Lying about Personalized Learning at iterating toward openness

Description Click to Edit

Champions of personalized instruction tend to fall back on the assumption that one-on-one tutoring is the most effective instructional approach but is not scalable (implicit in Bloom’s two sigma problem), and since “we all know” that group instruction is poor, we’ve no choice but to personalize using an automated computer system as our best and most effective path forward.

Now, if you’ve ever taught, you know that many students love to talk. It seems that they live to ask questions, argue, and endlessly discuss. Now, I ask you: How can removing all possibility of engaging in their favorite approach to learning (by making the computer the only entity with whom they can interact) be said to be personalization for them?

If we’re going to talk about “personalization,” options rich with human interaction must be part of the palette. Otherwise, we should call it what it is - a power grab by administrators forcing learners into a learning environment they do not prefer for the sake of increased efficiency.

Champions of personalized instruction tend to fall back on the assumption that one-on-one tutoring is the most effective instructional approach but is not scalable (implicit in Bloom’s two sigma problem), and since “we all know” that group instruction is poor, we’ve no choice but to personalize using an automated computer system as our best and most effective path forward.

Now, if you’ve ever taught, you know that many students love to talk. It seems that they live to ask questions, argue, and endlessly discuss. Now, I ask you: How can removing all possibility of engaging in their favorite approach to learning (by making the computer the only entity with whom they can interact) be said to be personalization for them?

If we’re going to talk about “personalization,” options rich with human interaction must be part of the palette. Otherwise, we should call it what it is - a power grab by administrators forcing learners into a learning environment they do not prefer for the sake of increased efficiency.

Original URL Click to Edit

http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/655

http://opencontent.org/blog/archives/655