Edison Learning

Presenters from Edison Learning‘s online division came to speak with us regarding their new K-12 online schools, now in session in a couple of different states. They had to go through a rigorous accreditation process and now these states think Edison’s schools are valid. Do you?
The systems Edison has put in place in their virtual schools is impressive. For every lesson (they called them modules) there are four different sections, increasing in difficulty and necessary student comprehension along the way. When a student has completed each of the four sections he should have full understanding of the ideas presented. What I found very interesting is that if a student is not achieving the assessment goals of the module (the quizzes at the end of each) a tutor who works with the student can look at each of the parts and diagnose the aspect of the lesson that the child is not understanding. The tutor can then help the student with that specific part of the lesson and not start from the beginning (unless that is where the student was mislead). If it works like they said it does, it seems like an improvement over teaching in brick and mortar schools. In the schools that most of us attended, our teachers would never be able to pinpoint where she lost each of her students but would have to guess using an average. Their method seems to be a great improvement, and if there were a way to adopt this method in the real classroom it could aid teachers and students tremendously.
The design of the school also is such that the student does not feel alone or without guidance, which would be my fear in an online school. The student is not left to do the work by himself or on his own schedule. Each student is assigned a tutor and a grader. Though these tutors and graders are responsible for many more students than in an actual school (in order to keep costs down, as this is a for-profit venture, by the way) the systems Edison put into place makes it easy for them to chart the students’ progress and check in with them periodically. It would seem that a student would not feel alone, left wandering in school cyber-space, but could sense that someone was watching his progress and hopefully encouraging him as well.
Since it is an online environment the designers added materials and challenges that lend themselves to the medium. There are games that the students can play to test their knowledge. Discussion rooms where students can chat about assignments. Perhaps most effective, there is an element of choice so the students can choose the path of learning that works best for them. Their tutor will help them to choose whether they want to study one subject at a time or many, and the rate at which they will do so. It is much better than in brick and mortar schools, were one is forced to deal with the material presented in the order the teacher chooses.
The innovations in online learning are impressive and carry some real value that would be excellent to add to our current schools. Of course there is an important limitation. There will never be a replacement for the social lessons provided by a school culture. Edison did have a solution for the social dilemma as well, saying that they organize field trips for the online students. But here we did see behind the curtain a bit. They cannot organize many field trips because they are not cost effective and for Edison, as much as they value education, there is always a bottom line.
As you know from my previous posts, I highly value “real world’ experience and the relationships formed in school are no different. I would posit that chat rooms and such cannot be a worthy replacement. Though I wonder if any students today value texting and online chat more highly than their day to day experience? That might be an interesting idea for further study, especially for us here at mediaconnectingcommunities…

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