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Are Online Math Programs Better Than Literacy?

October 26, 2011 | 9:52 AM | By

TB

Students at Rocketship Mateo Elementary working in the Learning Lab.

When it comes to math and literacy software, the choices are vast and varied. But over the past months, I’ve heard a recurring complaint from different school administrators: The quality of literacy software is not as high as that of math.

Why is this the case?

I spoke to Aylan Samouha, chief schools officer at Rocketship Education, a network of charter elementary schools in San Jose that allots 25 percent of students’ time at school in the computer lab, where they use math and literacy software for basic skills mastery. Time in classroom with their teacher is spent on what they call “higher-order thinking” and collaborative projects.

“There are aspects of math, particularly at the elementary school level, that lend themselves to online learning more easily.”

For math, Rocketship uses Dreambox Learning, ST Math, TenMarks and Equatia. For literacy, Compass Learning is used for vocabulary and Rosetta Stone for English language learners. Students also have independent reading time, for which they’re given “comprehension quizzes.” For both math and literacy, students who need more individualized help work in small groups of four or five with math and literacy specialists.

Samouha, who’s in charge of what software the school uses, says that the math software is “much further along than literacy.”

“It’s not like people aren’t trying to crack the code,” he says. “But the truth is that there are aspects of math, particularly at the elementary school level, that lend themselves to online learning more easily.”

In general, he points out, with any form of learning — online or otherwise — basic skills are easier to teach, grasp, and to measure than higher-order thinking and concepts. And although math does Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Digital Tools, Teaching Strategies, adaptive, Compass Learning, Dreambox, literacy, math

Why Should Schools Invest in Software?

October 12, 2011 | 12:31 PM | By

TB

A Rocketship student works at the Learning Lab using adaptive software.

The question keeps coming up: What technology should schools invest their money, time, and effort in? During this fraught time in our economy, the decision to invest in tools like adaptive software and other tech devices is sometimes portrayed as excessive or wasteful.

In Sunday’s New York Times, Matt Richtel and Trip Gabriel wrote about software program companies inflating their effectiveness in schools, and how they “ignore well-regarded independent studies that test their products’ effectiveness.” In the next couple of days, we’ll deconstruct the writers’ sources of information — namely the main source for their claim that the technologies are ineffective, the What Works Clearinghouse.

“It shouldn’t be a call to stop for investment, but a call to invest more, because we need to get it right.”

In the meantime, I spoke to Aylon Samouha, Chief Schools Officer at Rocketship Education, a network of charter schools in the Bay Area that uses software to reinforce basic skills mastery. (You can read more about their hybrid learning program and their competitive scores in this MindShift series). Samouha is in charge of the design and strategy of Rocketship’s hybrid learning model, as well as its teacher and principal training program, among many other things.

Samouha, who lives and breathes educational software and is consumed with finding the best way to integrate technology into the school day, has a very different perspective than what Richtel and Gabriel portray.

First, the facts. In an independent study released in August by SRI International, which Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Digital Tools, adaptive technology, Dreambox, financing, Rocketship

Drowning in Student Data? Two Companies Offer Solutions

October 5, 2011 | 9:24 AM | By

Flickr:dno1967b

By Betsy Corcoran, EdSurge

Teachers who want to use technology in the classroom to its best potential typically face a problem dealing with computers that’s weirdly reminiscent of dealing with a roomful of bright but disruptive students: It can be too much of a good thing.

With sophisticated high-tech tools comes a deluge of data, and for a lot of teachers, finding the right resources at the right moment can be maddeningly difficult. What’s more, the most sophisticated programs, which deliver detailed reports about student progress, don’t share data–which means that teachers can wind up with multiple “data dashboards.”

So educational technology entrepreneurs are starting to offer up a bit of help for both of these programs, according to two reports in today’s EdSurge newsletter.

Combining data from different programs to help teachers avoid an air-traffic-control problem as they try to mix and match the tools they use.

In Mountain View, a startup nonprofit organization, EdNovo, is doing early “alpha” tests of a Google-like search program for helping teachers find exactly the right digital content at the right time. And in San Francisco, a firm called EdElements just got a huge boost of financing to support Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Digital Tools, Teaching Strategies, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Dreambox, EdElements, EdNovo, ImagineK2, Rocketship