The Khan Academy: Free, Fun and Effective -- Cutting Edge Learning Via Computer

The Khan Academy is an interesting development. I've never heard of it before but I've probably seen it before since it is all over YouTube. What is the Khan Academy? It is an ersatz "school" that provides a unique teaching opportunity. It has grabbed the eye of people like Bill Gates. What makes it unique?

Sunny Chanel at Babble.com has posted an article titled "Will The Khan Academy Revolutionize the Classroom?"

I am skeptical of any "revolutionary" educational ideas that are going to change the world. I'm especially skeptical when they start saying they are going to teach kids at their own pace-I think there is a little too much "at their own pace;" at least too much "at their own pace" without bringing it together on a standardized basis.

The story of the Khan Academy explains it. Salmon Khan, the founder, was a hedge fund analyst who had a penchant for teaching. His cousins needed tutoring and he began using various methods, ending up with YouTube. I decided to see how the training went.

You can see the "class" I took here. It is about simple equations. If you spend a few minutes with it (total time about 11 minutes), you'll find, I think, it is very easy to understand. It does what the Khan Academy suggests and that is that it allows students to learn at their own pace. Students can speed it up or slow it down or repeat parts that are hard for them.

The Khan Academy has put up over 2,000 of these snippets of learning. They cover math, algebra, trigonometry, chemistry and biology to name just a few subjects.

I found the information I listened to and watched to be very easy to understand. However ,that isn't, in my opinion, the "breakthrough" that the Khan Academy presents.

While others are now beginning to come on board, initially Salmon Khan put up about 1,800 videos by himself. It looks like they have about 41.5 million lessons viewed, according to their website. The "pernt," as New Yorker Archie Bunker would say, is that Khan is putting all of this training up for free; further, it only took one man.

Khan is now beginning to put it in classrooms. The ramifications are significant. What does that do to the million-dollar professional tutoring firms like Sylvan? They inflate a school district's budget. Further, the simplicity of the teaching takes the mystery out of learning.

What the Khan Academy does is take some of the "rote memorization" and make it fun. It allows the teacher to focus classroom time on more general presentations.

The Kahn Academy isn't going to solve all the woes of our school system. I don't think that is what it presents. Here is a way to bring effective learning to a lot of kids on a personalized basis.

You may visit the Kahn Academy and decide if you like the concept here.

References:

Khan Academy Website, "Khan Academy"

Babble.com Website, Sunny Chanel, "Will the Khan Academy Revolutionize the Classroom?"

Khan Academy Website, Salmon Khan, "Simple Equations"