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Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

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Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#131

Post by boredandroid »

XLcommerce wrote: post #123
arijo wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know you're better at your job now than 17 years ago? Does an effective teacher evaluation system exist in your country that you can use as a reference to validate your claim?

Are you a better programmer now than you were 5 years ago? How do you know? Has anyone evaluated your work and told you are now 18% more efficient than 5 years ago? It may not be 100% accurate (since we are all masters at deluding ourselves), however it is possible to self-assess. Speaking as a teacher I know that my work is much better than it was 7 years ago (when I started). Simply delivering the material so many…

In companies of any size, programmers generally go through quarterly, biannual, or annual performance reviews where they are assessed by the manager and peers. Programmers who are overperforming are promoted and given more responsibility (and money), those who are under-performing get coaching or are fired. This is the same as virtually every other job on the planet.

You can argue this kind of evaluation is not fair (it is certainly less scientific then test scores), but the point is that on the whole it works. And teachers don't have it. They mostly cannot be fired, and receive compensation on a schedule based purely on years of tenure and education.

A good analogy would be if programmers were given tenure after two years at a company and then could not be fired regardless of productivity or any other offense other than gross misconduct. If the programmers then (unsurprisingly) resisted every attempt, no matter how small, to reward high performance and punish incompetence, we would have an equivalent situation.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#132

Post by ScottyGray »

I think the question is, what problem is it that Khan Academy seems to be solving? It may very well be a band-aid on the symptoms of our sick math education system. It might also be improving scores of students on exams.

I happen to be in the camp that HOW we are teaching and HOW we are measuring the learning of mathematics is the problem. We are teaching procedures simply to try to get the right data. We avoid actually teaching mathematics because the only real way to figure out what someone understands is to ask for an explanation and discussion and those results depend on trusting teachers to evaluate the understanding and assign a measure to it.

It seems that the best job we do teaching mathematics occurs at the lowest and highest extremes. K-3 elementary students, and Ph.D. Students. It's because at those extremes it's more about conversation than scores. Notice that no one gives Ph.D. students multiple choice quizzes.

Now back to Khan Academy, so this is how we are going to use this powerful computational tool to teach Mathematics? Watch video and take multiple choice quizzes? Anyone who thinks that's revolutionary doesn't understand the history of educational technology. This has all been done before, just not free. Free is the only difference between Khan Academy and all of the other previous efforts of using automatic quizzing systems and pre-taped lectures to teach.

I be a jerk to criticize Khan without offering an alternative. There has been a project happening at the University of Illinois for the past 20 years that IS revolutionary and does use the full power of the computer to change the approach to teaching math, AND flips the classroom the way Khan speaks of. It uses content written in Mathematica to approach the subject from the model level rather than the procedure level. It's simply too difficult for most people to understand models by doing hand calculations. However, once the models have been well explored and understood the procedures become trivial.

I am part of a project called Making Math to bring the model of teaching using Mathematica to the web using modern Javascript techniques. We're adding all the communication and feedback mechanisms as well as authoring and editing interfaces. BUT our motto is "if a computer can grade it, it's not worth asking." We feel that way because we expect explanations, and because at the end of the day, students want feedback from mentor, both help, and a pat on the back for a job well done.

(the one thing I like about Khan Academy is the marginalization of the lecture format and the flipping of the classroom. I just happen to think we can flip the classroom by engaging students in better activities, and providing a mechanism to explore and explain mathematical models).

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#133

Post by gjm11 »

bambax wrote: post #103

This is what one finds in the "About" page of Khan Academy: > Sal also found time to get three degrees from MIT and an MBA from Harvard > Shantanu (...) received four degrees from MIT > Bilal (...) completed his MBA and MA in Education from Stanford and a BS in Actuarial Science from Urbana-Champaign > Marcia (...) received her BS and MS in Computer Science from Stanford > Jessica (...) is an alumna of Stanford and U…

1. Is anyone actually saying that traditional education is irrelevant? In particular, is Khan Academy (or Sal Khan personally) saying this? (I haven't heard it.)

2. Imagine that you're a possible user (or funder or ...) of KA, but you are not convinced that "traditional education is irrelevant" or that KA's variety of not-so-traditional education is going to be any good.

One thing you might look for, when evaluating KA, is whether the people who run it are any good by the standards you're used to. So even if the people operating KA thought that "traditional education is irrelevant" it might be eminently reasonable for them to parade their traditional-education qualifications, in order to help persuade those who aren't yet on board with the idea.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#134

Post by fdschoeneman »

swcpg wrote: post #118
fdschoeneman wrote: post #14

I think this piece would be more effective, or at least somewhat effective, if its author had described a vision for online learning that takes the best of Khan's approach and combines it with, well, something interesting. The author never really explains what that something is. I don't think Khan Academy is perfect. Its gamification techniques will not work for all students. But it is an alternative for some student…

Unfortunately all evidence so far seems to indicate that online approaches to learning, on average, do not work very well. To be clear, meta-analyses continue to reveal that schooling, as it exists now, works as well or better than tech centered or online education. I do not find this surprising, if you do not change the philosophy and pedagogy, no repackaging will overcome the serious inherent flaws in the approach.…

You wrote "...online approaches to learning, on average, do not work very well..."

Huh? Listen my good man, we aren't talking about the average online approach to learning, we're talking specifically about Khan Academy approach. And I know Khan Academy works for some kids because I've seen some kids using, and liking it -- both kids ahead of their peers and kids behind them.

Whether it works for all kids, on average, is totally irrelevant.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#136

Post by XLcommerce »

boredandroid wrote: post #131
XLcommerce wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you a better programmer now than you were 5 years ago? How do you know? Has anyone evaluated your work and told you are now 18% more efficient than 5 years ago? It may not be 100% accurate (since we are all masters at deluding ourselves), however it is possible to self-assess. Speaking as a teacher I know that my work is much better than it was 7 years ago (when I started). Simply delivering the material so many…

In companies of any size, programmers generally go through quarterly, biannual, or annual performance reviews where they are assessed by the manager and peers. Programmers who are overperforming are promoted and given more responsibility (and money), those who are under-performing get coaching or are fired. This is the same as virtually every other job on the planet. You can argue this kind of evaluation is not fair…

I understand your points and they're all fair in the context of programming as a job. Code is code and can be evaluated in an atomic fashion, its objectively either good(correct, efficient etc) or not.

How exactly do you accurately assess teaching? Test scores? I've worked at very tough schools. High unemployment, high crime area. Good teaching in this context meant the teacher showed up, made it through the year without having a mental breakdown and student attendance was > 50%.

On the flipside I've worked at top tier private schools where success was gauged by how many of our students were in the top n% for the state.

Teachers fear outside assessment from bureaucrats. Here in Australia we even have league tables for schools, and there has been talk of tying teacher pay to student performance. Obviously a worry if you are a classroom teacher who understands the human component of teaching (ie it's more than test results in a spreadsheet).

In my opinion to truly assess a teacher you'd need to observe their teaching for weeks to see how they deal with the myriad of situations that arise in the classroom. What we end up with though is standardised testing which ends up telling us what we already know.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#137

Post by sams99 »

gomphus wrote: post #130
mathalicious wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Happy to tell you more. My name is Karim. I'm the founder of Mathalicious and the author of the blog post. I'm also a former classroom teacher and middle school math coach, where I worked with other teachers to help improve instruction by focusing on 1) conceptual understanding, and 2) relevance. It seems like the anti-post comments fall in three categories: 1. Khan is great 2. Mathalicious is just jealous 3. The aut…

Let me try to crack that nutshell... 1. ...and several other factors, like requiring all students in a class to move at the same pace. 2. We all, including Khan, recognize there is a problem. 3. You gravely mischaracterize Khan's approach. Yes, the video you selected (out of thousands) does promote rote methods, as do many of the exercises. But Khan is also at pains to demonstrate mathematical reasoning from first pr…

I agree with you gomphus, as an outsider reading this article it did make me feel kind of crappy.

The main feeling I got was:

"Look at the King! Look at the the King! Look at the King, the King, the King! The King is in the altogether, but altogether, the altogether He's altogether as naked as the day that he was born The King is in the altogether, but altogether, the altogether It's altogether the very least the King has ever worn"

I am sure there are drawbacks and improvements KA need to make, no doubt at all. But an all out attack from someone at a similar space, to me, seems counter-productive.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#138

Post by mathalicious »

gomphus wrote: post #130
mathalicious wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Happy to tell you more. My name is Karim. I'm the founder of Mathalicious and the author of the blog post. I'm also a former classroom teacher and middle school math coach, where I worked with other teachers to help improve instruction by focusing on 1) conceptual understanding, and 2) relevance. It seems like the anti-post comments fall in three categories: 1. Khan is great 2. Mathalicious is just jealous 3. The aut…

Let me try to crack that nutshell... 1. ...and several other factors, like requiring all students in a class to move at the same pace. 2. We all, including Khan, recognize there is a problem. 3. You gravely mischaracterize Khan's approach. Yes, the video you selected (out of thousands) does promote rote methods, as do many of the exercises. But Khan is also at pains to demonstrate mathematical reasoning from first pr…

Thanks for the comments. Very helpful. Again, to reiterate, I actually like Khan Academy, and the post wasn't critiquing Khan as much as it was our turning Khan into something that it's not. The post wasn't about Khan. It was about us.
Schools are experimenting with using it as a core instructional tool. That is not in question. Whether or not Khan himself is advocating this is besides the point (although they are involved in pilot programs). The point is that schools & districts are turning to a style of instruction that we know from research does not work, and that threatens to postpone the more important -- and necessary -- conversation about better teaching and better curriculum.
That said, I have heard what Khan has said about how he envisions Khan Academy being used. (Awkward sentence; apologies). He wants teachers to be able to offload skills instruction in order to be freed up to pursue projects and other applications. In theory, this is terrific. As a former classroom teacher myself, I know how much time we spend on basic skills. However, my concern -- and let's be clear; I say this as a teacher -- is that if students aren't learning the skills correctly in the first place, then they won't be able to apply them.
Finally, as someone who has spent considerable time -- and all of his savings -- trying to create a product that will help teachers teach better from the curriculum angle, I can tell you that Khan Academy has made it incredibly difficult to fund new projects in the ed space. Yes, there is more money than ever, but almost all of it is for platforms. Nobody wants to put money into effective content, because the media narrative has convinced them that the math problem has already been "solved." Having watched many, many Khan Academy videos, and having spoken to any number of teachers and school administrators, I have a difficult time believing this to be true.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#139

Post by XLcommerce »

roel_v wrote: post #90
yequalsx wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the same way that a bad parent who becomes a better parent knows they are now a better parent. Some things are not quantifiable. I know of no effective national evaluation system for parenting and yet some parents are good parents. I know that I am a better teacher now than when I first started. I'm not claiming to be a good teacher. I'm just claiming to be a better one. It's common for a practitioner to get bette…

"You should believe me because I say so"? Really? I'm not saying you are or are not, but this line of justification is an insult to anyone who considers themselves rational thinkers.

Not really. I would have though that: 'do it a lot and you'll get better at it' is fairly self evident. Obviously testing of some sort would help us to determine how much better one became.

I'd go so far as to say that it would be very difficult not to improve at something you were doing over a period of time.

Re: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time

#140

Post by mathalicious »

mathalicious wrote: post #138
gomphus wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me try to crack that nutshell... 1. ...and several other factors, like requiring all students in a class to move at the same pace. 2. We all, including Khan, recognize there is a problem. 3. You gravely mischaracterize Khan's approach. Yes, the video you selected (out of thousands) does promote rote methods, as do many of the exercises. But Khan is also at pains to demonstrate mathematical reasoning from first pr…

Thanks for the comments. Very helpful. Again, to reiterate, I actually like Khan Academy, and the post wasn't critiquing Khan as much as it was our turning Khan into something that it's not. The post wasn't about Khan. It was about us. Schools are experimenting with using it as a core instructional tool. That is not in question. Whether or not Khan himself is advocating this is besides the point (although they are in…

Again, at its core, the blog post was about how Khan Academy was originally intended as a source for homework help; that we've begun to use it for much more than this; and that this risks perpetuating the underlying problem.   This seems fairly straightforward, uncontroversial, and I must admit that I'm surprised by how energetic (and in some cases, vitriolic) the response has been.
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