Personalized Learning
My deepest apologies to any regular Edu-Blog readers that I have not been writing frequently enough to call this a “daily blog.” I mentioned in earlier blogs that it might evolve into an “every other day blog” but it seems like it could be a weekly blog. Bottom line: It’s been busy.
Well, I’m back talking about PERSONALIZED LEARNING. The BC Education Plan, as proposed by the Ministry of Education, is the newest educational initiative from the Provincial government. There are several components of the BC Education Plan to address 21st Century Learning. Personalized learning is one area that resonates with me as an advocate for Assessment for Learning (AFL).
What is personalized learning? Some may tease apart the notions of individualized learning, differentiated instruction, and personalized learning. Others may use the terms interchangeably. The ultimate challenge is trying to figure out what was intended by the policy when it was created in order to implement it appropriately. Interpretations will vary from school to school, from district to district, or from town to city. If policy is too difficult to translate or implement, it is often ignored.
Over lattes, a friend and colleague of mine were chatting about education, policy, and teaching practices. The conversation led to a wonderful story she shared with me about a recent teaching experience. To glean over what she had told me… although she a an experienced teacher, she was new to the school and assigned to teach a course new to her in her subject specialty. The class was exceptional, meaning “challenging,” and she was beginning to realize that her students were starting to disengage and under perform. This is a cross-roads for any teacher. One could PLOW through and cover the learning outcomes as intended. Or, one could INQUIRE to ask the students what’s happening and how it could be better. The latter approach screams AFL.
My friend chose to latter route. She asked for feedback from her students and listened. As a result, she catered the course to her students’ requests. A course that could have been assignment/test driven transformed into a course that was project/presentation driven. Students were more engaged and found the course personally relevant. I apologize for skimming through the story, but only my friend and her students know the details of the story. What I gathered from her story was that she took risks, was willing to change, and took the students’ strengths and interests into consideration so that her students can be successful. I asked her to “journal” this story. It’s inspirational.
What she did, in my mind, was personalized learning. She didn’t put her students on computers to learn the subject area independently from others. She didn’t ask the student to self-direct their learning into 30 different directions or at 30 different rates. She didn’t force the students to learn the content in one way or the highway to regurgitate the content on a written response test. She used her content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge to formulate a learning situation that engaged and motivated her students to achieve. Now that’s personalized learning. There is no need to be modest or shy. Share your story and pedagogical learning experiences. This is teaching.