Blending technology and classroom

Christopher PhillipsReviewer: Denise RQ Pivotal moments really can create who we are today and very much shapewho we become tomorrow. When I was a student, I was part of a group that wentto the DC metro area to try to figure out what business could do to tryto improve education for every child. What I remember mostabout my first classroom visit in DC was the sound of dripping waterfrom a dilapidated building. There was this classroomfull of maybe 20, 25 students, and there was one studentsitting at a desk, captivated by the waterdripping from the ceiling.

 I won't forget that scene because there wasn'tmuch learning going on, but I also won't forget his eyes. He saw me when I looked at him,and he knew he deserved better. That was a pivotal moment for me. At that time, I decided not to takea traditional path from business school and to devote my career,really my life's work, to try and figure out a way to make quality educationavailable to every child, regardless of what language they spoke,regardless of where they called home, regardless really of their ZIP code. 

Do you know how importantyour ZIP code is to giving you accessto a quality education? Of the 40,000 ZIP codesin the United States, two outside the Boston areaare considered the most highly educatedZIP codes in the country. So it seems to me we have a choice. We can load up our minivanand take all kids to the best neighborhoods withthe best teachers and the best education, or we can figure out a wayto make ZIP code irrelevant to a child’s ability to learn,to realize their learning potential, and I believe, in doing so,realize their human potential. 

I am very, very excitedabout the future of learning, despite what you might readin the paper every day, because I think it rests inthe promise of blended learning. Blended learning - learning that combines the traditional face-to-faceclassroom experience, that all of us perhaps grew up with, with new innovative learning technologies that have the power, in my mind,to democratize learning. So I want to tell you a little story,I want to talk about three things, three things that I thinkare converging now that are going to permanently,and I think, positively, change education. 

The first is the economic tsunamithat we've all weathered. 26 of 50 states are going to dramaticallydecrease their investment in education as the result of what has happenedin the past several years; 26 of 50. And as a result, schools are beingforced to do more with less, while classroom sizes get larger, and while the learning readinessof the students in that classroom continues to get broaderand broader and broader: broader socioeconomic, broader cultural,broader language skills. So what is a teacher to do? I want to tell you a reallyencouraging story about a teacher. Her name is Wendy Funk,she's a teacher in California. 

She saw, over the past two or three years,her class size go from 18 to 28 students. In the United States, the averageclassroom size is about 25 students now, but that's up from 16 in 1980. So Wendy looked at her classroom,and she said, "What am I going to do to make sure that every child getswhat they need when they need it?" What is a teacher to do,even a great teacher like Wendy? Wendy's pivotal moment camewhen she turned to blended learning. She turned to blended learningthat was supported by an intelligent,adaptive learning technology that I'll tell you more about later.

 So she asked her kids to spend 100 minutesa week on this adaptive software program and to rotate, part live class with her,some time on the adaptive program, and the results were nothingbut astounding. In six months, her classroom achieved the equivalent of a full yearof learning; in six months. So with the helpof these adaptive technologies that I'm going to introduce you to, we could actually increasethe velocity of learning. So it doesn't matterwhat a child's starting point is. It doesn't matterwhat they know when they start.

 What matters is the journeyand where it takes them. And that brings meto the second major force that's changing educationin a positive way. I mentioned it a few minute earlier:intelligent adaptive learning. How many of you have orderedsomething from Amazon or Netflix that you never - more on that later - that you never intended to buy? Because these software programsthat we use get to know us through use. They get to know us through use. 

And sometimes, they're right;oftentimes, they're right. We've brought that kindof capability to learning so that these adaptive technologies learnthe learner as the learner learns. Sounds funny, but it's true. They actually learn the learneras the learner learns. So that they can helpdetermine what next lesson, what next learning experiencea child should have, based on what they demonstratethey know, and what they don't know. 

So let me share with youan example that might help. Behind me, you'll see a virtualmanipulative, a learning tool. This is designed to allow studentsto explore a lot of different ways to solve problems. But what is happening in the background,what's happening under the hood is that the adaptive engineis collecting a lot of information as the student playswhat the student thinks is a game. In fact, this engine will collect about50,000 data points per student per hour. Did they hesitatewhen they picked up the mouse? Did they get the right answer immediately? All of those data points go into what lesson or what learning experiencethat child receives next. 

So let’s say we have a classroom,and in there, we have two students: one's very advanced,and one is struggling. The adaptive engine asksthe two students to build the number 48. The first student says,"Well, I know how to do that. I'm going to take 4 groups of 10,1 group of 8, and I get my number, 48." Doesn't hesitate,doesn't ask for help, is confident. 

The second student says, "I'm notquite sure, but I do know my ones. And I'm going to push overindividually 48 ones." In a multiple choice environment,both students are correct, right? They both got the right answer. But you can seethat each of those students demonstrated that they had a different levelof understanding of mathematics. And therefore, where they should progress to nextshouldn't be the same, it should be different. With the helpof blended learning solutions like intelligent adaptive technologies, students are actually putin the driver's seat so that they can literally helparchitect their own learning path. So that that first student might besent to a subtraction lesson and be asked to buildthe number 48, starting from 100, whereas the second student,who was struggling, might get a lesson in fives and tens so that that student can havea better opportunity to master what they weren't able to demonstratethat they mastered before. 

But the most important thing here is that both students getwhat they need, when they need it. Both students are engaged,they feel successful. They're not stigmatized,they're not embarrassed. Both students are supportedin an environment that is highly personalizedto their own unique learning needs. This is the promiseof intelligent adaptive learning. It'll never replace great teachers. But it can support great teachingas those classrooms explode. That brings me to the third forcethat is shaping the future of learning. My husband and I werein a electronics store recently trying to buy a flat-screen TV- probably for the Super Bowl - (Laughter) We went in there, and there was a little girl, maybethree or four years old with her father. 

And while her fatherwas engaged with the salesman, she went over to the wall started pressing all the TVshanging on the wall. She wasn't really satisfied,she went to the next one. Wasn't really satisfied,went to the next one. She turned around and said, "Daddy, we can't buyour TV here, they're all broken." (Laughter) Grace is partof a new generation of learners. She's used to having immediateresponsiveness at her own personal touch. She feels in commandof her environment with her touch. 

And most kids don't have the opportunity to experience blended learningin their classroom. And we have to inspire Graceto new levels of creativity, because the worldthat she's going to inherit, the jobs and industriesthat she's going to encounter, might not even exist yet. So we have to help Gracelearn how to learn and understand the valueof working through persistence. And in this environmentthat I was explaining to you, getting the wrong answerdoesn't mean failure. It's just the first step to a deeperunderstanding of subject matter. So when I think about my career,and I think about 20 years ago in DC, I oftentimes think about that classroom. 

I think about that child whose eyes I met, I think about the desk he was sitting in,and I think that about that drip. And I think about how many other studentsin classrooms across the United States are uninspired and perhaps overlooked. But don't be discouraged, be determined. Because that dripdoesn't have to be a ticking clock. That drip can just be a causeof motivation for all of us to make sure that, regardless of ZIP code,we can bring these blending technologies to every child and help to unlockthe learning potential of every child. 

Because you know what? When you thinkabout it, these are our future leaders. These are our future innovators,our future doers. These kids are our future. So I want to leave you with a quote froma famous anthropologist, Margaret Mead. It guides me in my work. She said, "if childrendo not learn the way we teach, we must teach the way they learn." Thank you.