Education Sector ran a 2-day chat about the expansion of “school choice” to public support of computer based individualized K12 student learning choices in and out of schools. The experts in the chat think this expansion will dominate public schools by 2020 and infer that it’s possible, but not available now by educators’ choices.
The case for the expansion of choice seems to be that public schools unnecessarily ration learning. Without saying it in so many words, experts and questioners appear to acknowledge that rationing.
Readers submitted questions. ES personnel moderated these submissions. Experts responded. The latter represented various commercial and nongovernmental agencies plus one public school (High Tech High School) person.
These ideas in the discussion impressed me most:
Some computer platforms in schools support flexible, individualized learning plans.
A few commercial vendors of “education” software platforms will dominate sales to public schools.
Public schools will likely continue to lag behind “cutting edge” learning venues in and out of schools.
Students “dumb down” in schools from ways they learn with advanced electronic communication devices in order to accommodate public school teachers.
The role of “teacher” will make “obvious” changes away from instructional gatekeeper to information and skills to that of coach, etc.
Independent education software developers will continue to distribute their programs to individual and other venues until a large software vendor buys their product(s).
The Q&As in this chat mostly overlapped with conversations about NESI(New Era School Initiative), descriptions and reasons for the emergence of a mass market of independent learners, and uses of intelligent software platforms to support flexible learning processes and content.
Kudos and thanks, Education Sector, for a timely, informative chat about a critical issue in education.
Education Sector Online Discussion: School Choice a la Carte, October 7, 2009 – October 8, 2009
For more links on this topic, click on Keywords New Era School Initiative and Learning Efficiency on this The Tablet PC Education Blog