr. Siegel. He passionately states that, “We have to free the brain from that cage” and “Inspire to rewire.”

His vision for completely revamping education begins by adding three more R’s to the current curriculum — Reflection, Relationships, and Resilience.

I propose that we take it even one step further and include three more R’s to this new vision of our education system. As expressed by his holiness the Dalai Lama, these additional R’s are: “Respect for self, Respect for others, and Responsibility for all your actions.”

And while I’m at it, along with these six new R’s I would passionately suggest adding The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz to students’ required reading list. It is a simple yet fundamental foundation that teaches us how to cultivate a way of being that supports healthy relationships, with self and others. The concepts and principles of this little yet powerful book are so simple even the young minds of elementary school can grasp and apply them.

There are, of course, some institutions that recognize the value in teaching and encouraging the concept of interconnectedness that cultivates feelings of compassion, empathy and oneness with our fellow humans. Sadly, most do not. In fact, quite the opposite is true.

By negating these integral elements of the human condition we are creating an increasingly alarming disconnect from not only each other but from ourselves. A competitive ‘every man for himself’ attitude, although Dr. Siegel makes no direct mention of this is his lecture, ultimately creates an environment where young students potentially lash out at each other at an escalating and more violent rate.

Lately, we have all been hearing about so many tragic cases of teen suicide due to bullying in schools. Now, with the rise of media social networks such as Facebook, “cyber bullying” has become a growing trend.

Although bullying has been around for decades, its ferociousness is getting out of hand. Do you think that this — let’s call it what it really is: harassment and assault — would be as much of a problem as it is today if we were taught from the very beginning of our infancy and throughout our elementary and high school years to treat everyone with love, kindness and respect… and that anything else would simply NOT be tolerated? There would undoubtedly be a significant decrease in violence of all sorts, which ideally would spill over into how we behave in the adult world.

Whether you agree or not, it stands to reason that by not including a curriculum that teaches, encourages and supports the necessity of interpersonal relationships to a well balanced and functioning society, we are ultimately breeding generations of disconnected youth who in turn grow into disconnected adults who could potentially be in positions of power, making decisions that affect us all. Scary!

In our uncertain times, now more than ever we must find effective ways to do things differently to help shape a better world. And I for one am excited at the prospect and look forward to the day when Dr. Siegel’s vision of Mindsight becomes a way of life for all generations to come…youth and adult alike.

Watch Dr. Daniel J. Siegel’s inspiring TED.com lecture and See and hear for yourself the brilliance and simplicity of his life changing vision for our future.

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Photo Credit

“Bird in a Cage/Fisheye” Aleera @ Flickr.com. Creative Commons. Some Rights Reserved.

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