This weekend the New York Times began a series on digital learning: Grading the Digital School, The High-Tech Gamble. The series will look at “the intersection of education, technology and business as schools embrace digital learning.”
Digital learning can have many faces: an online course where all learning takes place within an online module, one that may even have a moderator or teacher at the other end to answer questions and help guide students along (I’m thinking here of the CTY or EPGY programs). Another on-line learning option might be something that supplements the classroom, like the Khan Academy, created to support students who might need additional instruction or who perhaps didn’t quite get the concept the way it was taught in class the first time. Digital learning can also be a category for programs like Descartes Cove (offered by JHU) – basically a game-based learning module without an online component but where students advance along by answering math questions correctly.
High ability students, their parents and teachers probably have the most experience with digital learning programs by virtue of having to seek out more advanced levels of materials to meet the needs of the learner in or outside of the classroom. We have had good and bad experiences with digital learning. The most rigorous programs require a good bit of adult monitoring and check-ins along with a highly motivated student. The least rigorous programs are game based and provide only marginal advancement in knowledge (and here I am thinking of programs like SuccessMaker where students can “game the system” by discovering patterns in the program without actually learning the underlying math. Several parents with math degrees (not me) at our school discovered that, although their children were scoring several grade levels above their current grade in math, when asked the same math questions outside of the program they didn’t have clue as to how to begin to solve them. I expect this will also be part of the focus of the NYT series).
What online or digital learning resources have you found to be successful? Engaging? Do your schools encourage or discourage online learning for high ability students?
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