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Education Innovation
This discussion topic has been set up to discuss innovative educational ideas for all levels of education. Which areas of education have a “blind spot” regarding allocation of existing resources and teaching methods? How would you approach improving this? Is there something that we are already doing well that could still be done more effectively and efficiently, or for lower cost? How do we transition the traditional classroom into the digital age? How can we approach balancing mainstream and/or commercial viability of products with the need for specialised resources? If these are some of the questions you have pondered, you are in the right place!
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@Mike asked the question “…thinking how we can positively affect education & teen/pre-teen development in areas that have a disproportionate amount of resources.”
I 100% agree that there is a lack of resources for the pre-teen and teen age group compared to what is available for primary (elementary) aged kids – especially in the online environment & especially with respect to curriculum aligned, self-paced resources.
This is a problem that I am currently facing with my nearly 11 year old son in our home schooling journey. We are currently using subscription based programs like Study Ladder and Prodigy Math (Beast Academy is also in the same sort of category of resources). These resources are online, self paced and curriculum aligned, so they are highly suitable for home schoolers – especially those who have erratic, mobile or highly flexible lifestyles and for kids who need self paced learning, in an entertaining format, to keep them engaged. However, there is not a lot in the way of more advanced learning resources that follow this engaging format. This particularly affects younger children who are undertaking accelerated learning. Once they are finished with these resources that are designed for primary school learners, they are thrown in the deep end of adult style education – a style of learning which they may have a lot of difficulty adjusting to, even though they are ready for the actual content.
I would personally like to see more of the above style of resources developed in alignment with more advanced stages of the government curriculums, or more advanced topics just generally, whilst maintaining a gaming / entertainment format of delivery that appeals to a broad range of ages (even adult learners).
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@Mike I would also love to see someone develop a continuous, online, 24/7 interactive, live school – where students can log on, select the “class” that they want to attend and have an interactive, virtual classroom experience with other students and a teacher. The delivery format could include interactive components such as participating in a group discussion with other attendees, asking questions of the teacher, or a “split screen” setup where there are questions and tasks to complete as the class progresses. Classes could also be delivered as a pre-recorded teaching with tasks & questions to be completed as the student progresses through the recording (or use the first delivered class as the recording) – but this would depend on the level of student-teacher interaction required for the particular content delivery and format. Classes could be organised by grade & subject, or by interest topic employing cross-curricular learning. (ie. you could have a Grade 8 science class, or a rocketry topic class that is aimed at multiple age groups and incorporates math, science and other traditional subjects within the lessons). A class schedule could be published in advance, a bit like a TV program guide, with classes frequently repeated and the time that they are held being rotated to cater for different time zones. The information about each class & course could include detailed cross-links to government curriculums for countries like the US, Australia, the UK and any other country that has a sufficiently detailed curriculum. The list of courses & classes could also have a search function so users can search for all the classes with content linked to Grade 4 English from the US curriculum, for example. There could also be a function that keeps a record of the classes that the student has attended and completed, so that charts, stats and reports can be generated to indicate how much of & which specific components of a selected government curriculum the student has completed through the online classes; (this will help home schoolers keep records for home school registration purposes, as well as just tracking the student’s progress in a general sense). Such a system could eventually be used to also deliver educational qualifications like a true online course (fully government accredited school / training provider for various jurisdictions), where students “enroll” for a full course – for example, it could make qualifications like the International Baccalaureate more accessible. The advantage of the above idea over traditional zoom style, scheduled classes is that it offers a lot more flexibility with the delivery; can cater to accelerated and self paced learning much more effectively than the mainstream schooling system does now; could potentially be used as an almost exclusive resource for home schooling purposes (or just bits & pieces – whichever suits each individual user); streamlines the government compliance processes; could be adapted for use by mainstream schools (either separately or in tandem with other users); could be delivered in a manner that is much more cost efficient that the status quo; has the potential to concurrently incorporate both a commercialised subscription structure and a philanthropic approach; you can get better economies of scale; depending on the level of anticipated student interaction for each class, some classes could be capped at low numbers of attendees and others could potentially have 100s or even 1000s of students logged in at once; it could be used to break down barriers caused by disability, poverty or other disadvantage; the current system is very heavily stacked in favour of the well to do – this project could shift the balance of the education system to a more level playing field, where academic merit rather than socio-economic background is the primary driver of progression through the system.
Apologies for my projectile vomit of ideas! I’ll just leave this here… ????
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I have been pleasantly surprised with the quality and variety of what is available with Outschool. It has so many of the features you suggested already integrated. We have had to do a lot of try it and see, but my just turned 12yo found a couple she really enjoys. It is a nice place to sample activities as well. What I find I like best is the ability to adapt to very advanced learners and also to be able to skim a subject.
On another note – having gone through this for the 3rd time at this age, we have allowed the tween/early teen years to be a time of deep exploration without any requirements outside of prove to me you can read, communicate, and continue math. This allows for such a vast opportunity of exploration into “who am I”, “what am I passionate about?”, “what is out there in the world for me?”, “where do I fit in?” types of focus. From there, in the later teen years, it is easy to transition into dual credit as a spring board for college as a focus of developing/investigating those passions. At that point, it is true they are ready for the adult type learning, and will hopefully have an idea of at least a general direction, being able to pursue the major of interest immediately instead of waiting to finish the first two years of “core” work at college. Additionally, it allows for the exploration of a couple of years of non-formal education, if the child desires as they enter adulthood, instead of being herded into the university pipeline. They have two years to become more as they have done the dual credit work. That one thing alone as an aspect of homeschooling, has been the greates benefit to my young adulters. (Now 21/23). Their advice to me for their youngest sibling is to allow for that time of exploration/becoming more than any academic pursuit. It is easy, one of the said, to learn anything you need to know for a class/course. It is not so easy to know who you are, what your passion is, or how you fit in.
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