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Learning from those who jumped first
Who would know more about using blended learning in the classroom than the educators who are doing this work?
 A new book by Liz Arney, director of innovative learning at Aspire Public Schools, offers guidance and practical tips on how to use computers to enhance lessons. The book, Go Blended!, A Handbook for Blending Technology in Schools, is based on hands-on work by Arney and others who use blended learning in their schools. Nearly a third of schools in the Aspire charter school system -- which spans 38 schools in California and Tennessee -- use blended learning today. It started small. The first pilot was in 2011, in an Aspire school in Oakland, Calif.
I talked to Arney on the phone Friday. Here are a few edited snippets from our conversation.
What did you learn from your work?
There is a whole chapter on lessons learned. When we first piloted blended learning it was really just to pilot it. I think that was a mistake – it was blended learning for blended learning’s sake. We quickly realized that we really needed to do was hire technology to serve a teaching problem.
If you had a crystal ball what would you say is next?
I see a lot more than I saw three years ago, that’s becoming normalized, and I am excited about that. So much of it is just getting technology use stabilized in a school. All the sudden then the magic can happen. In terms of what it’s going to look like, I feel like anything, two years from now. I feel like it’s going to so exceed my imagination. If you had asked me three years ago if one-third of Aspire schools were using blended, I would have said: “What are you talking about? We haven’t even figured things out yet.” I don’t think we’ve figured out everything. I think we all need to get focused on instruction. If people are talking about the tech too much that’s not good – not that I don’t want them to understand the tech. I just don’t want them to get seduced by it. I feel like the bright and shiny always worries me.
Why does that worry you?
Well, I think it breaks your heart. It seems bright and shiny until you get into it. Then there is a bit of heartbreak. I always worry that people think they can outsource the problems to tech. Then you don’t have to think about it anymore. You have to hire tech to solve a problem, but you don’t give tech your problems. These problems -- the achievement gap problems, and how to get kids college ready -- that’s a really big problem and we can’t give those away.
What questions do you have? What stories would you like to read? Drop me a note: dobo@hechingerreport.org. And to fill out your reading list, check out my weekly roundup of blended learning news items.
1. Fly south: Last week I traveled to southern Florida. But I didn’t lounge on the beach. I visited two schools (here and here) in the Miami-Dade School District to see what they are doing with blended learning. Also, I spent time at an event for top executives from the education publishing company Pearson. The company got a new foothold in online learning last week when North Carolina’s state board of education voted to approve the state’s first online schools. The virtual schools will be run by Connections, which is owned by Pearson, and by K12, Inc., another education company -- and a competitor to Pearson.
2. Issues of privacy: As more schools make use of technology in the classroom, and startups create new tools, there are more questions about protecting student information. A parent discovered several security problems last year, according to a must-read story in The New York Times. Want to learn more about data use and student privacy? Check out this new report, “Data Drives School-Community Collaboration: Seven Principles for Effective Data Sharing,” from the Data Quality Campaign and StriveTogether. (And check the events section of this newsletter for details on an upcoming webinar on this topic.)
3. Let’s get personal: Many people believe blended learning provides a way to create a personal learning path for every student. A recent blog post at Mind/Shift explores the topic: “What Do We Really Mean When We Say ‘Personalized Learning’?” Well, that’s not an easy answer; some say this type of teaching must encourage students to make learning choices. Earlier this month I spoke with Rebecca E. Wolfe, director of Students at the Center, a project of Jobs for the Future. Personalized learning, she said, must include choices for students, and the lessons must give children and parents a clear understanding of how they are progressing in class. Why does this distinction matter? If students simply sit in front of a computer that gives them tailored lessons, “it doesn’t change any of the relationship to what they need to know, and how they need to learn,” Wolfe said. “It’s putting into a computer the way we are already doing education.”
4. Under the microscope: State leaders are debating the value of online learning programs in Idaho, and some say there is a looming crisis with the state’s digital network. An audit of technology in the classroom in this state revealed that schools are not using it widely, according to a report in Idaho Education News. And in Michigan, a new report about virtual classes there showed more students are taking these classes, but with disappointing academic results. “The more virtual courses a student takes, the less successful they are, the report found,” according to the Detroit Free Press.
5. Watson, I Presume: The computer system that won on the game show Jeopardy might assist teachers in the classroom, as I reported in October. (ICYMI: Read that story here.) The IBM technology that fuels the system, dubbed Watson, gives developers access to Watson services so they can create applications. Last week, IBM released five new services: text to speech, speech to text, visual recognition, concept insights and tradeoff analytics. Let’s hope the computer voice is smoother than the one featured in the chorus of this awesome song about robots.
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