Why should we focus on personalized learning? Over the last two years personalized learning has become a common topic of discussion the subject of thousands of technical publications, inspired numerous books and been discussed in global forums. Why this approach to school transformation? How is this related to the accountablity movement in education?
David Hopkins in Every School a Great School states the need for personalization as:
"It is moral purpose that drives personaliztion. We see it most vividly in the concern of the committed, conscientious teacher to match what is taught and how it is taught to the individual learner as a person. That is not just a question of 'sufficient challenge" of aligning pedagogy to the point of progression that each learner has reached, even though that is vitally important. It is also part of the teacher's concern to touch the hearts as well as the minds, to nourish a hunger for learning and help equip the learner with a proficiency and confidence to pursue understanding themselves. The concrete expression of the phrase 'every child is special' and the creation of an education system which treats them so, is what personalized learning is all about."
The challenges for learners and educators are tremendous and personalized learning should address these key challenges with simple, scalable solutions.
Educator's Time - Educators are under extreme time stress with ever increasing demands. They care deeply about students and want to meet each student's unique needs, but are forced to use "one-size-fits-all" instruction
Student Drop Out Rate - Often students feel the instruction they receive is irrelevant, boring, or that it has nothing to do with what they want to learn. This is resulting in unacceptable dropout rates from the progressive loss of engagement.
Policy Makers are frustrated by the decade of investment in technology with undefined results and given the extreme shortage of educators, current economic pressures, are looking for the way to provide quality instruction at scale. Often they do not have accurate measures of meaningful student performance or viable options to improve the learning experience.
How Can Personalized Learning Help?
Time for Personal Attention -Educators who take advantage personal learner devices and use formative assessment tools to personalize the learning experience will have the ability to automate routine tasks to focus on student mentoring to better meet each student's unique needs
Personal Tools - Students will use their personal digital tools to learn at their chosen time & place. This personal experience will inspire them to achieve their aspirations and provide personal feedback for progressive achievement, producing a highly motivated, self-directed learner
Reliable Insight for Decisions - Policy Makers will gain insight from the data driven personal learning tools that provide direct, timely, actionable measures of individual student outcomes. These tools will also provide evidence of the learning value realized from their investment in technology. The shortage of educators will be moderated by simple effective personalized learning tools that provide more time for educators to focus on learners