Jason got me turned on to the Khan Academy idea. While I haven't tried it out yet, as he has, I was impressed with Sal Khan in the 60 minute piece for a few reasons. First, the guy has no background in education, yet he seemed to understand a lot about effective teaching: scaffolding, prioritizing, self-paced instruction, a guide on the side.
Second, the idea that some pilot programs have students learning the concept from the Academy at home and the practice is being done in the classroom with a teacher is not really his goal, but it is a better approach if you are using this instructional format. It allows the teacher the ability to see who is struggling and provide immediate assistance. Third, I like how he emphasized that this is all about freeing up the teacher for better use of his or her time. No more do we have to devote half of the period to lecturing, but instead can provide small group or individual assistance and develop other activities, such as authentic problems, to situate the learning. By offloading the concept delivery, it frees up teachers to do some of the million other things we have to do in a classroom.
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