What is Knowledge Based Learning?

Traditional schools base the progress of students on their attendance records as well as their test scores. Often, homework counts for such a small percentage of the score (at least in college), that a student could probably skip most of it as long as they show up and do well on the tests.

Knowledge based learning is a long needed approach to education. It allows the students to work at their own pace and use knowledge they already have. It also measures what the student has learned rather than how many hours a student spends in class or how many days a week the student checks in.

Traditional schools often have attendance requirements that have to be met or the student may fail the class. For instance, when I attended Indiana University of South Bend (IUSB), students were only allowed to miss 3 days before the school had the right to fail the student in that class based on attendance, no matter how well the student performed academically.

Even online schools have attendance requirements that need to be met. Discussion boards are the basic format for measuring attendance. Usually, the student needs to post a response to a question from the teacher, then respond to 2 students. Those discussion board posts are how the teachers measure the students attendance.

Knowledge based learning is entirely different. The teachers are more concerned with making sure that the student knows the material than they are about how much time the student puts into the material, which only makes good sense. After all, students learn at different rates. A student who knows the material should not have to waste large amounts of time rehashing material they already know.

In knowledge based learning, students have specific tasks to complete that demonstrate to the teachers that the student is well versed in the subject at hand. Once the tasks are complete to the satisfaction of the teachers, the student is done with the class. Students may even be able to test out of classes completely if they have enough prior knowledge to pass the tests.

Some schools, like WGU Indiana are starting to use this version of higher education to assist adults in making their way through required curricula. This particular school, of which I am a student, has suggested time lines, but no attendance requirements. Students must complete a required amount of classes within a term, but there are no requirements for students to check in for any particular class, though there are tons of resources.

In short, knowledge based learning is about what you know and not about anything else. It's a great way to save students from spending time on material that they are already well versed in so that they can spend that extra time on material they are unfamiliar with. After all, education is about learning new material isn't it?