I wish the world would read my posts on standards-based grading, which allows my students to show growth and mastery in physics: http://bit.ly/SBGposts
One of my pseudoteaching posts talks about how forward thinking universities like MIT (your alma mater) are switching from lecture-based physics to a more interactive model like Modeling. The research on Modeling is there, please don't ignore it: http://modeling.asu.edu/modeling/Mod_Instr-effective.htm
More research --> The 3 key principles from "How Students Learn: History, Mathematics, and Science in the Classroom" are:
#1. Engaging Prior Understandings - "If students’ preconceptions are not addressed directly, they often memorize content (e.g., formulas in physics), yet still use their experience-based preconceptions to act in the world.
#2. The Essential Role of Factual Knowledge and Conceptual Frameworks in Understanding - "What novices see as separate pieces of information, experts see as organized sets of ideas."
#3. The Importance of Self-Monitoring - "Appropriate kinds of self-monitoring and reflection have been demonstrated to support learning with understanding in a variety of areas. In one study,15 for example, students who were directed to engage in self-explanation as they solved mathematics problems developed deeper conceptual understanding than did students who solved those same problems but did not engage in self-explanation."
Modeling Physics does all 3. Your videos are 0 for 3. Badges do not count as "self-monitoring" in any meaningful sense.
You also have no hard data (as of yet) as to the effectiveness of your videos. Just anecdotal comments from students. You have no controlled studies. In fact, controlled studies show that video lectures are rather ineffective. See Derek Muller's video abstract and research: http://bit.ly/KhanEffectiveness
I'm not trying to be mean. I think your videos can be a resource for some teachers/students. But using video as the primary method for content delivery is ineffective.
We should not have to "flip" lectures and HW in order for students to be more interactive in class. When inquiry is done right, the interaction is already built in.
I'll stop there, before this gets too long.
Thanks for your time,
Frank Noschese (aka torque2)
According to Dan, today’s math curriculum is teaching students to expect (and excel at) paint-by-numbers classwork, robbing kids of a skill more important than solving problems: formulating them. How does Khan Academy foster problem posing and creativity?
If your philosophy of education is sit-and-get, i.e., teaching is telling and learning is listening, then Khan Academy (and flipping) are more efficient than in-classroom lecturing.
But why lecture at all? TRUE progressive educators, TRUE education visionaries and revolutionaries don’t want to do these things better. We want to DO BETTER THINGS.
Rather than instructing students with Khan’s videos, teachers should be inspiring them to figure things out on their own and learn how to create their own knowledge by working together. For example, instead of relying on lectures and textbooks, Modeling Instruction in Physics emphasizes active student construction of conceptual and mathematical models in an interactive learning community. Students are engaged with simple scenarios to learn to model the physical world. In comparison to traditional instruction, Modeling is extremely effective — under expert modeling instruction high school students average more than two standard deviations higher on a standard instrument for assessing conceptual understanding of physics.
Watch one Modeling class in action: http://bit.ly/ModelingPhysics . In the clip, the teacher says, “I don’t lecture at all. Instead, I create experiences for the students either in the lab or puzzles and problems for them to solve and it’s up to them to try to figure that out.” I’ve often wondered why this type of teaching hasn’t gotten more attention in the media. Maybe because the teacher is using simple things like whiteboards and bowling balls rather than shiny iPads and SmartBoards?
While Khan argues that his videos now eliminate "one-size-fits-all" education, his videos are exactly that. I tried finding Khan Academy videos for my students to use as references for studying, or to use as a tutorial when there’s a substitute teacher, but the physics ones aren't very good. They don’t use a lot of the multiple representations that are so fundamental to learning. Concept development is minimal, and he unknowingly plays into student misconceptions. His videos do not align with proper Physics Education Research. Teachers improve via reading up on pedagogy and getting feedback from mentors & students. Where is Sal's feedback? Where's the pedagogy?
The research that Khan chooses to ignore is summarized in this one book, now available as a free PDF: "How Students Learn: History, Mathematics, and Science in the Classroom" http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=10126