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reason: What is at the very top of your education reform list?Here is my prediction: online learning is not going to save us.
Jeb Bush: Applying digital learning as a transformative tool to disrupt the public education system, to make it more child-centered, more customized, more robust, more diverse, and more exciting.
I'm pretty sure.
I would like online learning to work. (I think.) I just don't expect that it's going to work, partly because it hasn't worked (well) for me or for anyone close to me, and partly because distance learning was an expensive flop when colleges tried it in the 1990s (see pages 98-99).
This brings me to my beef with education reformers who are advocating "technology": if they don't have an argument as to why technology is going to be "transformative" this time around, then they don't have an argument.
That's not to say they're wrong; maybe this time will be different. But I have yet to hear a reformer explain why this time will be different, and that's a problem.
They are not reckoning with the evidence against their position.
High-Tech Heretic: Reflections of a Computer Contrarian
Oversold and Underused: Computers in the Classroom
Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know?
The Computer Delusion by Todd Oppenheimer
In defense of Clifford Stoll
Virtual Schools at Education Next
11 comments:
I get the sense that, post-Crash, a lot of people (including school board members & possibly administrators) are pinning their hopes on 'technology' to reduce spending.
But I don't see that happening, either.
Structurally, unions will continue to press for higher spending (which is what they should do; that is their mission), and parents of K-12 children will continue to press for higher spending (which, given what I know now, probably isn't what they should do--?)
The introduction of online courses doesn't change those structural forces.
I can easily imagine public schools continuing to spend more and more money on "curriculum specialists" and "teaching learning facilitators" and so on, while putting kids in front of computer screens all day long for learning.
I base this on the fact that I know of districts where spending and number of administrators rose -- while class size also rose! The increased spending went to administrators.
Parents won't favor increasing 'screen time' in schools (I don't think), but I've seen here in my town that many K-5 parents favor increasing the number of administrators.
My children have learned a lot from EPGY (and learned it quickly), and the eldest likes Alcumus from AOPS. He also liked the Descartes Cove math program and Middle School Advantage and asked met to get High School Advantage. A free program he has tried is XYAlgebra. On this site Aleks and Khan Academy have often been praised.
Online learning is a bad fit for public schools, because the teachers' unions DO NOT WANT labor-saving technology and because educators want to ignore IQ differences and have everyone learn the same material at the same age. The primary problem is the government monopoly nature of public education and the kinds of teachers it attracts, not the ineffectiveness of online learning.
K12 is opening a new "hybrid" school in my area this fall and it's one of the options we are considering for high school if our personal circumstances at the time do not allow for prep school. The school for which we are zoned doesn't offer any honors courses until 11th grade, while the K12 Flex Academy offers 4 years' worth of honors courses and a whole bunch more electives.
Crimson Wife - oh, that's interesting!
How will it be hybrid?
I've spent a lot of time with ALEKS; I took half the algebra 1 course & all of the geometry course. I've been thinking about getting back to algebra on ALEKS but am dreading it.
I'll probably go back to my Saxon books.
What is the problem being solved? Is it meeting NCLB's low cut-off standards on a statistical basis, or is it providing the best individual education for each child? Is the goal absolute or relative?
Online learning can be great if it allows for acceleration, but is it better than having a teacher-centered class at that level? I would prefer being taught by a person who could look me in the eyes and adapt the teaching to my own individual needs. Next, would be a teacher-centered class at my level. However, I've known some teachers who added no extra value over studying the textbook on my own. Also, there is a limit for what a teacher can do. A lot of what I have learned came from doing homework, but a good teacher can weed out the bad homework from the good homework.
Our middle school allows certain kids to accelerate and take online courses. They bought a solution. This is supposed to make full-inclusion OK. It's not transformative. It's an excuse for not fixing a fundamental problem. If you take an online course, you're on your own.
There is nothing inherent about technology except storage and speed. That doesn't guarantee anything. Technology doesn't transform educational philosophy. Kids will still get to fifth grade without knowing their times table.
The problem is not defined, so what, exactly, is being transformed?
One of these days I'm finally going to write my Irene Pepperberg post (which is my theory for why online learning isn't as good as classroom learning).
I think I may actually have written about it before.
Time to hit the search box.
Online learning can be great if it allows for acceleration, but is it better than having a teacher-centered class at that level?
Right - that's the question.
I'm pretty sure that online learning is inferior to an accelerated teacher-centered class for reasons having to do with my own experience and with 'social learning theory.'
Basically, online learning is a Skinner box; it's predicated on S-R learning. (stimulus response)
I suspect that students fare better in learning situations predicated on Bandura's social learning theory.
(I'm not extremely well-versed in these distinctions, so take this with a grain of salt - I'm going to have to go back and look at my various books...)
Also: I'm not reflexively anti-Skinner or Skinner boxes. Not at all; both Jimmy & Andrew were in "ABA" programs.
I'm just saying that I think there's a core social feature missing in online learning as online learning is currently configured (e.g. ALEKS).
The problem is not defined, so what, exactly, is being transformed?
Good point!
I continue to be somewhat mystified by why, exactly, our schools are so focused on 'technology' and, potentially, online learning....
I definitely hear reformers (and school board members) hoping that online learning will finally 'disrupt' conventional public schools --- or just reduce taxes by eliminating the need for so many teachers.
But I get the feeling that my own public school system, which certainly doesn't want to disrupt itself or to reduce spending, would also like to put kids on computers for a lot of their day.
Project Lead the Way, which involves sitting in front of a computer simulating engineering projects, is the start.
I **think** that technology gibes with constructivist classrooms in that online learning or computer learning is supposed to be the ultimate in 'differentiated instruction.'
Every student in the room can be plugged into the computer doing something different. ("School of One")
At least, I get the sense there's an element of this thinking out there.
I could be wrong.
Our middle school allows certain kids to accelerate and take online courses. They bought a solution. This is supposed to make full-inclusion OK.
How does that work?
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