We learnt through the Covid pandemic that we need to be quick thinking and flexible in our approach, we needed to take risks, to gamble on the future outcomes. Let us grow this aspect of our current learning and invest in the unseen future. The young across all cultures may have the creative vision to light the way to seeing what the future may look like. Today on the 3rd February I heard on the radio of a piece of homework written by an eleven year old in the mid 1960’s. This piece of teacher marked work was found, this year, down the side of an old sofa. In the paper the student accurately predicted the future, which we can recognise and know now as mobile phones and Zoom chats. The future is always unfolding and is often arrived at as a solution to an existing problem like rna derived vaccine. But what if as a country we could harness “new ideas” and value scientific imagination of much younger people? My idea would be to set up a competition similar to “the Haywood” for keystage 3 children to “see the future”. This would develop a point in the curriculum for creative innovation and act as a stimulus for project based learning. Competition entries could be submitted as written, drawn, spoken, sung or electronically developed and this would ensure its eligibility would be open to all abilities, sectors and cultures. As with the 500 word competition (which I believe is heavily subscribed) it should have notable people on the final panel, superstars from this age like Lewis Hamilton, J K Rowling, Joe Wicks, Susan Hopkins, George the Poet, Alice Bentinck James Dyson etc. The winning entry /ies could go to a nominated research and development team or academy for prototyping. Prizes could include money (or shares in a company if the idea was developed) and the whole could form part of a maths module on money, business, etc.
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