With the advent of merging education and technology, there are so many exciting things being introduced to aid children throughout the learning process. One tool that is “removing the one-size-fits-all lecture from the classroom and letting students have a self paced lecture at home,” is Khan Academy.
What began as a series of tutorial videos to help his cousins in math, Sal Khan’s Khan Academy has grown to include 5,500 instructional videos and a personalized learning dashboard, including activities that empower learners to study at their own pace, both in- and outside of the classroom. This non-profit organization promises to offer all of their resources for free, for everyone, forever. Khan Academy also offers coaching tools for parents and teachers.
Watch Salman Khan’s Ted Talk and learn how Khan Academy is impacting the way students learn.
Khan Academy has being implemented in pilot programs across the country, including one school system in the Los Altos, CA school district which Khan details in his Ted Talk above.
For math specifically, one way that Khan Academy was changing the way students learned was by allowing the lecture to be consumed by students at their own pace at home. This allows for what work would usually be done as homework to be done in the classroom instead, allowing the teacher to provide a more one-on-one aid for students who need help–or to allow students who are doing well to tutor others. This also allows students who already understand a concept to move on and not become bored in the classroom.
One of the most important things about Khan Academy is the specific data provided for each individual student. When used in the classroom, Khan Academy provides teachers with granular data, including exactly which problems a student is struggling with in order to make their interactions with the student as productive as possible.
Recently, Khan Academy released their ipad app which features much of the same content previously only available online via your laptop or desktop computer.
Learn more about Khan Academy’s free resources at khanacademy.org.
Reading this on an ipad? Download the new Khan Academy ipad app here.