Sunday, December 5, 2010

Individualized online instruction

Clayton M. Christensen has written some very interesting books on how innovation works in business: The Innovators Dilemma and The Innovator's Solution.

More recently he applied his theories of how innovation takes hold and takes over (or doesn't) to education in Disrupting Class / How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns. Once again, a very interesting book. Without recapping the entire argument, let me just give the bottom line: online learning will change everything, but it won't happen by schools applying online learning to their core subjects, math, reading, language arts, science and social studies. It will begin with online remedial learning, online learning purchased by parents of struggling students, online courses on subjects that are not offered locally, online learning for home schoolers and online learning for preschoolers.

What do we know about the value of individualized instruction? Does having a personal tutor result in significantly higher student achievement than learning in a typical classroom? And, if personal tutors do help students to significantly higher achievement, why?

Suggested answers to "why" include

1. Students can learn at their own rate
2. Instruction can be tailored to the student's learning style
3. Instruction content can better match student interests

Is it true that individualized instruction is superior to classroom instruction for the above three reasons? Is small group instruction (3 - 5 collaborating students) even better than individualized instruction?

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Keywords: online learning