Khan Academy: the Teachers Strike Back 575
theodp writes "With his Khan Academy: The Hype and the Reality screed in the Washington Post, Mathalicious founder Karim Kai Ani — a former middle school teacher and math coach — throws some cold water on the Summer of Khan Love hippies, starting with U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. From the article: 'When asked why so many teachers have such adverse reactions to Khan Academy, Khan suggests it's because they're jealous. "It'd piss me off, too, if I had been teaching for 30 years and suddenly this ex-hedge-fund guy is hailed as the world's teacher." Of course, teachers aren't "pissed off" because Sal Khan is the world's teacher. They're concerned that he's a bad teacher who people think is great; that the guy who's delivered over 170 million lessons to students around the world openly brags about being unprepared and considers the precise explanation of mathematical concepts to be mere "nitpicking." Experienced educators are concerned that when bad teaching happens in the classroom, it's a crisis; but that when it happens on YouTube, it's a "revolution."'"
A field in its infancy (Score:5, Insightful)
Online education is in its infancy. This is an area where many ideas are being tried. Some will work better than others. Probably nothing currently available is "the answer", but rather all are those little baby steps toward what will eventually emerge. It's a normal and pretty universally unavoidable process.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, because holy shit that teacher pay rate is out of control.
Seriously, since when did the abysmally low rate of pay teachers receive become a point of contention?
Classroom vs. Kahn (Score:5, Insightful)
If the teaching is going to be bad either way, then Kahn costs a heck of a lot less to get the same result.
If Kahn and a unionized teacher are both bad, for Kahn the solution is for someone to upload a new lesson that's better. For the teacher, the solution is to suck it up because teacher unions demand that seniority trumps all other considerations.
I have no idea if Kahn or classroom teachers are ultimately the better choice. But the teachers unions better cobble together some damn good arguments for why they deserve the compensation and job protections they get, if Kahn offers way better bang for the buck.
I don't know .... (Score:5, Insightful)
My personal thought is, who cares? You get what you pay for, right? Services like Khan Academy are great if they're helping people learn things they wouldn't otherwise take an interest in learning about, or if it enables learning they were interested in but couldn't afford traditional methods of education.
If you're already IN a traditional classroom environment, then no - I'm not sure Khan Academy lessons are so great. I mean, you have to ask, as a paying student, why you're paying your hard-earned money to get a personal classroom experience with supposed educational professionals, who turn around and ask you to sit through canned Khan presentations instead of presenting the material themselves.
As for the "precise explanation of mathematical concepts to be mere nitpicking"? Maybe it is, really? By that, I mean, most people are really only interested in learning math as long as it allows them to accomplish something. The minority who find the theory itself fascinating and want to learn more math for the sake of learning it are the ones who will probably move beyond whatever Khan Academy teaches, and consult other sources.
If you know enough math to get correct answers to the problem you encounter as part of your daily life or job, then that's likely ALL the math you really need to know.
Conflict of interest (Score:5, Insightful)
This is article deriding free on-line math education written by a person who develops paid on-line math education.
Slope as rise over run. (Score:5, Insightful)
If the complaint about how "rise of run isn't a formal definition of slope" is indicative of the kinds of errors in his lectures, then I'd say Khan is right that the naysayers are just being picky. Yah, it's not perfectly accurate or a formal definition, but it's an excellent start to understanding a deeper understanding.
An educators job should be to get people excited about a subject, not to present the most perfect, gods honest truth answers to everything. Anyone interested in a subject will go on to learn more, and find out the more nuanced and correct answers. If you've ever become an expert in any field, you know that everyone (including the best teachers) don't always have time or knowledge to give the best possible answers. That's OK, since education doesn't stop once the class stops.
If your ultimate (and final) response when asked why you believe something is "because my teacher told me", then you really don't understand the subject matter very well at all.
Wrong. Classroom PLUS Khan (Score:5, Insightful)
If the teaching is going to be bad either way, then Kahn [sic] costs a heck of a lot less to get the same result.
I think I should point out that I haven't found any place where Khan suggests that his youtube videos replace public education.
Khan's made a few mistakes. The first that is the worst is that the article mentions he was corrected about multiplying negative numbers and instead of praising the people for making a new video correcting him, he apparently just took his video down and replaced it. And then made some little remark about why people put up such a big fuss about this concept. His second and less grievous mistake was to engage talking heads and accept praise from politicians. I think if he had just focused on making videos, ignored the praise and let Bill Gates or some other public figure pitch the video, he wouldn't find himself the target in this back and forth. We need to stop looking at online education as a replacement and instead as an augmenting force in our children's learning.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
yep... because they all put in carbonite for those two months off and don't have to eat...right?
Re:A field in its infancy (Score:5, Insightful)
No, online education is just 'education'. We have been having this argument for at least 100 years regarding technology and its transformation of learning. Some things do get easier better with technology, but in the end what we have a is a teaching and learning problem -- not a technology problem. Using new technologies we figure out ways to improve teaching and learning but one technology will not be the answer.
Nor will Salman Khan's idea that he is going to build Charter schools where students watch and hour of his videos a day to learn all the math they need to know and spend the rest of the day playing guitar or making paintings.
Learning is hard. Some parts can be made easier with computer technology. Some parts can be made easier by turning them into a game. Some parts you just need to sit down and memorize. Most parts are done best when there is a group who are trying to figure things out and working together to achieve a common goal.
This is how businesses grow and get better. This is how children grow and learn. Technologies including chalk, pencils, iPads and times tables are tools to help.
Motivation (Score:5, Insightful)
Khan Academy is the greatest supplemental education resource I have ever seen. But, one thing it can't do is force you to sit down, block off an hour a day, and learn a subject. Let's face is, 95% of us do not have that motivation, especially where one tab away awaits an entire internet of distractions.
Having a physical obligation, to an in-face person in a physical location to show up and learn something is an exceptionally powerful psychological motivational force and something that online education simply can't replace.
But man, would have I killed to have Khan available when it came to exam time in high school and college.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
RIght on about Math (Score:5, Insightful)
Cult of the false expert. (Score:5, Insightful)
We need to be wary of Kahn Academy, but we have to be wary of "experts" that are condemning Kahn Academy as well.
A lot of times the "experts" doing on the complaining in popular media are just as worthless as listening to your fat neighbor who is bitching over his beer on his porch. Most of the talking heads on TV are like this and more and more even the people that are high ranking in governmental and professional organizations are well is well. It's because they're better at bullshit then their "expert" subject.
So.. as far as Kahn Academy, it's likely a little bit of both sides are right and both sides are wrong. You have "educators" that don't want to absorb different ideas and you have Kahn who is also a bit of an ass himself.
Eveyone hates to be made into a commodity (Score:5, Insightful)
Look at this like Wikipedia. There are obvious quality problems, but Wikipedia keeps improving and getting larger, and if you're Microsoft Encarta, there's just no market for you any longer (thus, the first MS product actually killed by Open Source).
The guild apprenticeship system really hated book-learning. Copyists really hated printing. Both of these were previous means to commoditize education. This is just more of the same.
There will be tremendous economic repercussions from the further commoditization of education.
Bruce
exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
People decrying this are the teachers who are in fear of change. Nobody said his solution has to be the final one but guess what - do you see any of these teachers who are complaining doing anything to create online teaching methods?
If anything, Khan should be commended for apparently doing what some teachers have not - and for free, no less.
Ad Hominem (Score:4, Insightful)
This is article deriding free on-line math education written by a person who develops paid on-line math education.
That sounds like an ad hominem. Motives aside, is the argument valid? One part of the article stood out to me:
As a result, experienced educators have begun to push back against what they see as fundamental problems with Khan’s approach to teaching. In June, two professors from Grand Valley State University created their own video in [washingtonpost.com]which they pointed out errors in Khan’s lesson on negative numbers: not things they disagreed with, but things he got plain wrong. To his credit, Khan did replace the video. However, instead of using this as an opportunity to engage educators and improve his teaching, he dismissed the criticism.
“It’s kind of weird,” Khan explained, “when people are nitpicking about multiplying negative numbers.”
When asked why so many teachers have such adverse reactions to Khan Academy, Khan suggests it’s because they’re jealous. “It’d piss me off, too, if I had been teaching for 30 years and suddenly this ex-hedge-fund guy is hailed as the world’s teacher.”
Why isn't Khan embracing criticism and review/removal/replacement of his videos by knowledgeable folks? I would be rewarding people proofing my many videos and trying to get more people doing that instead of dismissing it as "nitpicking."
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:2, Insightful)
Classic republican tactic. Attack the facts and use ad hom attacks. Then their people just repeat the lie on blogs. Pretty soon teachers are villinized and cutting funding for schools becomes easier.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
I dunno, teachers are paid pretty well for the months they actually work. Often near $25-30+ an hour.
Isn't that something to work towards though, instead of something to deride?
Why does it always have to be a race to the bottom?
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
Not when you factor in the fact that they have to spend significant parts of those summers preparing updated curricula based on new test criteria, new versions of the books, etc. Not when you realize that they need to rework their tests over the summer, or else the students cheat. And so on.
Besides, $25 per hour is not being "paid pretty well". It's three times minimum wage, but a pharmacist makes double that with only about two more years of education. A tech sector employee makes double that on a bachelor's degree. Supervisors in Ford factories make double that, often with no degree at all. And for this, the teachers attended four years of college, plus at least a couple of years to get their teaching credentials, plus additional classes (CPE/CPD) every few years to maintain those credentials.
Teachers have what is, without a doubt, one of the most important jobs in the world. Without education, society would not move forward. Yet somehow we as a society feel that they deserve no more pay (on average) than a 7-11 store manager or a construction worker. And those same people wonder why our education system has problems. Please tell me you don't seriously consider such low salaries to be reasonable.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
Bullshit. Ever seen the requirements to stay certified as a teachers? 9, sometimes 12 hours of study per year that they have to shell out and attend for college courses just to "stay certified." It's a small wonder most of them eventually get multiple Masters degrees or a Doctorate, there's no point in not for the amount of "continuing education" courses they are required to take just to stay employed.
And when do you think they're taking those courses, hmmm?
I hate right wing shitbag morons like you who misrepresent teachers and think they're "doing nothing" all summer.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
Can you link to a "9" credit hour requirement in any public school system in the US? Otherwise, I find your assertion extremely difficult to swallow.
Re:RIght on about Math (Score:3, Insightful)
Mathematics is BORING until you can show people WHY they are learning this
Actually if you continue learning maths, there's a moment where they become interesting by themselves and not only for what you can do with it.
If you didn't felt this, I guess you stopped too early, like when you stop reading a very good book because the first chapter was boring. Or maybe it's just not your kind (say, like some musical taste), whatever practical use it has or not.
Re:A field in its infancy (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd have given a testicle for something like Khan Academy, when I was young. Instead, I got a bunch of angry overworked and under-performing teachers that just wanted me to shut up, go away, not ask questions, and *most of all* never correct them when they spread completely inaccurate information to the class. All I wanted was a way to self-educate. To a degree, I accomplished that with a lot of school-skipping, when I spent day after day at the central public library, instead. However, I was often hindered by wanting to learn things, but not knowing where to start or what path to follow. For example, I would be far ahead of where I am, today, if I had someone or something to guide me into programming a decade earlier. Back when I didn't have an internet to tell me about C and C++ and Perl. Back when the furthest I could get was "I know I want to code" and reading a book in the tiny section at the library that only really had theoretical things with pseudo-code that didn't mean anything to me at the time.
Khan (and the internet, overall) is an autodidacts wet-dream. It is what could have changed the lives of so many young people in the past who weren't stupid or lazy, but weren't getting any real meat out of their "real" education.
Re:Wrong. Classroom PLUS Khan (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong. Classroom PLUS Khan
Yes, and there are examples that the Classroom + Khan is an effective model. The Economist has an article [economist.com] describing how the Los Altos school district is using Khan's videos to provide the "dry lecture" which is assigned for homework while classroom time is used for supervised problem solving with the teacher roving about helping any struggling students. That model makes complete sense to me especially since we keep hearing stories about how parent's can't do their kids homework (I've been called in to help my little cousin with her math homework at times when her parents were thoroughly confused).
Re:A field in its infancy (Score:4, Insightful)
I would think a combination of Wikipedia and Khan would be great. Have competing videos of the different subjects all online and let the viewers rank them. As for him making mistakes, so what? Are critics saying that professional teachers never make mistakes? How many would be willing to put their school year online for criticism? At least with Khan Academy you have people who know watching and commenting. That lets people track down errors.
I've always said that lectures are a waste of time. You say the same thing over every semester. If it was a produced lecture you could keep improving the quality of it and use class time more productively for hands on activities and interaction.
Re:A field in its infancy (Score:4, Insightful)
Great points. I think my strongest quality is my ability to learn. I spend most of my leisure learning new thing or improving my skills. I get annoyed when people say your so lucky because your handy. BS instead of watching sports or getting drunk I am online researching new things. Luck has nothing to do with it. Why waste your time on fantasy when there is so much interesting stuff out there in the real world waiting to be learned.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm hoping you're being sarcastic and don't really have the idea that there are just all these "real" professional-wage paying jobs that are available for just three months that are being held open for teachers.
Who would rather have teach you physics, someone with a degree in Education or someone with a degree in Physics?
I'm going with "sarcastic".
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
So if there aren't any fires, firefighters shouldn't be paid? And if there aren't any crimes, police shouldn't be paid?
Wow, are you off-base. You don't really know anything about it do you?
...and still be elected governor of New Jersey?
You're getting all your information about teachers and teaching from talk radio, aren't you? That statement is not true, even here in Chicago, which is ground zero for the "thugs in the teachers' union.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:1, Insightful)
My wife is a teacher and keeps calling me to get the real answers because the IT folk in her school district lacked any real knowledge of any topic and could only fix/implement things by script. (well, that's not really true, but one or two instances lead to easy generalizations, don't they)
If teaching was really so easy and so well paid, then you (yes - YOU) could use your superior skills and abilities to make a real difference in the world and a substantial contribution to society by quitting your bit-twiddling, script-reading, Windoze-hating, printer cartridge-changing job and start teaching. So why don't you?
Teachers are becoming the targets of the new skinheads, with pogroms just around the corner. Wisconsin and Florida are leading the way.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Classroom vs. Kahn (Score:5, Insightful)
Thank Gaia, given that universal public education is incredibly valuable.
You don't spend much time volunteering at your local public school, or working over a period of years with public school teachers, do you?
The US public school system works exceedingly well. You are taking a few failed large urban districts such as City of Detroit and City of St. Louis and projecting them onto all "public schools" (the talking point meme these days is actually 'government schools').
The fact is that the vast majority of US families live in suburbs or exurbs of large cities and/or in small cities (and some rural districts), and for the most part their public schools are doing just fine (and if you like/believe standardized tests, doing better every year). Where that isn't true there is generally a clear link to lack of money (rural districts).
However, many of those families get their news from a specific ideologically-driven source and have been told that "public schools are failing". Well, they know it can't be their public school district because they get the test reports, know the teachers, etc. BUT - it must be those people in the next district over who have failing public schools. Let's force them to privatize! Think there might be an agenda at work there somewhere?
sPh
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
When will America wake up and realize that just one good teacher is worth more than both the Koch brothers
Maybe voters will be willing to pay good teachers more when we stop paying bad teachers the exact same salaries.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
So are garbage men. So are programmers.
Being in the "top 50%" of earners really doesn't mean shit any more. It just means their rations haven't been cut as much as yours.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
That's my point. Education is the worst academic discipline after Economics. Even psychology degrees require more rigor than Econ.
The university where I taught closed it's Education department several years ago, much to my delight. It's one of the top 3 schools in the US. They wouldn't listen to me and close the Econ school though.
Re:Adverse reactions? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
Or when we stop spending more money on administration and pointless toys like "Smart Boards" than on teachers.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:5, Insightful)
In contrast, my mother has taught high school french, italian, and spanish for at least a decade now. Her workload is insane. Not only does she have the normal hours of the day where she has to be on campus directly dealing with kids, she then gets to spend time reading and grading papers, as well as evaluate how well her lesson plans worked, and update them for the next time she teaches (or to adjust for faster/slower class progress). The net result is that she works at least twelve hours a day, often more, and regularly gets about four hours of sleep.
If you're teaching a class that requires grading of papers or has handouts. you get to create the material, make enough copies, teach it in class, read/grade all of the responses, and then repeat. God help you if you want to actually challenge your students with more than multiple choice, and have them write real sentences or prose. 30 students times 5 classes is 150 students' worth of papers to READ every day. How long would you spend on each? My teachers in high school, like my mother now, read their students' papers closely enough to be able to write corrections, and even write feedback on them. I imagine it's more than a minute per student spent correcting, and more than ten minutes spent per class evaluating the effectiveness of your curriculum and planning how best to ensure your students actually _learn_. So, that's another four hours on top of your "eight hour" day right there.
So, while teachers bring in some decent sounding dough, the amount of time they put into it depends a lot on the subject matter they teach and the degree to which they invest themselves in teaching well. (It's probably still a lot easier than being a sysadmin, though.)
Re:A field in its infancy (Score:4, Insightful)
This.
Learning is easy. Making time to learn is inconvenient for people who do not enjoy knowledge as its own reward.
Many want the fruit of the tree but don't want the labor and time required to plant, nurture and cultivate. They also do not want the risk of the tree not bearing fruit after they have invested the time.
People want a free, no risk lunch. That is why they say learning is hard.
Re:And the unions are pissed... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd guess a similar thing is going on there. The people who have no greater interest than teaching take the safe approach, while people who may be more interested in physics but decide to abandon it and go into teaching are more likely to be interesting people with active brains on their necks.
I guess the two explanations are not mutually exclusive, there could be some indoctrination in education degrees that encourages thinking inside the box too.