Good evening, and welcome to ted talks education. We are so excited to have a packed theater here at town hall in new york city. Thats right. Yes. And a special welcome to those watching on pbs. I would say we wish you were here, but that would make it really uncomfortable, crowded, and new york city rents are high enough, so why dont we both enjoy from where we are. Tonight we will be examining how we teach, marveling at how we learn, and celebrating the timehonored tradition of educating the next generation. The speaker were about to bring to the stage used to work for a hedge fund. Then to help tutor his cousin, he started uploading math lessons to youtube. In true entrepreneurial spirit, he turned these oneonone lessons and grew them into the khan academy, delivering over 380 million lessons in over 36 languages all across the world. Ladies and gentlemen, please, put your hands together for sal khan. [cheering and applause] iim here today to talk about two ideas that, at least based on my observations at khan academy, areare kind of the core, thethe key leverage points forfor learning, and its the idea of mastery and the idea of mindset. And i saw this in the early days when i was working with my cousins. Uh, a lot of them were having trouble with math at first because they had all of these gaps accumulate in theirin their learning, and at some point they got to an algebra class, and they might have been a little bit shaky on some of the prealgebra, and, uh, because of that, uh, theythey thought they didnt have the math gene. I saw in the early days when i was uploading some of those those videos on youtube, andand i realized that people who were not my cousins were watching, and iyou know, at first thosethosethose comments were just simple thank yous, and i thought that was a pretty big deal, but then the comments got a little bit more intense. Uh, oh, you know, student after student saying that, uh, they had grown up not liking math, it was getting difficult as they got into more advanced math topics, and by the time they got to algebra, they had so many gaps in their knowledge that they just couldnt engage with it, but when they were a little bit older, they took a little bit of agency, they found resources like khan academy, and they were able to fill in those gaps. In a lot of ways, this is how you would master a lot of things in life. Its the way that you would learn a martial art. In a martial art, you would practice the white belt skills as long as necessary, and only when youve mastered it, you would move on to become a yellow belt. This is not the way that aa traditional academic model is structured, the type of academic model that most of us grew up in. In a traditional academic model, we Group Students together, usually by age, and around middle school age, andand perceived ability, and we shepherd them all together at the same pace, and what typically happens lets say were in a middle school prealgebra class, and the current unit is on exponents. Uh, the teacher will give a lecture on exponents, then well, uh, go home, do some homework. The next morning, well review the homework. Then well get another lecture, homework, lecture, homework, and then we get a test, and on that test, maybe i get a 75 , maybe you get a 90 , maybe you get a 95 , and even though that that test has identified gaps in our knowledge i didnt know 25 of the material even the a student, what was the 5 they didnt know . Even though weve identified those gaps, the whole class will then move on to the next subject, and that process continues, andand you immediately start to realize howhow strange this is. I didnt know 25 of the more foundational thing, and now im being pushed to the more advanced thing, and this will continue for months, and it will continue for years. Always at some point, i might be in algebra class or a trigonometry class, and i hit a wall, and then i start to disengage. So the idea of mastery learning is to do the exact opposite. Instead of artificially constraining when and how long you work on something, do it the other way around. Whats variable is when and how long a student actually has to work on something, and whats fixed is that they actually master the material, and its important to realize that not only will this make the student learn their exponents better, but it will reinforce the the right mindset muscles. It makes them realize that if you got 20 wrong on something, it doesnt mean that you have a c branded in your dna somehow. It means that you should just keep working on it. You should have grit, you should have perseverance, you should take agency over your learning. A lot of skeptics might say, well, hey, this is all great, philosophically, this whole idea of masterybased learning and its connection to mindset, but it seems impractical. To actually do it with students, it seems like every student would be on their own track. It would have to be personalized. You would have to have private tutors. But now today, its its no longer impractical. We have the tools to do it. If students need an explanation at their own time and pace, well, theres ondemand video for that. They need practice, they need to have feed they need feedback, well, therestheres theres adaptive exercises readily available for students. And when that happens, all sorts of neat things happen. One, the students can actually master the concepts, but theyre also building their growth mindset, theyre building their grit, their perseverance, thetheyre taking agency over their learning, and all sorts of beautiful things can start to happen in the actual classroom, and this isnt even just aanice to have. Ii think its a social imperative. Werewere exiting what you call the industrial age, and were going into this, whatever, information revolution. In the industrial age, society was a pyramid, and at the base of the pyramid, you had aa large pool of you needed human labor. In the middle of pyramid, you had kind of an information processing, aa bureaucracy class, and at the top of the pyramid you had youryour owners of capital andandand your entrepreneurs andand your creative class. But we know whats happening already as we go into this information revolution. Thethethe bottom of that of that pyramid, automation is going to take over. So as a society, we have a question. All this new productivitys happening because of this technology, but who participates in it . Is it just going to be the very top of the pyramid, in which case, what does everyone else do . Howhow do they operate . Or do we something thats more aspirational . Do we actually attempt to invert the pyramid, where you have a large creative class, where almost everyone can participate as an entrepreneur, an artist, as a researcher . And i dont think that this is utopia. I really think that this is all based on the idea if we let people tap into their potential by mastering concepts that that they can get there, when you think about the type of equity we can have and the rate at which civilization could even progress, and so im pretty optimistic about it, and i think its going to be aa pretty exciting time to be alive. Thank you. [cheering and applause] that was great, right . Yeah. Our first speaker. As we reimagine the future of schools, filmmaker Greg Whiteley asked the questions, what could a modern classroom look like . And what effect would that have on the childrens experience in the room . Lets take a look. [applause] narrator over 150 years ago, as jobs began moving from farms to factories, these fathers of the Industrial Revolution had a vision. To execute this vision, they stole an educational model from the prussian army. As a result, they took kids from oneroom schoolhouses and placed them in neat little factories of learning, and the results were actually pretty amazing. For the next 100 years, you could build an actual factory in any u. S. City, and youd have a young workforce already living there that could read, write, follow basic instructions, but as the world has radically changed since the early days of the Industrial Revolution, our schools have remained largely the same. Bock you learn how to take tests, you learn how to write reports, you learn how to do the things that are valued in school. Most of those things, you dont actually do in the real world. Narrator and as the skill set required by todays jobs continues to evolve, our nations young people are being left behind. If we were to reimagine schools today, what would those new classrooms need to look like . Would kids need to continue to sit neatly in rows with a teacher at the front . Or could we do Something Different . Instead of a lecture, could it be a studentled discussion . Hessince hes been outside, hes seen everything for, like, what they are. So it has tosorry it has to do with knowledge. Man a little bit. Because you Gain Knowledge from going to the outside world, and then you come back in, and then your beliefs change. Narrator instead of studying and taking tests in isolation, could kids work in groups . Could teachers also work in teams . Throughout history, different civilizations have come to be and then just as quickly gone away. Were going to take that very abstract concept, and were going to create a physical manifestation of it. Narrator what if instead of focusing on rote memorization, students focused on projects that combined multiple disciplines and helped foster a much deeper connection to the material. Maya so we started off by learning about the mayans, the romans, and the greeks, and their civilization and how they rose to power. What the projects really help is they dont just give you, ok, this is what you need to learn, learn it, memorize it. Its more, like, you really need to understand it, and you really need to understand why you need to know this. Narrator todays workplaces require an entirely new set of skills from even a few decades ago. If our kids can learn those skills in the modern classroom, theyll be ready to take on the jobs of the 21st century. If were willing to take a leap, a leap not unlike the one we took more than a century ago, and to challenge our kids in a fundamentally new way, what they produce might just surprise us. [applause] coming to the stage is the first ever dean of freshmen at stanford university, but she quickly learned her job title could have been dean of freshmen parents at stanford university. Shes the author of the bestselling book how to raise an adult, and we are so thrilled to have her here with us tonight. Please offer up a warm welcome to julie lythcotthaims. [applause] you know, i didnt set out to be a parenting expert. Its just that theres a certain style of parenting these days that is kind of messing up kids, impeding their chances to develop into their selves. I guess what im saying is, we spend a lot of time being very concerned about parents who arent involved enough in the lives of their kids and their education or their upbringing, and rightly so, but at the other end of the spectrum, theres a lot of harm going on there, as well, where parents feel a kid cant be successful unless the parent is protecting and preventing at every turn and hovering over every happening and micromanaging every moment and steering their kid towards some small subset of colleges and careers. Our kids end up leading a kind of checklisted childhood, and heres what the checklisted childhood looks like. We want to be sure they go to the right schools, but not just that, that theyre in the right classes at the right schools, and that they get the right grades in the right classes in the right schools. And when they get to high school, they dont say, well, what might i be interested in studying or doing as an activity . They go to counselors, and they say, what do i need to do to get into the right college . And then when the grades start to roll in in high school, and theyre getting some bs or, god forbid, some cs, they frantically text their friends and say, has anyone ever gotten into the right college with these grades . And theyre withering now under high rates of anxiety and depression, and some of them are wondering, will this life ever turn out to have been worth it . Well, we parents, we parents are pretty sure its all worth it. We seem to behave its, like, we literally think they will have no future if they dont get into one of these tiny set of colleges or careers we have in mind for them, or maybe, maybe were just afraid they wont have a future we can brag about to our friends and with stickers on the backs of our cars. Yeah. [applause] and so with our overhelp, our overprotection and overdirection and handholding, we deprive our kids of the chance to build selfefficacy, which is a really fundamental tenant of the human psyche, far more important than that selfesteem they get every time we applaud. Am i saying every kid is hardworking and motivated and doesnt need a parents involvement or interest in their lives, and we should just back off and let go . Hell, no. That is not what im saying. What im saying is we should be less concerned with a specific set of colleges they might be able to apply to or might get into and far more concerned that they have the habits, the mindset, the skill set, the wellness to be successful wherever they go. What im saying is our kids need us to be a little less obsessed with grades and scores and a whole lot more interested in childhood, providing a foundation for their success, built on things like love and chores. [laughter and applause] did i just say chores . Did i just say chores . I really did. But, really. Heres why. The longest longitudinal study of humans ever conducted, its called the harvard grant study. It found that professional success in life, which is what we want for our kids, that professional success in life comes from having done chores as a kid, and the earlier you started, the better, that a roll up your sleeves and pitch in mindset, a mindset that says, theres some unpleasant work. Someones got to do it. It might as well be me. A second very important finding from the harvard grant study said that happiness in life comes from love, not love of work, love of humans, our spouse, our partner, our friends, our family. So childhood needs to teach our kids how to love, and they cant love others if they dont first love themselves, and they wont love themselves if we cant offer them unconditional love. [applause] right. And so instead of being obsessed with grades and scores when they come home, we need to close our technology, put away our phones, and look them in the eye, and let them see the joy that fills our faces when we see our child for the first time in a few hours, and then we have to say, how was your day . What did you like about today . They need to know they matter to us as humans, not because of their gpa. All right, so youre thinking, chores and love, that sounds all well and good, but give me a break. The colleges want to see top scores and grades and accolades and awards, and im going to tell you, sort of. The very biggest brandname schools are asking that of our young adults, but heres the good news. Contrary to what the College Rankings racket would have us believe. [applause] you dont have to go to one of the biggest brandname schools to be happy and successful in life. Happy and successful people went to a state school, went to a Small College no one has heard of, went to community college, went to a college over here and flunked out. [cheering and applause] it is hardly the end of the world if our kids dont go to one of those big brandname schools, and more importantly, if their childhood has not been lived according to a tyrannical checklist, then when they get to college, whichever one it is, well, theyll have gone there on their own volition, fueled by their own desire, capable and ready to thrive there. I have to admit something to you. Ive got two kids, sawyer and avery. Theyre teenagers. And once upon a time, i think i was treating my sawyer and avery like little bonsai trees. [laughter] that i was going to carefully clip and prune and shape into some perfect form of a human that might just be perfect enough to warrant them admission to one of the most highly selective colleges, but ive come to realize after working with thousands of other peoples kids. [laughter] my kids arent bonsai trees. Theyre wildflowers of an unknown genus and species. [laughter] and its my job to provide a nourishing environment to strengthen them through chores and to love them so they can love others and receive love, and the college, the major, the career, thats up to them. My job is not to make them become what i would have them become, but to support them in becoming their glorious selves. Thank you. [cheering and applause] thank you. Our next performer is an accomplished singersongwriter, musician and producer, and shes one of my favorite musicians. I am thrilled to introduce to you tonight meshell ndegeocello. [music playing] said, baby, do you understand me now . Sometimes you see im mad no one can always be an angel sometimes you see some bad cause im just a soul whose intentions are good oh, lord, please dont let me be misunderstood sometimes i feel so carefree with a joy thats hard to hide sometimes all i know is worry and then youre bound to see my other side cause im just a soul whose intentions are good oh, lord, please dont let me be misunderstood so if i seem edgy i want you to know i never mean to take it out on you so life has its problems i got more than my share but thats one thing i never mean to do cause im just a soul whose intentions are good oh, lord, please dont let me be misunderstood oh, lord [applause] please thank otto hauser and mr. Jebin bruni. Thank you. I just finished reading our next speakers book punished policing the lives of black and latino boys, and i am so thrilled that ted has invited him to speak here tonight. Ladies and gentlemen, please give a warm welcome to awardwinning professor victor rios. [applause] for over a decade, i have studied young people that have been pushed out of school, socalled dropouts. As they end up failed by the Education System, theyre on the streets, where theyre vulnerable to violence, police harassment, police brutality, and incarceration. I see these young peoples through a perspective that looks at the assets that they bring to the Education System. How do i know that these young people have the potential and the promise to change . I know this because i am one of them. You see, i grew up in dire poverty in the inner city. We were on welfare, sometimes homeless, many times hungry. By the time i was 15 years old, i had been incarcerated in juvie 3 times for 3 felonies. The reason im here today is because a teacher that cared reached out and managed to tap into my soul. This teacher, mrs. Russ, she was the kind of teacher that was always in your business. I told her a story about my uncle ruben. He would take me to work with him because i was broke, and he knew i needed some money. He collected glass bottles for a living. 4 00 in the morning on a school day, wed throw the glass bottles in the back of his van, and the bottles would break, and my hands and arms would start to bleed, and i was terrified and in pain, and i would stop working,