Bill Gates Enrolls His Kids In Khan Academy(money.cnn.com)
money.cnn.com
Bill Gates Enrolls His Kids In Khan Academy
http://money.cnn.com/2010/08/23/technology/sal_khan_academy.fortune/index.htm
26 comments
As a student at UCLA I can say that I have learned more from a handful of Khan's Calculus and Linear Algebra video tutorials than I have from several quarters worth of math courses at school.
Clearly there is controversy in this statement. Conservatives insist that receiving a "quality education" at the university level should cost $40k+ a hear. A man that shatters this notion by providing free videos superior to many university courses cannot do so without creating an uproar from the old-fashioned.
In any case, Khan has done a great service to this world. I hope this publicity will help his videos reach the corners of the world.
Clearly there is controversy in this statement. Conservatives insist that receiving a "quality education" at the university level should cost $40k+ a hear. A man that shatters this notion by providing free videos superior to many university courses cannot do so without creating an uproar from the old-fashioned.
In any case, Khan has done a great service to this world. I hope this publicity will help his videos reach the corners of the world.
I am a conservative/libertarian and dont think university level education should cost 40K per year. I have no idea where you got that from or why you injected politics into this. If anything the university establishment is overwhelmingly liberal and would be the one taking issue with this.
Let's not forget the fact that "conservative" is an actual word in the language and that it means "opposed to change". The change here would be not paying 40k for a university education, and arguing for preserving the status quo would by definition be a conservative position to adopt. I did not read anything political in your parent post, though I could be wrong, but in any case, why the knee-jerk reaction?
*I am not from the US and the word "conservative" does not carry political connotations for me.
*I am not from the US and the word "conservative" does not carry political connotations for me.
He said he went to UCLA (so I knew he was from the states or at least accustomed to the culture/lingo), he also used the word 'Conservatives' as a label for a group of people which given normal conversational English here in the states means he is referring to people who adopt a certain political position.
For the record, conservative is actually a pretty poor adjective for the US political movement that bears the name. While some old fuddy-duddy white dudes may hanker for the days of old and wish we could go back - most people my age are 'conservatives' because we are against the growth of government and its encroachment into our affairs. We dont want to conserve anything, we want to change it and make it better.
For the record, conservative is actually a pretty poor adjective for the US political movement that bears the name. While some old fuddy-duddy white dudes may hanker for the days of old and wish we could go back - most people my age are 'conservatives' because we are against the growth of government and its encroachment into our affairs. We dont want to conserve anything, we want to change it and make it better.
I think political labelling, especially in the US, is fundamentally broken. "Conservatism" isn't really about not changing things, while "Liberalism" in the US sense has only a little in common with its historical meaning (sometimes called "classical liberalism").
Meanwhile, "progressives" have somehow managed to capture a label which is pretty much an unalloyed good, even though many folks would think that the kind of "progress" which "progressives" want is not progress in the right direction.
It ought to be possible to reframe the debate, but unfortunately that would require people to fully and honestly comprehend the differences between various political ideologies, and very few people seem interested in understanding what their political opponents actually believe.
Meanwhile, "progressives" have somehow managed to capture a label which is pretty much an unalloyed good, even though many folks would think that the kind of "progress" which "progressives" want is not progress in the right direction.
It ought to be possible to reframe the debate, but unfortunately that would require people to fully and honestly comprehend the differences between various political ideologies, and very few people seem interested in understanding what their political opponents actually believe.
Ah, that's enlightening. Thanks for the clarification. Perhaps due to the cultural gap, I've always had the impression that conservatives (the political movement) in the US were actually conservative.
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Note the phrasing: "Khan has his skeptics in the education business." Emphasis on "business".
if a business can't be run profitably it means its potential customers don't value its product at a price that covers the cost of production + overhead.
don't confuse the shitty government collusion in the education industry with a free market in education.
don't confuse the shitty government collusion in the education industry with a free market in education.
If the Khan Academy was new to you too, it's a giant library of training videos produced by one clever guy, Sal Khan. Subjects range from algebra to chemistry, finance and lots more. Looks great.
http://khanacademy.org/
http://khanexercises.appspot.com/video/raising-money-for-a-s...
http://khanacademy.org/
http://khanexercises.appspot.com/video/raising-money-for-a-s...
It's great. I wish there was something like this on higher level subjects. The pace of learning when sitting in a lecture is depressingly low.
I agree completely - I tried a couple on subjects I didn't know much about and found them slow. But I think this is perhaps a more complex problem - even advanced lectures at university sometimes seemed so slow as to be boring, even when I found the overall topic quite difficult. Pacing needs to change during lecture according to the individual maybe? Only easy solution is 1:1 teaching I'd guess.
I think the 10 minute lectures are a big improvement already. You can skip things you already know and even if you watch them all the pace is quite a bit higher than university lectures.
One thing that would be absolutely fantastic is if there were physics lectures that don't only list the facts but explain how the famous physicist got there. For example in my quantum mechanics course they just put the Schrodinger equation on page 1 and then derive things from that, never even mentioning experiments. Surely that is not how Schrodinger did it. And frankly this way of teaching is not very convincing. You get the feeling you're just learning a bunch of stupid mathematical tricks.
This also applies to mathematical lectures. I'd love to see theorems demonstrated experimentally and explain how the mathematician that got the theorem invented it. For example if we prove that the number of primes less than n is roughly n/ln(n) it would be lovely to have that demonstrated by writing a computer program that counts the primes less than n (or do this as an exercise), or to have some heuristic reasoning as to why it's true. This shows that the theorem is really saying something about our universe, instead of having just a bunch of steps in a proof.
One thing that would be absolutely fantastic is if there were physics lectures that don't only list the facts but explain how the famous physicist got there. For example in my quantum mechanics course they just put the Schrodinger equation on page 1 and then derive things from that, never even mentioning experiments. Surely that is not how Schrodinger did it. And frankly this way of teaching is not very convincing. You get the feeling you're just learning a bunch of stupid mathematical tricks.
This also applies to mathematical lectures. I'd love to see theorems demonstrated experimentally and explain how the mathematician that got the theorem invented it. For example if we prove that the number of primes less than n is roughly n/ln(n) it would be lovely to have that demonstrated by writing a computer program that counts the primes less than n (or do this as an exercise), or to have some heuristic reasoning as to why it's true. This shows that the theorem is really saying something about our universe, instead of having just a bunch of steps in a proof.
This has to be the most disruptive startups around. The videos are always applauded, but I think not as many people know of the web applications Khan has built for some of his videos.
I urge everyone to watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRf6XiEZ_Y8
Khan lays out the future development goals for Khan Academy. There's software, peer-to-peer learning, and better allocation of teacher resources.
It makes me realize that the way education is taught right now has to be one of the most archaic traditions.
I urge everyone to watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRf6XiEZ_Y8
Khan lays out the future development goals for Khan Academy. There's software, peer-to-peer learning, and better allocation of teacher resources.
It makes me realize that the way education is taught right now has to be one of the most archaic traditions.
Sidenote - Khan Academy is hiring: http://sfbay.craigslist.org/pen/eng/1920729182.html
I hope this isn't too off-topic, but since this is the perfect mix of hackers + people interested in education...
Quizlet.com is the startup I'm working on and we're also hiring. We're a for-profit but strongly educationally focused web company trying to help improve the way people study online. Different than (complementary to) Khan Academy, but gaining traction with 1M+ registered users. Get in touch if your interested.
Quizlet.com is the startup I'm working on and we're also hiring. We're a for-profit but strongly educationally focused web company trying to help improve the way people study online. Different than (complementary to) Khan Academy, but gaining traction with 1M+ registered users. Get in touch if your interested.
Cool! I hope they can get a better way of drawing text on the videos. It gets a bit illegible in this one:
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/introduction-to-differentia...
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/introduction-to-differentia...
I think the real win would be to transform the video to html5: transcribe the text and drawings, add some basic "slideshow" like control of the text (syncing his narration to the text. The result should require much less cpu/bandwidth/storage. One could load up a new kindle with the entire contents and have one hell of a "magic textbook".
That is one of the older videos done with MS Paint. there are newer ones recorded in high definition with other software that I have never seen any legibility problems. I believe he intends to redo the older videos in high def with the newer software, but that has to be balanced against actually making new videos.
Redoing the videos could be done by someone else though -- the audio is normally pretty good.
Oh man I wish I lived in SF and I wish worked for them! As a mostly self-educated autodidact-hacker-math-type, I get their mission. They're one of the few websites out there for which I would drop everything to pour myself into fully. Unlike say the 5,000 hype-driven profit-driven web startups who are just copy-cloning the flavor-du-jour amongst each other, and who have no hope of any tenable business model. And they all mimic Apple or Facebook in saying "we're going to change the world", which is complete hyperbole as the true intention is for the business guys behind the curtain to extract profits.
Khan Academy will change the world!
Alas!
Khan Academy will change the world!
Alas!
It says "Telecommuting is ok." so you should apply!
Between the Khan academy and wikipedia, open source and a whole bunch of other things the internet has realized a lot of its potential.
That the rest is turning in to a giant billboard is a pity, but those few sites and the open source movement make it more than worth it.
They're some of the best things to come out of all this and for the most part they were completely unpredictable.
The Khan academy is the use case for youtube to put forward as to why they exist. There are many more, but hardly any on that level of dedication and quality of content.
Wikipedia does the same thing for text and has left 'old' encyclopedias in the dust.
Now we need something similar for scientific papers that develops real traction, so that those that use for instance the Khan academy have access to all the underlying materials.
That the rest is turning in to a giant billboard is a pity, but those few sites and the open source movement make it more than worth it.
They're some of the best things to come out of all this and for the most part they were completely unpredictable.
The Khan academy is the use case for youtube to put forward as to why they exist. There are many more, but hardly any on that level of dedication and quality of content.
Wikipedia does the same thing for text and has left 'old' encyclopedias in the dust.
Now we need something similar for scientific papers that develops real traction, so that those that use for instance the Khan academy have access to all the underlying materials.
arxiv.org may be turning into that for sci papers
anyone in science care to chime in?
anyone in science care to chime in?
For the less "sciency" science of Generative Linguistics, there is another arxiv.org-style repository at http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz.
People in this scientific community are quite aware of the advantages that these kind of open repositories bring to their disciplines.
People in this scientific community are quite aware of the advantages that these kind of open repositories bring to their disciplines.
Ivan Illich predicted exactly this sort of thing in his 1970 book Deschooling Society. He basically predicted an Internet-led revolution in learning.
Here is an interview with Khan done at Mixergy. Awesome guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQtXHp5wXLE&feature=chann...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQtXHp5wXLE&feature=chann...
I keep thinking he could use a better/smoother drawing method. A way to 2x the speed would be good for my attention span as well.
Edit: looks like newer videos have better rendering - http://www.khanacademy.org/video/linear-algebra---eigenvecto... versus http://khanexercises.appspot.com/video/raising-money-for-a-s...
Edit: looks like newer videos have better rendering - http://www.khanacademy.org/video/linear-algebra---eigenvecto... versus http://khanexercises.appspot.com/video/raising-money-for-a-s...
A way to multiply the speed by 1.4x or 2x would be amazing. I mean, without using a Flash video downloader and then viewing the downloaded videos in VLC at higher speed; that's too much trouble for something that should be nigh-effortless.
Flowplayer can play at double speed. It can also play YouTube videos, so it should be a pretty easy hack.
I had not heard of Khan Academy before today. I'm impressed by the breadth of his knowledge. He's a math expert so I understand that, but being able to lecture on a high school level on all the other topics on the site is pretty amazing.
I checked out one of the videos on the Napoleonic wars. It's a subject I have interest in and have read about, but there's no way I could give a lecture on it. Khan gave a very nicely prepared lecture with plenty of details.
I checked out one of the videos on the Napoleonic wars. It's a subject I have interest in and have read about, but there's no way I could give a lecture on it. Khan gave a very nicely prepared lecture with plenty of details.
Would you call his college level courses (high school in some countries) high school level lectures? He doesn't really skip rigour compared to any other college math course at that level.
I'd call most of the math lectures, except the later calculus and differential equations and linear algebra lectures high school (or lower) level. For college level you'd expect a more rigorous treatment of limits and integrals for example. The videos do seem excellent as an intuitive explanation.
I truly believe that stuff like Khan Academy is a part of the real future of education.
If you listen to Sal's talks or read some tesimonials, you will find it is a very real part of education already. I hope the work of Khan Academy keeps growing organically on its own merit and is not institutionalised in anyway.
I have not done either of those. I did watch a couple of his math videos on the site. It just so happens that we are teaching our son math this year. What great timing for this post. The videos were very good. I had my son watch the the "Division 1" video for a bit and he was tracking with it very well. Kudos to Khan Academy.
Ivan Illich, in his writings on Deschooling Society, would have been immensely proud - especially once this gets truly p2p. Being able to get an education, without being institutionalised, on demand not force-fed - what a beautiful counterpoint this will become to traditional education. If kids went home to this and every morning/evening did some collaborative community service of some sort - so that they learn to socialise - how much better off society could be!
I hope that it will be widely accepted, or at least deeply incorporated. Also certificates from khan academy, from some day, would be very nice.
Gates should donate to khan, even if its a few thousand.
I see a much larger donation coming the way of Khan Academy. Gates is in a philanthropic spree and if his recent remark is any indication, he has big hopes from education delivered through web.
http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/06/bill-gates-education/
In all, it’s a well-deserved feat for Khan Academy.
http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/06/bill-gates-education/
In all, it’s a well-deserved feat for Khan Academy.
A MacArthur award should be headed his way.
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IMO, of the various videos & podcasts of his I've found, this is the most thought-provoking & in-depth:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1C7FH7El35w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1C7FH7El35w
One downside. The wealthy (like the Gate's) will have a harder time signalling their wealth if their children don't matriculate in a prestigious academy/school. Will Gates refuse the high priced tuition at Harvard in favor of a free internet school?
Or more likely, he'll simply augment his children's already (probably) incredible education with some online lectures.
I don't think Harvard et al are in any danger yet. Too much vested in the current status quo. Again back to the social signals, a cocktail party, were did you go to school, etc. Unless you are uber-rich, this is important.
Or more likely, he'll simply augment his children's already (probably) incredible education with some online lectures.
I don't think Harvard et al are in any danger yet. Too much vested in the current status quo. Again back to the social signals, a cocktail party, were did you go to school, etc. Unless you are uber-rich, this is important.
Gates is ueber-rich.
John Udell ran a very interesting interview with Salman Khan: http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail4386.html
The interview with Udell theorizes a bit on why Khan's approach works. Key bits: he approaches subjects conversationally; he doesn't appear in the videos, which reduces distraction; most of his video segments last 10 minutes, which is at about the point where attention gives out; the technology lets people pause the lessons to look words up, something you can't do in a classroom.
I have a few pet links I always post when this sort of radical refactoring of education is discussed. Khan is doing via the net something a lot like a 'tracks and clusters' concept David Gelernter pushed in the 2009 Edge essays:
http://edge.org/q2009/q09_9.html#gelernter
Roger Schank's ideas about just-in-time, story-centric curricula may also be interesting:
http://www.edge.org/q2009/q09_print.html#schank
http://edge.org/q2009/q09_9.html#gelernter
Roger Schank's ideas about just-in-time, story-centric curricula may also be interesting:
http://www.edge.org/q2009/q09_print.html#schank
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Hopefully, Khan, and the people he inspires, can work towards a solution to the larger problem in making education accessible to everyone: while the resources for education are readily available to anyone who can get to a public library, the culture of the least educated people often prohibits self-improvement.
I don't mean this to be a prejudiced statement, I understand there are prejudices and nuances, but I live in a very blue collar neighborhood, and I hang out in the library and interact with the middle school and high school students here. The percentage of people in my town who would feel comfortable admitting an interest in watching a Khan Academy video is very low.
I don't mean this to be a prejudiced statement, I understand there are prejudices and nuances, but I live in a very blue collar neighborhood, and I hang out in the library and interact with the middle school and high school students here. The percentage of people in my town who would feel comfortable admitting an interest in watching a Khan Academy video is very low.
I love watching the videos on that site, but I find a month later it's like I never saw the video. I'll revert back to not knowing how the immune system works for example. Any memory/learning tips for that?
If you're watching it passively like it was a sitcom on television or something you're not going to have very good recall.
If you want to remember more try taking notes, quizzing yourself, reading up on related areas, applying what you learned to your daily life, etc.
If you want to remember more try taking notes, quizzing yourself, reading up on related areas, applying what you learned to your daily life, etc.
You lose what you don't use. This is normal.
To be specific: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forgetting_curve
Spaced repetition. Review the material right when you're about to forget.
The first step is to take notes.
The next thing is to apply it. If you don't apply it, don't sweat it; you've only lost the time you spent watching the video.
The next thing is to apply it. If you don't apply it, don't sweat it; you've only lost the time you spent watching the video.
I am so giddy excited for this. I'm going to do this every night for half an hour until I reclaim math as a subject I understand.
I think this guy deserves some kind of posthumous Nobel prize if he really keeps this up, as he states he intends to, "until he dies" (ok, we don't have to wait until he dies).
Cliched line but true ... : things like this restore my faith in humanity.
Cliched line but true ... : things like this restore my faith in humanity.
That won't be happening. The Nobel Prize cannot be given to a dead person. It's in the rules.
Khan Academy is awesome and I hope more people take notice of what he is doing.
I am now reading The Fourth Paraidgm in which Mark Abbott talks about "A new path for science?" where he says discoveries and teaching will happen at the "edges." I think Khan Academy is a good example.
Had a bit of time to kill. So quickly put together a quick re-design. Would love to get thoughts. http://screencast.com/t/MWMyNzRi
OK this may get me a few downmods but I just have to say it.Before you click that down arrow, hear me out please.
There is no denying that what Mr. Khan is doing is fantastic. But it would be wrong to de-emphasis the value that a community of learners adds to your education, like a university or a college. I am not a conservative (I not exactly old enough to be a conservative), but I see the point in the university model. First of all, I am not for the high fees and the bureaucracy, nor am I for the heavy course work with no explorations and grades for minimal work. I cannot loath them enough. But why do you want to take away the community that a place like the university would generate?
You do not want to be a lone wolf just watching a few tutorial videos and call it an education. We all know we learn more from each other than from anyone of the faculty members. (Here I am talking about students who really want to learn, not the one's who just want the elite degree. Thought the number is less, but it may increase if we work on making the system reward excellence rather than exam papers).
Also you may be able establish a lab for UG studies of software engineering or electronics (upto a certain extent), but subjects like mechanical engineering and Instrumentation & Control require quite expensive labs. Not feasible for an individual to buy.
Why not pool many student's money and buy those. We would need a common place to meet, so lets buy some buildings. Hey we would definitely need recreation and food, so lets make a recreational centre and a canteen. All this can be managed by students, but if not lets hire some MBA's to manage all this. WALA you have a ditto university but without bureaucracy.
There is no denying that what Mr. Khan is doing is fantastic. But it would be wrong to de-emphasis the value that a community of learners adds to your education, like a university or a college. I am not a conservative (I not exactly old enough to be a conservative), but I see the point in the university model. First of all, I am not for the high fees and the bureaucracy, nor am I for the heavy course work with no explorations and grades for minimal work. I cannot loath them enough. But why do you want to take away the community that a place like the university would generate?
You do not want to be a lone wolf just watching a few tutorial videos and call it an education. We all know we learn more from each other than from anyone of the faculty members. (Here I am talking about students who really want to learn, not the one's who just want the elite degree. Thought the number is less, but it may increase if we work on making the system reward excellence rather than exam papers).
Also you may be able establish a lab for UG studies of software engineering or electronics (upto a certain extent), but subjects like mechanical engineering and Instrumentation & Control require quite expensive labs. Not feasible for an individual to buy.
Why not pool many student's money and buy those. We would need a common place to meet, so lets buy some buildings. Hey we would definitely need recreation and food, so lets make a recreational centre and a canteen. All this can be managed by students, but if not lets hire some MBA's to manage all this. WALA you have a ditto university but without bureaucracy.
And again, the community of learners can be better found in for quite a few on the internet, (especially tech fields) than a random sampling of a university classroom. Plus stuff like tech can be very solitary for large periods of time.
I am not concerned about the tutorial sessions, but heck my main concern is labs. How can you have a Bridge construction or fluid dynamics lab at our home?
I'm not sure why one would choose lectures narrated by a single guy without expertise in any of the topics over real lectures given by world-class faculty and researchers.
Berkeley, MIT, Yale and other top universities in the past decade have made hundreds of courses available in audio and video form. I've been hooked on Berkeley courses for a few years now, actually wishing sometimes that my commute were longer.
Berkeley, MIT, Yale and other top universities in the past decade have made hundreds of courses available in audio and video form. I've been hooked on Berkeley courses for a few years now, actually wishing sometimes that my commute were longer.
Khan is an Electrical Engineer from MIT with an MBA from Harvard. His ability to teach far outperforms the majority of university professors.
Try watching some of his videos.
Try watching some of his videos.
I won't argue that the guy is a very talented and eloquent speaker. My point is different: he may be very erudite, but the depth of his knowledge in any of the subjects he's teaching (except maybe some subjects in EE and finance) is not going to compare with that of professors in the respective fields. Certainly, the fact that he's addressing these subjects at high-school level, does a lot to level the field for him.
By the way, I'm not sure how listing his credentials is supportive of your claim that "his ability to teach far outperforms the majority of university professors."
Finally, it's not the anonymous 'majority of university professors' that I'm comparing him to, but the top people in their fields at the top American universities. Those people must excel both in research and teaching, otherwise they simply don't make it there.
By the way, I'm not sure how listing his credentials is supportive of your claim that "his ability to teach far outperforms the majority of university professors."
Finally, it's not the anonymous 'majority of university professors' that I'm comparing him to, but the top people in their fields at the top American universities. Those people must excel both in research and teaching, otherwise they simply don't make it there.
I have degrees from MIT and UC Berkeley. I can attest from experience that at such institutions, while there are indeed some professors who excel in both research and teaching, the vast majority are there because of the quality of their research with teaching a secondary concern.
Also, I think having a huge depth of knowledge is really not that important when teaching introductory topics (as long as you don't get anything wrong!). Having tutored students for many years, I'm quite certain that the biggest impediment to learning such topics is motivation, which is addressed more by a teacher's enthusiasm and speaking ability than the depth of their knowledge.
Also, I think having a huge depth of knowledge is really not that important when teaching introductory topics (as long as you don't get anything wrong!). Having tutored students for many years, I'm quite certain that the biggest impediment to learning such topics is motivation, which is addressed more by a teacher's enthusiasm and speaking ability than the depth of their knowledge.
think having a huge depth of knowledge is really not that important when teaching introductory topics
Absolutely, and as I said, that levels out the playing field for him a lot. Partially I was misled by the enthusiasm of the HN users here for the lectures; I didn't expect the crowd here to be so excited about high-school material.
Absolutely, and as I said, that levels out the playing field for him a lot. Partially I was misled by the enthusiasm of the HN users here for the lectures; I didn't expect the crowd here to be so excited about high-school material.
He teaches a good chunk of first and second year math college courses. Especially the more popular ones applicable to a broad number of majors.
OK, I really need a reality check here. First, let me make it clear - on every reddit discussion about math and about Khan Academy that's I've been involved in, I heartily recommend it. I think what he's doing makes him one of the education heroes of the 21st century, and I'm a public school math teacher! But..."eloquent speaker"??? Khan drives me UP THE GODDAM WALL with his palsy-mousing and repetition while he's thinking on-the-fly. I mean, what amazes me about him is he's able to just sit down and do these videos without any script beforehand, which you can tell because he just starts making up examples while he's explaining things!!! But as a teacher - and professional speaker - and former theatre major - he makes me crazy. EVERY video I've seen goes like this:
"OK, we're going to cover (insert topic here). Now suppose we want to solve 2X=5, that's, uh, 2x, uh twoooo, (wiggles stylus, then writes 2), uh X (wiggles stylus, then writes X, eeeeequals, (wiggles stylus, then writes the equals sign), equals (wiggles stylus, writes 5) five..." Ad nauseum.
I have heard literally NO ONE mention this in any discussion about Khan Academy. Why? I haven't hallucinated this behavior - it's on EVERY video, because, well, it's his STYLE. And I've never seen this behavior at a blackboard by any instructor, no matter how crummy they were (and, whoo, have I seen some crummy ones!).
Please, someone tell me that I've fallen into some universe where I've become the character Monk, and I'm the only one who's bothered by Khan's presentation!
"OK, we're going to cover (insert topic here). Now suppose we want to solve 2X=5, that's, uh, 2x, uh twoooo, (wiggles stylus, then writes 2), uh X (wiggles stylus, then writes X, eeeeequals, (wiggles stylus, then writes the equals sign), equals (wiggles stylus, writes 5) five..." Ad nauseum.
I have heard literally NO ONE mention this in any discussion about Khan Academy. Why? I haven't hallucinated this behavior - it's on EVERY video, because, well, it's his STYLE. And I've never seen this behavior at a blackboard by any instructor, no matter how crummy they were (and, whoo, have I seen some crummy ones!).
Please, someone tell me that I've fallen into some universe where I've become the character Monk, and I'm the only one who's bothered by Khan's presentation!
His lessons aren't Teaching Company level, and he could definitely benefit from doing multiple takes and splicing them together. Still his style works for me, and I'd happily trade in any math teacher I ever had for Khan.
It's an unfortunate fact of teaching that certain styles just don't work for specific personalities. One person's harmless eccentricity is another's grating lesson-derailer. There are going to be some people you can't do much to help, no matter how good you are, or how attentive the student is. And it's not anyone's fault.
It's an unfortunate fact of teaching that certain styles just don't work for specific personalities. One person's harmless eccentricity is another's grating lesson-derailer. There are going to be some people you can't do much to help, no matter how good you are, or how attentive the student is. And it's not anyone's fault.
You've fallen into some universe where you've become the character Monk, and you're the only one who's bothered by Khan's presentation!
I upvoted you because I got the humor. Seriously, at this point I am completely willing to accept this is just me, because I have heard no one complain about this but me!
I've just tried to watch one video -- Carnot cycle.
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/carnot-cycle-and-carnot-eng...
I've read the first book of the Feynman lectures during the last six months, only for fun, to compare the insights of Feynman with the education I've received during my school time, twenty years ago.
In that lecture Khan was ALMOST right, but I think it's not good. He mentions in one moment "the energy given to the system was the higher potential energy of the rocks" which is wrong. There's no the same amount of rocks, so the energy of the remaining (less) rocks is the same as the energy of more rocks before in the process he described.
Feynman's approach to actually understand that the energy transferred was to "speed up" the movement of the gas molecules is right, this is not.
He also "derives" the formula with delta U = Q - ... where he should have just written Q = ... because that was what was intentionally done.
So I'm not satisfied, I believe Khan was able to deliver much better lecture had he first prepared himself a little more. Maybe using some simpler book as the start but using Feynman for the insight to be able to explain what's really going on.
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/carnot-cycle-and-carnot-eng...
I've read the first book of the Feynman lectures during the last six months, only for fun, to compare the insights of Feynman with the education I've received during my school time, twenty years ago.
In that lecture Khan was ALMOST right, but I think it's not good. He mentions in one moment "the energy given to the system was the higher potential energy of the rocks" which is wrong. There's no the same amount of rocks, so the energy of the remaining (less) rocks is the same as the energy of more rocks before in the process he described.
Feynman's approach to actually understand that the energy transferred was to "speed up" the movement of the gas molecules is right, this is not.
He also "derives" the formula with delta U = Q - ... where he should have just written Q = ... because that was what was intentionally done.
So I'm not satisfied, I believe Khan was able to deliver much better lecture had he first prepared himself a little more. Maybe using some simpler book as the start but using Feynman for the insight to be able to explain what's really going on.
email him, if you really want to help him improve it
I suppose part of it is that they target a very different audience. He addresses subjects at high-school level: something that any reasonably educated person should be competent enough to do.
Most professors at those institutions care very little about the teaching part of their job. The incentives they face make it that way.
Do you know this from personal experience or is it just one of those things that "everyone knows"?
My experience of both real-life lectures and podcasted ones suggests otherwise.
My experience of both real-life lectures and podcasted ones suggests otherwise.
Podcasted lectures probably show an enormous selection bias, in that professors who don't care about teaching probably have no desire to make their lectures available to a wider audience. That aside I will concur that "professors don't like to teach" is probably much more anecdotal than evidence backed.
You also have to be pretty confident about your teaching ability to put that stuff up on the internet for everyone to see. I'd like to put some of my lectures online in a year or two, but currently they don't meet the Khan standard.
Regarding research professors, the chair of the department I was a graduate student at once said that your teaching can only hurt your career; it can never help it.
Regarding research professors, the chair of the department I was a graduate student at once said that your teaching can only hurt your career; it can never help it.
Personal experience and the experience of colleagues. I spent 11 years in the undergraduate/graduate system both learning and teaching. It's also something you can learn if you ever have to look for work in academia. It's very rare that anyone cares about your teaching credentials. Typically undergraduate education is at the bottom of a professor's concerns. First is research/publications/funding. Next are graduate students and their research. Undergraduate teaching is an 'in the time left' activity.
Professors have four jobs: fundraiser, researcher, teacher and tester. They're evaluated in that priority in most universities. They have a few assistants for their various jobs, but it's mainly on their shoulders. A university professor's job should really be separated into four separate jobs, and universities can provide much better services in each area. A teacher who can just concentrating the best of teaching, a marker who can provide flexible final examination services so people can take their finals on their schedules, a fundraiser who's actually focusing on fundraising and not being miserable doing it, and a researcher who actually just researches and is not hired by a corporation.
I think it may be unfair to say that they don't care, but certainly the incentives weigh against spending their efforts on teaching (against, say, writing a paper or yet another grant application).
To the best of my knowledge, teaching professors take course evaluations very seriously. If grants and papers is all you care about, then you take a different track (scientist vs professor).
You are misinformed. At the vast majority of college/university-level schools, the faculty incentives run strongly toward research and weakly (or not at all) towards teaching. It is definitely not the case that the grants-and-papers types gravitate to "scientist" positions in preference to "professor" positions.
Put another way, if you are someone who is primarily interested in teaching at the college/university level, and are not as interested in research ("grants and papers"), there are very, very, very few stable employment opportunities for you.
Put another way, if you are someone who is primarily interested in teaching at the college/university level, and are not as interested in research ("grants and papers"), there are very, very, very few stable employment opportunities for you.
A lot of community colleges consist of just teachers, being disconnected from the need to do research. All they do is teach, and often just have a masters. I've usually also found they are significantly better at teaching their subjects than universities, especially in mathematics.
Ah---this is true. However, most community colleges do not have computer science programs, and many that do have it as a one-class-per-term appendage off another department (usually math). But for people in other fields, community college[1] does indeed often pose an opportunity for "just teaching" at the post-secondary level.
[1] which non-US readers might call simply "college"---a typically two-year program, post-secondary, often with a large number of vocational programs but usually also teaching a general education curriculum that might enable one to transfer into the second or third year of university.
[1] which non-US readers might call simply "college"---a typically two-year program, post-secondary, often with a large number of vocational programs but usually also teaching a general education curriculum that might enable one to transfer into the second or third year of university.
Since learning is my greatest love, school has always been my greatest enemy. I've been enamored with the Khan Academy from about the first 30 seconds of the first video I watched.
I've come across a few references to the idea that the biggest factor in education is the skill of the teacher, and that there is no way of guessing which teachers will be better than others. Apparently, there is no correlation between teaching ability and experience or education level. The Khan Academy model lets us leverage the impact of the greatest teachers and make excellent education available to anyone who wants it.
[edit: typo]