Education as entertainment

At first sight there ought to be nothing contentious about the idea of education as entertainment. Who, after all, has not been entertained, at least once in their life, by a great teacher – has not been diverted by the teacher’s wit, enthusiasm, bearing, tone of voice, turn of phrase or use of eye contact? And who has not learned something profound from a great entertainment – from a brilliantly performed Shakespearian play, for example? Yet underneath such common ground lurks another idea that ought to be very contentious: the idea that education, to be truly modern and therefore accessible, should nearly always be entertaining – for otherwise it may not be inclusive.

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Here is the introduction to a chapter of a book edited by Dennis Hayes – click on this Education as Entertainment link to read the full chapter.

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This view condescends. It is an attempt to sugar what is obviously thought to be a bitter pill. The struggle to learn is, in this conception, not valued for what it is: an active struggle, with the potential that such an activity has to build character among the millions of pupils and students who are prepared to engage in it. No, since the struggle to learn is, very probably, perceived as painful, so entertainment – a less active, strenuous pursuit of leisure – must take some or all of that struggle’s place.

In the current culture, education as entertainment marks the final stage in a broader turn away from the substantive business of education. That much is confirmed by the specially exalted role given to different forms of play within education.

The Role of Play in Education

Today, influenced both by the spread of information technology (IT) in schools and elsewhere, and by a loathing for what is held to be the authoritarian pedagogy of the past, experts believe that education should not be a one-way exercise in teacher ‘chalk and talk’ (Woudhuysen, 2002a and 2002b). Despite or perhaps because of the couch-potato implications of recasting education as entertainment, its advocates in the world of education are firm that they want teaching to be interactive and ‘student centred’. In a significant borrowing from American management theory and its cult of user delight in new products, they hope that education can prompt awe, wonder, excitement, laughter and exhilaration. In short, educationalists believe that education should be entertaining in the sense that the pupil or student is able to play with ideas.

In ancient Greek philosophy, a clear distinction was made between the teacher and the entertainer. In Roman times, a sound body, promoted in part through participation in sport, was seen as useful for the preservation of a sound mind. However today’s liberal educationalists take the Romans a step further. They intend that the catchphrase of the Early Learning Centre retail chain – ‘Playing to Learn, Learning to Play’ – should be understood not just by parents of pre-school children, but by teachers everywhere.

Government policy is to have more and more very young children supervised in formal play sessions at British primary schools. It is sympathetic to the speculation that computer games can provide a model for e-learning, the online school and the corporate university. Importantly, too, government reserves a special place in the curriculum for sport.

The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority’s chief executive during 2000-01, David Hargreaves, argued that physical education and school sport were ‘a vital part of pupils’ learning experience, enhancing attainment in other subjects’ (O’Leary, 2001). Then, announcing a £450 million programme of investment in school sports in October 2002, Tony Blair committed the government to recruiting nearly 16,000 new school sports coordinators and teachers, as well as to a guarantee that all 5-16 year olds in the UK would receive a minimum of two hours a week of physical education and sport by 2006  (DCMS, 2002). Sport is seen as a means of keeping young people engaged and out of trouble (DCMS, 2002). Most recently, chess has been revived as an excellent means of assisting child development.

It is a short step from here for government to see adult attendance and participation in playful entertainments as a fitting arena for state education. Both junior and senior audiences, after all, were the target of the Millennium Dome (McGuigan and Gilmore, 2000), which might best be considered a giant induction of millions into the Blairite conception of citizenship (Lewis, Richardson and Woudhuysen, 1998). Following in the footsteps of the San Francisco Exploratorium and the Science Museum’s Launch Pad, ‘hands on’ is the philosophy at science museums in Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Glasgow. Playful interactivity also characterises many exhibits at many Lottery-funded museum developments.