hybrid learning

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Silicon Valley Execs Funnel $3 million into Rocketship

May 11, 2011 | 3:54 PM | By

TB

Students using computers at Rocketship's Learning Lab.

Silicon Valley executives — CEOs and COOs of companies like Netflix, Facebook, and Skype — have funneled $3 million to Rocketship Education this year that will be used to refine its sophisticated software system.

The money will be spent to improve four components of Rocketship’s computer software: assessment of students, the way it generates learning plans that identify what students need to learn, a scheduler that uses the learning plan to choose from a bank of lessons that’s best suited for each student, and a management system that keeps track of all that information.

With a more streamlined process, the aim is to lighten the load for teachers who have to analyze all the data for each student, and to have the software recommend better default learning plans that teachers can easily adjust for students, according to co-founder John Danner.

“There’s a sense in Silicon Valley that there’s got to be more in the way that Silicon Valley solves problems that can be applied to education.”

It’s a software engineer’s dream — or nightmare — however you look at it. Creating a system that takes into consideration 1,000 standards that students need to master from K-5, and lessons mapped to each of those objectives offered by dozens of different vendors. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Facebook, hybrid learning, Netflix, Rocketship, Silicon Valley, Skype

Five Lessons Learned from a New Charter School

May 6, 2011 | 4:28 PM | By

Tina Barseghian

 

The Rocketship network of charter Schools in San Jose is fairly new — the first school just opened in 2007. But from an observer’s perspective, a few lessons can be pulled from the way the young network has engineered the design of the school system. Can these ideas be applied to any school, whether they’re charter, private, or traditional public school?

  1. THE CAMPUS IS ONLY THE SETTING. When it comes to school, innovation in the way a student learns lives in the circuitry of the way the day is designed. For a school that’s known as one of the pioneers of hybrid learning, the campus of Rocketship Mateo Sheedy is decidedly traditional. Classrooms, playgrounds, and the school’s office look like any other. In fact, I’d argue the campus is more modest than many I’ve seen. Students sit on the floor of the Reading Center for their individual reading times. The computers are sectioned off from the cafeteria with dividers. Students are squeezed next to each other on the only available seating in the lunch room. What makes it different is the inventive schedule that guides how and what students learn, making most of the educators’ time and effort. With all the discussions about the future school day, it turns out that it might actually not look so different than today.
  2. SMART, ADAPTIVE TECHNOLOGY IS KEY. Finding the “Holy Grail” of individualized learning when it comes to technology depends on how well the computer programs work with students’ learning levels. Rocketship administrators believe the ones they’ve chosen do the job.  As spokesperson Judith McGarry described it, remediation happens seamlessly until each student is ready to move to the next level. Granted, these are fairly simple subjects in K-5 grades. The true test will come when or if it moves into middle school curriculum and beyond.
  3. SCHOOLS CAN DO MORE WITH LESS. Because a portion of students’ day is spent in the computer Learning Lab using the adaptive technology, hiring an extra teacher for that period is not necessary. The labs are monitored by teacher aides, who mostly answer questions and try to keep students focusing on their work. Continue reading →
FILED UNDER: Culture, Learning Methods, Research, Teaching With Tech, assessment, hybrid learning, professional development, Rocketship

A Look Inside Rocketship

May 6, 2011 | 12:30 PM | By

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Culture, hybrid learning, Rocketship

Hybrid Learning Comes to Life at Rocketship

May 3, 2011 | 12:19 PM | By

Sintia Marquez in Rocketship’s Learning Lab, where she uses adapative technology that moves at her level.

When it comes to a student’s education, expectation is everything. What parents and educators expect from each student, and what she expects from herself, has a tremendous effect on how a student fares in school.

For Sintia Marquez, a fifth-grader at Rocketship Mateo Sheedy Elementary, expectations are high, both on the part of her parents and her teachers.

Though she’s naturally a high achiever – well above grade level in both literacy and math – that foundation of support and encouragement from her parents and teachers is helping her forge ahead, even in a public charter school where more than 90% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch and 70% for whom English is a second language.

Sintia’s mother was allowed to progress only to middle school in Mexico. She’s a housekeeper now, and her father finds work as a contractor and a restaurant worker. “Sintia can’t say that I have a career that she can be proud of,” said Livier Maria Marquez in the one-bedroom guesthouse she shares with her husband and two daughters. “One of my hopes is for her to go to college. She really wants to go to Stanford or Santa Clara.”

“Remediation occurres in this sort of seamless, automated way.”

If the present is any indication of the future, Sintia is well on her way there. In June, she’ll graduate from Rocketship, one of three branded charter schools in the area that has plans to expand across the state and across the country. The school offers open enrollment and receives funding from local, state, and federal taxes, as well as from venture capital.

Since she transferred from a nearby public school in fourth grade, Sintia has been able to progress at her own advanced level with the help of the charter school’s hybrid learning system. With this system, teachers teach high-level concepts in class, and students practice those theories in a computer lab.

It’s all part of a highly engineered, tightly structured block schedule that moves students through classrooms and computer labs, with time for recess, lunch, and outdoor activities throughout the day. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Culture, Learning Methods, adaptive, blended learning, hybrid learning, Rocketship

How Can an Advanced Student Move Ahead in Public School?

April 29, 2011 | 2:25 PM | By

http://youtu.be/NS2uTchaTrg?hd=1

As her mother saw it, Sintia Marquez was too smart for her school.

She’d outpaced her school’s ability to keep up with her by fourth grade. So her mother moved Sintia to a new school, a charter called Rocketship Mateo Sheedy Elementary, which focuses on the concept of individualized learning.

What’s different about Rocketship is the school’s focus on allowing students to progress at their own pace. Teachers introduce new concepts in class, and students practice the material they’ve learned in a computer lab, a system called hybrid learning. Rocketship also has a longer school day — from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. — and an intense program to motivate kids, even as young as kindergarten, to think seriously about going to college.

TB

If state assessment scores determine a school’s success — and in this high-stakes testing environment they certainly do — Rocketship’s flagship school qualifies as a winner. For the past two years, the school has scored 925 on the Academic Performance Index (API) — the same score earned by Palo Alto School District, a neighboring community with a much more affluent demographic. It bears noting that, of the 463 students at Rocketship, 91 percent qualify for free or reduced lunch program, and 71 percent are English as Second Language learners.

Rocketship Mateo Sheedy is one of three Rocketship charter schools in the area, but the organization has  plans to expand across the state and eventually across the country. They offer open enrollment (not lottery, like many charters) and receive funding from local, state, and federal taxes, as well as from venture capital. Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Culture, Learning Methods, Teaching With Tech, hybrid learning, individualized instruction, individualized learning, Rocketship