"Khan Academy founder re-thinks schools, teaching, learning... "

[nd5056]

Originally Posted by Aliceacc

I'm a high school math teacher.

Here's my experience: Like anything else, the Khan Academy videos, and everything else like them, are a tool. /their value lies in the application.

I have no plan to ever completely "flip" my classroom. But I did start this year with kind of a "slow rollover."

Two or three times a week (at least prior to Hurricane Sandy-- she's put a bit of a crimp into my planning) my homework would be for my kids to watch a Khan Academy video, or some other similar video. They were to take notes, and I checked those notes the next day.

The next day in class, I went over the notes, but did so kind of quickly. There were no huge pauses as I waited for my kids to copy all those geometric theorems. But I DID explain each and every one. The kids were already familiar with the explanations, having seen them the night before. But I went over each one again, to ensure that the kids didn't have any additional questions not covered in the video. I also supplemented the information presented. Like most teachers, my own explanations and hints vary from my peers. I like to include those hints and shortcuts in the notes.

But, since they had already taken the vast majority of the notes, we had a whole lot more time for practice problems.

I loved it, and the kids loved it. It was a nice change for them-- it kind of broke up the homework load. I plan to go back to it next year (when I'm more sure that all my kids have access to a computer. Right now I still have a number who are displaced, and possibly a few still living in a shelter. So for the time being, I'm sticking to the textbook for homework.)

Like any other tool, the videos can be misused. But I think they're a great addition to the tools at my disposal to help my kids learn math.

Love your approach, it is a tool for you to use and if used as intended, it'll help you to be a great teacher and effective one too.

Just like power tools helps us with the manual tasks to save time, I can see how it can prime the kids and just finish then individually as needed, you get more millage out of your school time allocated for this. And the kids get more or of it too.

[Pigeon]

In dh's district, there are still an appreciable number of homes without Internet, which limits teachers being able to assign this kind of thing as homework.

[BrerMom]

Originally Posted by Pigeon

In dh's district, there are still an appreciable number of homes without Internet, which limits teachers being able to assign this kind of thing as homework.

Exactly. All things are not equal everywhere. We are lucky enough to have a district subscription to Brainpop.com. As homework, I assigned one of the videos as homework and had almost 25% of that particular class come in to watch it before school with me. After surveying the other classes, I quickly realized that assigning a video for four different classes wouldn't give me enough time to help kids without internet access before school.

[Bungle]

I think that the key piece missing in moving to a video based education system is that children cannot learn from them alone. The videos are fantastic and I learned a lot from them, especially chemistry, however if I have a question I cannot raise my hand and ask the computer monitor to clarify any ideas I may be struggling with.

[Robbi]

Originally Posted by Bungle

I think that the key piece missing in moving to a video based education system is that children cannot learn from them alone. The videos are fantastic and I learned a lot from them, especially chemistry, however if I have a question I cannot raise my hand and ask the computer monitor to clarify any ideas I may be struggling with.

Our daughter used Google or she contacted her teachers if she had a question. They got back to her pretty quickly. If she needed an answer right away in order to finish an assignment, she moved onto a different class until she had her answer. One of the great things about online school is that a student is not stuck in one class and can hop around if they feel like it.

[Ephany]

I have one class that's similar to some of the concepts discussed here. Before attending lecture, I'll have roughly 2 hours of online videos to watch. This is 2-3xs per week. So before I even step foot in the classroom, that's up to 6 hours of video added onto the 4-6 hours of class. Generally they're in a power point format, and quite frankly, it's painful. Yes, it's nice to be able to stop and rewind, however, I find that I'm teaching myself material I've never seen before. You can email the professor, but may have to wait a day or so for a response. There are also a ton of distractions since I'm not in a classroom. I also have pre-work to complete in order to attend class. Generally, it'll take me 2 hours per lecture. There are roughly 100 people in lecture, and the professor presents material based on the idea that you've already mastered everything on the pre-recorded lectures. Then we have the homework which is another 1-2 hours per lecture.

It's by far my hardest class and many of my classmates agree. Thankfully, I only have 1 more semester in this particular sequence, but I'm personally not fond of this method. I'm not sure if it's because I'm older and have had too many years of 'traditional' classroom experiences. Of course, I'm seeing this from a university perspective, not elementary or high school. I can definitely see using online material to supplement traditional classroom teaching at those levels, but not replacing it entirely.

[Becky2005]

Originally Posted by Pigeon

In dh's district, there are still an appreciable number of homes without Internet, which limits teachers being able to assign this kind of thing as homework.

That was my thinking. I know I live in a more affluent area but not everyone in the world has internet readily available, especially on say a Tuesday night at 9 pm after the library closes and/or easy access to the library.

I only bring this up because election night became a pain for me with my kids homework -- one of the assignments was to watch the election coverage....we don't have tv -- we got rid of our cable & don't have one of the fancy boxes you need now for basic tv. I had the teachers basically baffled that we didn't have TV (they e-mailed me to double check that when he told them he didn't have TV, that was correct). He was supposed to get an alternative assignment but we were never quite told what that was going to be and eventually we just figured out using the internet for the part of his assignment he needed to do.

That was my first hand --hmm...how ARE we going to do a homework assignment that is just assumed we have access to something that we don't.

I do know of people here that don't have internet access or extremely slow internet acess (think dial-up!).

I haven't watched them but think they could be great resources but wouldn't like it if it was a required assignment.

[Aliceacc]

Excellent point about internet access.

I'm in a Catholic high school, where people pay tuition. At the start of the year, when I was considering the idea, I brought it up-- both at "meet the teacher" night and in my classes. I asked that anyone who might have an issue either say something or email me privately. The response was overwhelmingly positive. Had I gotten anyone who said they didn't have computer access, I would have reconsidered.

Again, Hurricane Sandy has my kids pretty scattered. I haven't assigned a video since, simply because I'm not sure which of my kids is living where. Even those who are living with relatives may be living 16 or 18 to a house--- I know some of the faculty are. So an assignment such as this one would be a burden on the family. That most certainly is not my intention, so I've halted things for the time being. One or two of the kids have asked when we'll resume them, and I've explained why I don't know the answer.

As to the length of the assignment, that's another totally fair complaint. My classes know that a typical night's homework is 20 minutes, and that they're allowed to stop when the 20 minute mark passes. (Seriously, it's math. There are no math emergencies. If a kid doesn't know what he's doing after 20 minutes of real effort, he can come to extra help. There's no reason for any kid to be up all night doing homework.) When I preview the videos, I keep an eye on the length.

Again, I think the videos are great tools. In addition to the ones at Khan Academy, there are some great ones (and some not so great ones) at www.teachertube.com . But like any other tool, they've got to be used correctly. I'm having fun learning how they can enhance my teaching.

[Friend of a Mouse]

Originally Posted by Northstar

I think that's the point Sal Khan is making when he says that we have to re-think what happens in actual class meetings. The point of lectures, or videos, is that they're a good starting point for learning the material, but now, in 2013, there's no reason why students and teachers need to come together in a room at the same time for this type of learning. Students can interact with videos and lectures the way they always interacted with textbooks... on their own time, at their own pace. In their pajamas with a big plate of nachos if they like!

That means that class meetings can be for problem-solving, discussion, exploring implications, analysis, skill-building based on the material that was covered in the lecture/video. Things where the students interact with each other, with the professor, and with the concepts.

I don't think that we can just make sweeping generalizations. This will work great for some highly motivated students. But I would hazard to guess the lowest motivated students will be about as likely to watch this as they are to read their textbook in advance. It also scares me for the kids I teach. I teach students who are visually impaired. If our school goes this way, this will present many unique challenges to my students. I am very worried about how this affects students who need ot be able to ask questions during the explanations or may need things explained in more than one way. I think this can be a great tool, but like everything else, we shouldn't fall into the trap of thinking that one size fits all.

[preschoolmom]

Originally Posted by Aliceacc

Excellent point about internet access.



As to the length of the assignment, that's another totally fair complaint. My classes know that a typical night's homework is 20 minutes, and that they're allowed to stop when the 20 minute mark passes. (Seriously, it's math. There are no math emergencies. If a kid doesn't know what he's doing after 20 minutes of real effort, he can come to extra help. There's no reason for any kid to be up all night doing homework.) When I preview the videos, I keep an eye on the length.

You sound amazing - I wish you were one of our teachers!

[Aliceacc]

My kids love my 20 minute rule.

I wish the teachers of my own children would adopt it. My 9 year old one night had to write 19 spelling words 5 times each... and that was just the spelling homework! She has auditory processing issues and simply cannot sound out words. So getting 19 words out of 20 wrong on a spelling pretest wasn't bad enough; she had to rewrite each of the words 5 times. She learned a lot, but it wasn't spelling.

My kids )my students, that is) are also allowed to miss (and make up for full credit) up to 3 homeworks per marking period. Hey, sometimes life gets in the way of homework. When that happens, I would much rather they make it up honestly than copy it off someone in the cafeteria or on the bus.