Comments for Mathalicious

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Money for Nothing | Lines and Lines of Tangency

Money for Nothing | Lines and Lines of Tangency — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 00:54:14 +0000

[...] the conversation following a recent Mathalicious blog post, one commenter said: “If we have evidence that current teachers are ineffective (and don’t [...]

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 17:40:34 +0000

It’s not different, it’s just free.

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by learning, online lectures, and deprofessionalization « Learning: Theory, Policy, Practice

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 18:05:16 +0000

[...] essentially a repackaging, with digital drawing tools, of the same old stand-and-deliver, “answer chase” models. In that sense, Khan Academy is yet another example of ignorance in the educational media [...]

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time | Brent Sordyl's blog

Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time | Brent Sordyl's blog — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 20:19:58 +0000

[...] Story: Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time « Mathalicious) Like this:LikeBe the first to like this post. e-learning e-learning, khanacademy dupeGuru [...]

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by The Primary Colors of Friday Ed Bites - the weighted pupil

The Primary Colors of Friday Ed Bites - the weighted pupil — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:58:46 +0000

[...] has plenty of critics. A few weeks ago, I posted Gary Rubenstein’s critique. This time, the critique comes from Mathalicious, an online professional development tool for math [...]

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Kiera

Kiera — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 17:32:30 +0000

This notion of looking to other country’s curriculum seems like such a no brainer, especially when we are compared to these same countries when it comes to measuring performance. There are other curriculum that seem to provide better foundations for mathematical constructs so that their students can progress in ways that further reenforce a deep understanding of math concepts. Curriculum such as the Dutch Realistic Mathematic Education (RME) and the consequent Mathematics in Context (MiC) are specifically designed to study development of algebraic understanding using applied problem solving strategies and approaches. The results of these experiments have been positive. Why then are we not integrating and capitalizing on all that the world knows about how to best teach mathematics?
I regret to state the obvious but it is not because Khan Academy has taken all the funding for other viable options. My best guess, and I am by no means an expert in the matter, is that curriculum and resource producing companies and school districts are in business. Not always the business of teaching and learning, but business none the less.
What Khan Academy can provide is an alternative to the costly partnership, which in the long run will dissolve the rigid alliance that currently dictates what we khan and khan’t do.

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Internet Learning Academy | Pearltrees

Internet Learning Academy | Pearltrees — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 23:03:26 +0000

[...] Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time « Mathalicious First, technology has finally gotten to a point on the exponential growth curve where we can create “adaptive learning” systems that analyze student behavior and tailor personalized learning opportunities just for them. [...]

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Teacher Mom

Teacher Mom — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 20:55:23 +0000

A good resource for certian ideas/points lost to learners, who can then pick them up.

Comment on Khan Academy: It’s Different This Time by Darrell Rudmann

Darrell Rudmann — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 22:59:14 +0000

I think the post comes close to the primary problem with video instruction, but gets caught up in the somewhat less important issue of no-cost materials. Bill Gates is essentially promoting the outdated British empiricist school of thought on learning and memory; in a Wired article recently, he called the cognitivism, the modal form of understanding how people make sense of information, “bullshit.” How Gates (and the KA) approach pedagogy is to say, “Just explain it well, they’ll get it,” as if the human mind is a perfect sponge that absorbs the information completely and correctly on the first go. No mistakes. It’s like the Lego model of teaching. I show you the bricks and how they go together, and now you can do it too. No mistakes, gaps, or unnecessary additions. Perhaps it would be nice if it were so simple.

The human memory system doesn’t work like that, and that is where KA has a problem as anything beyond supplemental material. Present how to do something once, and 30 students may form 30 different ways of understanding it. No, explaining it “better” doesn’t make the problem go away–we make sense of something using what we already know, and our existing base of knowledge is more diverse and unique than fingerprints or DNA. Working a class of students to minimize misconceptions, learn how to apply material, to analyze and think critically does not happen through direct instruction. Video-based instruction is direct instruction.

(While there is some hope for creating intelligent tutoring systems that can adapt to learners better, the decades of work has found many, many challenges (not technological in nature), and this will not go away using videos.)

Peripheral comments: Many commenters have presented praise on repetition, but don’t forget: students have to be interested enough to rewatch, the students have to know that they don’t understand and they need to rewatch, and ultimately, if they didn’t understand it in the first place, it is very likely that they will not after they rewatch it. Happens all the time.

We’ve had the ability to do televideo courses for a long time. People hate them. They want to work with others, at the same pace, together. That’s human nature.

The gamification element of technology is pedagogically unwise (unless a student is already uninterested) since it teaches that learning produces tangible “rewards;” but most if not all existing systems of learning use extrinisic motivation in some form or another, so I’m not sure it’s a real dealbreaker. I can say that for every child who loves earning badges, there will be one who eventually loses interest and another who couldn’t care less.

Darrell Rudmann, Ph.D. in Educational Psychology, but not a hedge-fund manager or residing in Silicon Valley, so what do I know?

Comment on Big Foot Conspiracy by Lyle Zapato

Lyle Zapato — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 17:31:04 +0000

It’s true, math is delicious.