kitchen table math, the sequel: Allison on Khan-love in Minnesota

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Allison on Khan-love in Minnesota

I'm seeing the same thing as Catherine: schools love khan.

Khan isn't going to teach k-8 kids anything, but schools love it anyway.

a) now they think they don't have to spend money on textbooks for elementary kids (first hand have heard that directly from a curriculum director)

b) now their teachers don't need to know how to do the math, khan will do it for them. (heard that directly from an instructional coach who champions Teach Like a Champion)

I know 2 other elementary teachers who love it because now they can do fun Terc things.

I only know one person who is anti Khan here in the establishment. Her very sane complaint: the man teaches completing the square without even drawing a square. It's nothing but computational and procedural fluency for him. It's the opposite of actual instruction, but now schools will use it and instruct even less.
I'm surprised nobody said one of Khan’s most significant achievements is that he has enormously expanded the world’s access to a master teacher.

2 comments:

Catherine Johnson said...

I'm going to say, again, that I have personally used Khan -- and I have personally found the videos a very difficult way to learn new content.

As usual, I'll say that I'm glad he's there; I admire what he's done; etc., etc.

But his videos work much, much better as review of material you learned somewhere else.

Genevieve said...

I have also used Khan (mostly for review of concepts learned 5-10 years ago). The review is helpful. The problems are very helpful. One of the weaknesses of the higher math and science is that there aren't problems to work on. I find that I understand the videos, but remember little the next week.