Do Schools Kill Creativity Speech Analysis (Essay Example)

The speech I am analyzing is a speech by Sir Ken Robinson on a Ted talk from 2006 titled “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” To analyze a persuasive speech, you have to look at many different factors. In a research report from 2012 by Yokoyama and Diabo, they talk about  factors as small as smiling can affect whether a speech is effective or not. They talk about how there are so many little details that persuasive speakers must pay attention to if they want to be listened to. He says when people speak slow, they are seen as less trustworthy versus people who talk faster. Making sure your tone fluctuates but is also clear is very important. Gaze is also a very important factor and was determined that high levels of gaze was associated with more trustworthiness. According to a 2001 journal by William J. Paisley explains how attractiveness, credibility and power all play a major role in persuasion. He says these three factors are the top factors that advertisers and any other type of persuasive speech look to include. In the previously mentioned Robinson speech, I believe that he included parts from both sources that made his speech that much more effective. Robinson gave his speech on Education and how he believes that it is suppressing children's creativity. Robinsons thesis for this speech was that “We are educating people out of their creative capacities' '(Robinson, 2006) During his speech he used a bigger vocabulary, grammar and articulation that I believe was very appropriate for his speech since he was talking about education. Robinson also used physical behaviors that supported what he was saying. He would take pauses after saying something important or meaningful, smile when he said something funny and looked very serious when it wasn't a joke. He made sweeping eye contact the entire time he was speaking and used minimal hand movement as to not be too distracting. I believed that these factors, along with fluctuating his tone and pitch while talking, maintained the interest of the audience since it was such a serious topic. He also added jokes in which he was able to keep the interest of those who may have started to zone out. Robinson only used verbal data to provide information to the audience, didn't walk around too much during the speech and dressed in a suit, which matched the subject of the speech. Robinson does have the qualifications to talk about this subject because he is a leader in the development of education, creativity and innovation. This helps a lot with the credibility of his speech since he has experience with what he is talking about. As well as having the qualifications, he also had his entire speech memorized and did not read from a script. This helps with someone's persuasiveness because it shows that he knows what he is talking about.

I believe that Robinsons speech was very ethical and used a lot of reliable journals to back up what he was saying. His topic is also one that I don't believe is very controversial, since so many people today believe that America's education system needs to be changed. He used a direct quote from Picasso that said “...all children are born an artist, the problem is to remain an artist as you grow up.” I believe this quote was effective to add to back up his argument about how the education system is suppressing children's creativity and that it needs to be changed. He addresses the audience a few times and relates his speech to them, since they were an older audience and probably not in school anymore. To do this, he started his speech off with putting their mind back to when they were in school and telling a story about how educators are scary people but only because every single person in a room has had good and bad experiences with them. He goes on to say to the audience that he bets everyone in the room has had a significant portion of their lives affected by their younger education and their educators. Relating a speech to an audience is very helpful in any speech, especially persuasive speeches, to be able to make sure your audience relates to your topic and will agree with you and your side of the argument. He then tells a story about a girl he met named Jenny who was a dancer. He said that when she was younger her mom took her to a psychologist because her teachers were complaining at school how she wouldn't sit still and would mess with other kids and not listen. The psychologist turned on his radio and walked out of the room with the mom and said look, she isn't a bad kid, she's a dancer. They wanted to put her on medicine to suppress her movements when in reality, she wasn't born to sit at a desk and learn math like every kid is forced to do. She went on to be a multi-millionaire with her own company. Robinson explains how this is looked down upon vocally and just in the “hierarchy of subjects”(Robinson, 2006). He explains how in every school system of the world math and science is at the top, while arts and humanities is at the bottom. People will tell children, you don't want to take music or art because you are not going to be a musician or artist. This is told to children because these jobs are not known for making a lot of money. However, in the process of doing this, suppresses children's desire to be creative and do what they love in fear of being judged or just knowing that their degree and interest may be connected to a stigmatism. I believe this aspect of Robinsons speech was very effective. He was able to connect what he was saying to a real life example that he witnessed and that actually happened to someone that he knows. Being able to use real life examples helps people put what he is saying and arguing in perspective of what it may look like if arts and music was more important in the school and education system. I also believe that since he used younger children in his examples, it would make his pathos stronger. He may have been trying to make people sad for these small children who love being creative but are put on drugs and told to sit down and be quiet. Overall, I believe that Robinsons speech was very persuasive and effective since he used so many small details and paid a lot of attention to the structure of his speech and making sure he sounded credible and used credible sources to back up his argument.