Critic of Khan

Here are some of the things that people are saying that paint a different and more critical picture of Khan Academy

Observations from Khan Academy Experiment

I decided that I wanted to spend some time this week doing some objective observation and comparison of the control class. The traditional class has gotten way less air time and Ms. Negash is a great teacher, so I felt like I should check in and see how they are progressing. This proved to be a very fruitful use of my time for two reasons. Firstly, I got to hear first hand how the students in the traditional classroom are dealing with the curriculum and the fact that they are in summer school. Secondly, Ms. Negash was out sick so I got to experience both classes with..... a substitute.

Those readers who are in education know what I am getting at. Having a Sub is like throwing a day of instruction out the window. In very few cases are there Sub's who have strong enough classroom management skills to hold it down, never mind enough instructional experience it keep the learning rolling. In this case the Sub is a veteran teacher is Envision Academy, and is the summer school acting principal, so needless to say he is an amazing Sub.

The traditional classroom was loud. They were playing a game of jeopardy to review and practiced learned concepts. About 60%-70% of the class was engaged, the others were using their white boards to draw. I sat next to one of the drawers and asked what they had learned today. The response was less than hopeful for both of us, they were unclear. After class I spoke with the Sub and he stated that he felt like the class had indeed been a bit out of control. He said that things are usually slightly better with Ms. Negash but in general this block has a hard time staying engaged.

The Blended Learning group was fascinating. The class ran smoothly as the students understood the procedures and the expectations. They busily tried to work there way through the modules that Ms. Negash identified for completion. The Sub asked me if he could help them, or how hands on or off he should be, but the students knew exactly what to do. The room was as quiet as it is on any other day. The Sub did leave for a few minutes to take care of some principal tasks, leaving me in charge, and the students began to chat. I was floored that the talk was all math related and naturally died down long before the Sub returned.

Walking around the room I noticed that one student was taking a break. I went over to check in and I noticed that she was reviewing her data while eating a snack. I asked her to explain to me what the data was telling her, what information did she gain from looking at this. She promptly, and proudly showed me how she was able to track which modules she was proficient in and what badges she had attained that day. She described how this helped keep her focused and gave her a sense of accomplishment. This made me realize that Khan's data tracking tools are not only useful to teacher as a meaning of tracking progress and planning targeted instruction, but they are also useful to students as a method of feedback that allows them to think strategically in planning their instructional time. In future implementations with classes I think it would be wise to show the students the data tools early on and frequently.

As a final note, the Sub was pleased at how smoothly the second class went. He did not feel like the students in either group are more or less distractable as individuals during the school year. He also agreed that the traditional group responded as most classes do when there is a Sub, but the Blended Learning class seemed unfazed.

What does this say about how engaged the students are? What does this tell us about Ms. Negash's ability to create structure and routine for her students?

How data supports positive behavior

During yesterday's much-anticipated roll out the students had time to play around with Khan Academy's platform and interact with the different features. Some students had already used the site before and were drawn to some of the later modules that had been marked for review; while others were excited that they could successfully complete the first addition module with ease. This experience of success is something that many of these students may not recognize in a math class, and is a helpful motivator.

After the students had time to explore we reined in their attention so as to demonstrate some of the data tracking features. As described earlier this instigated much excitement, many exclamations, and the student's undivided attention. As a former teacher I was pleasantly surprised. The demo came to a close, I closed the projector window and turned the classes attention to Ruth who began to transition the class. I noticed that all of a sudden the activity monitor on my screen began to jump as a student was fervently answering math problems. I stopped the class, quickly opened the projector window and asked the class who was not paying attention to the teacher. One of the more verbal students looked up from his screen with a giant grin and the class broke into laughter. He apologized to Ruth and exclaimed that he thought it was really cool that we could see what he was doing. I laughed as well and told him that I was pumped I had to redirect him away from doing classwork instead of being of task.

Khan Academy, if used strategically and with intent, is not only a mechanism for instruction but is also a tool for dealing with one of the biggest hurdles in education, classroom management

Using Khan Academy in the classroom

In the spring I trained all of the Learning Specialist in our network on Khan Academy. They used it a remedial tool for students who struggle in math and as a way to provide extra support and practice, as a skill builder. For summer school we have decided to launch a prototyping of blended learning using google's new Chromebooks. We are in the beginning stages, the students in both the control and experimental groups are taking the pre-test. The control group is receiving traditional Algebra I while the experimental group is receiving just that, an experiment in how blending the traditional role of the teacher with that of a coach can change outcomes for students. To follow the project check out

http://blendmylearning.com/

and

http://theteachercafe.blogspot.com/

Helpful tool for Math lessons

I am sitting in class and a group of students just presented this simulation to the group. I am so pumped by how helpful this representation will be for students who struggle with graphing equations, especially Algebra II, that I have to post it immediately


Hope you like it!!

Some Interesting Tech Tools

Over the past few months I have been collecting and archiving tech tools that I have found on a variety of websites, that I think would be useful to use with the students I work with. Many of these are tools that help to support differentiation in the classroom, and increase access for students who have learning differences.
This website is a neat tool for teaching money skills. Working in Special Education we are mandated to ensure that our students are prepared to transition from high school to post-secondary activities. This is a great tool for transition planning.
Students are always stating that they do not want to do things that they find difficult. How often have you heard the line "why do I have to learn stupid Algebra? I won't use it in my life anyways"?
Well here is a website that helps teach kids exactly how they will use math in their daily lives.
This tool is an interactive time line to support history instruction.
This tool allows students to create an account where they can upload clips of audio information that they record on a variety of devices. For example, a student who has auditory processing deficits can use his/her phone to capture important points in the lecture, and then upload it so that they can use it later.
This tool is designed to be used in trigonometry but I feel like it can be a useful tool for demonstrating certain core concepts in geometry as well, and provides a good visual at the same time.
I trust that these tools will be interesting and useful. I apologize for not providing sample lessons in this post. What can I say, school is getting intense. My midterms are coming up quickly.

Differentiation to support Critical Thinking

This post is slightly different than most other posts because it is more like a lesson. This is a short Professional Development opportunity that I put together for teachers. Following the steps below one could easily use this as a self-guided lesson. I hope that the tools collected here are useful and the teachers of all subjects can find ways to incorporate them into their curriculum design and instructional practices.

Title of Session:

Tools to differentiate for students building Critical Thinking skills

Tech Skill You Will Teach:

In this session you will learn about free web resources that can be used to differentiate classroom activities for students with a variety of learning challenges.

Readability

• Intro: Why differentiate, the importance of reaching all students, possible barriers to learning.

• Find text online, copy and paste it into word document.

• Go to Tools, then Spelling and Grammar, then options, then check Readability Statistic.

The end output should give you Flesh-Kincaid grade level.
Video of how to use Spelling and Grammar tool for checking readability statistic

Summarizing and Synthesizing tool to help teach synthesis and to address different reading levels in the classroom

• Introduce Summarity
  

• Participants try with a piece of text that they use in their class.

Graphic Organizers help students structure thinking and highlight points of importance.

• IntroduceBubbl Us

• Participants create visuals for the summarized text they previously created using summarity.

• Bonus activity (time permitting) check out VoiceThread

Here is an example of a final product, created in VoiceThread.

• Bonus (for math / science folks) check out Wolfram Alpha

Measurable Outcomes:

Find tool to measure readability

Create a leveled text

Create a graphic organizer

I hope that this workshop taught you something new.