Thomas Arnett, Senior Research Fellow in Education, Christensen Institute, Author at eSchool News

Is this the moment in history when K–12 school systems get disrupted?

Thomas Arnett, Senior Research Fellow in Education, Christensen Institute — Fri, 08 Jan 2021 10:00:02 +0000

With COVID-19 cases again on the rise, schools are once again closing their doors this year. Meanwhile, the toll on many educators, students, and families feels crushing. It may be the biggest understatement of 2020 to say that the pandemic has thrown K–12 environments into turmoil. By forcing conventional classrooms online, the pandemic exacerbates the challenges of keeping students engaged and on-track through single-paced, whole-group instruction. Frustrated by this reality, a sizable proportion of students, parents, and teachers have left their schools to seek alternatives such as homeschooling, virtual schools, micro-schools, and learning pods. These shifts beg the question: are we witnessing the beginning of K–12 disruption—the type Clayton Christensen described? What is Disruptive Innovation? Before I dive in on answering that question, let’s clarify what Disruptive Innovation means. Disruption, as defined by the Christensen Institute, is more than just upheaval. In our research on how organizations and sectors change, Disruptive Innovation describes a phenomenon whereby the incumbent technologies and business models in a sector get displaced by new technologies from new entrants in that sector. The phenomenon starts when new entrants come up with seemingly inferior solutions to serve people who are unserved (nonconsumers) or overserved by established incumbents (low-end customers). Then, over time, these new entrants improve their offerings into compelling alternatives to incumbent solutions. The disruption of the sector unfolds as the people previously served by incumbents migrate to good-enough solutions from new entrants that also offer greater affordability, customizability, and convenience. Consider, for example, how Amazon disrupted conventional retail by initially setting up a website to sell books; or how Netflix disrupted Blockbuster by initially mailing people DVDs. When Clayton Christensen first described this phenomenon in the mid-1990s, it captivated the attention of the business world because it explained how leading incumbents in an industry—the organizations that seemed to be doing everything right—were routinely upended by new entrants with seemingly inferior products. The implications for business strategy were huge, and the term quickly became a buzzword in both board meetings and startup communities. Nonetheless, Disruptive Innovation is a phenomenon, not an agenda. Like gravity, it happens as a course of nature when certain conditions are true. It is neither inherently good nor bad, but it can have both positive and negative consequences. Disruptive Innovation is often painful for the people who lose jobs and investments in the decline of incumbent organizations. Furthermore, any technological progress, whether disruptive or otherwise, can have unanticipated consequences—consider social media’s impact on political polarization and mental health. Nonetheless, Disruptive Innovation routinely produces marked social benefits. The technologies that flow from disruption are more affordable, customizable, convenient, user-friendly, and accessible than their predecessors. This means that advances in communication, transportation, health care, and the like that come about through Disruptive Innovation end up helping more people in more places. Are K–12 schools getting disrupted? The big disruption-related question right now in K–12 education is whether learning pods, micro-schools, and other alternatives will disrupt conventional schools. At first glance, these models seem to fit the pattern: in their infancy, they’re unable to offer everything conventional schools provide; but they initially serve students and families who are locked out of childcare, structured learning environments, and other services they need from conventional schooling. However, checking the box on a few disruption look-fors doesn’t guarantee disruption any more than having wings can guarantee that ostriches and penguins will fly. The nonconsumption problem The pandemic has certainly created nonconsumption—a key starting point for disruptive innovations. Until last March, many families relied on schools to provide a range of services, including reliable childcare, social communities, and a structured setting for learning. Then COVID-19 created a void, and pods and micro-schools sprung up to fill in. But this response to nonconsumption differs from the normal pattern of disruption. Normally, serving nonconsumption gives disruptive innovations an opportunity to grow and improve without inciting a competitive response from incumbents. But the nonconsumers of schooling today are not families and students that established schools routinely ignore. Rather, established schools see students who leave for pods or micro-schools as lost enrollments; and as the pandemic draws on, conventional schools will respond to try to rake those enrollments back. Some are already setting up learning hubs and virtual schools of their own. The affordability problem Second, pods and micro-schools are too expensive and complicated to be disruptive. Disruptive innovations don’t enter as premium offerings that command premium prices. Rather, they appeal to people by offering affordability and convenience. In contrast, parents take on a massive workload to create their own pods or micro-schools. Some may outsource that work by hiring a teacher to man the ship, but then affordability goes out the window. Splitting the cost of a teachers’ salary among a group of 2-3 families is nowhere near as cheap as free public education. So when it comes to affordability, the only potential disruptive path for pods and mirco-schools is at the low end of the private school market.

Blended learning models can help schools reopen–here’s how

Mon, 21 Dec 2020 10:00:34 +0000

As educators start considering their options for the fall, the future is full of uncertainty. If schools remain closed, they’ll need to prepare for more remote learning. On the other hand, there’s a chance schools might be able to open back up, in which case they’ll likely need to have students come in shifts in order to maintain social distancing. Fortunately, if bringing students to school part-time is an option, schools don’t have to invent new approaches from scratch. Two of the blended-learning models we’ve documented are well suited to these circumstances: the Enriched Virtual model and the Flipped Classroom model. There is a caveat: They all hinge on internet connectivity, a challenge that both public and private efforts are moving quickly to try to solve. Related content: 10 blended learning resources for schools In an Enriched Virtual arrangement, students complete the majority of coursework online at home or outside of school, but attend school for required face-to-face learning sessions with a teacher a few times a week. In Flipped Classroom setups, students learn at home via online coursework and video-recorded lectures, and teachers use class time for teacher-guided practice or projects. Normally, the Flipped Classroom model is used by teachers whose students come to class every day, whereas the Enriched Virtual model is generally deployed to increase support for students in virtual schooling who normally wouldn’t attend a brick-and-mortar school at all. In COVID-19 circumstances requiring a reduction of the number of students in school buildings on any given day, however, the distinctions between these models become a bit blurry. Here are some examples of what these types of models look like. Combining independent online learning with face-to-face instruction Scott Nolt, a high school history teacher in North Carolina, has been using blended learning for years as a way to teach his students without daily direct instruction. At the school where he first developed his approach to blended learning, roughly half of his students met in class with him on any given day while the other half learned independently, often at home. At his current school, students were in class with him every day until COVID-19 closed their campus, but spent most of their time working independently on course activities while Nolt worked with small groups in a study-hall-type arrangement. This approach allowed him and his students to transition seamlessly to distance learning once schools closed. During their online learning time students dive into new content by studying texts, watching online videos, and taking assessments that help them develop their basic understanding of course content. They then turn to individual assignments and group discussions that help them develop their analytical, critical thinking skills. While working online, students communicate with Nolt through an online messaging system and through the comment features built into online assignments and discussions that allow him to give feedback on their work. The blended-learning approach allows students to explore concepts at different depths of understanding, based on their interests. All students are expected to learn the “big idea” for each lesson or unit, but can then choose activities for going deeper on topics that interest them. They then demonstrate their mastery of course concepts through essays, PowerPoint presentations, or other types of assignments. Using blended learning to strengthen relationships Stacey Roshan, a high school math teacher in the Washington, DC, area, became a teacher because she wanted to share her love of math with students and help combat the notion of “I’m not a math person.” She wanted her class to be a place where exploring math was fun and where students knew she cared about them as individuals. But for many of her AP Calculus students, it was hard to love math given their nightly struggle through homework assignments with unanswered questions and the enormous pressure to get straight A’s. Meanwhile, back in the classroom, Roshan found there was little time to focus on students’ needs when she was busy trying to ensure that she delivered all the content they needed to tackle their nightly assignments. To address these challenges, Roshan turned to blended learning. She “flipped” her lessons into online videos for students to watch at home. She then shifted class time toward addressing students’ questions and misunderstandings as they worked through problems, discussing and exploring math concepts conceptually, and engaging with students in a more personal way. As Roshan explains in her book, Tech with Heart, “It’s important to understand that my flipped classroom is not about videos at home and textbook work in class. It is about easing students’ anxiety by giving them time to work through problems with their peers and with me. It is about personalizing the learning space, building relationships with students and gaining their trust, and being there to support them when they need me the most.”

3 things edtech can’t do

Thomas Arnett — Tue, 16 Apr 2019 07:00:39 +0000

We’re swimming in a world of technologies that have huge implications for the future of schooling. Computers live in teachers and students’ pockets, the Internet makes information and media ubiquitous commodities, apps offer to aid with all our daily routines, and artificial intelligence unlocks new possibilities for differentiated instruction.

Yet even with these technologies flooding into schools and classrooms, computers won’t be replacing teachers any time soon, and that’s why now, more than ever, teachers should be given the critical support they’re asking for in the classroom. To illustrate this point, consider these three things educational technology can’t do.

1. Technology can’t … provide higher-order feedback

Software is great for generating immediate, automated feedback on students’ mastery of basic knowledge and skills. But higher-order feedback falls outside its purview.

Consider, for example, essay grading. For years, word processors have been able to point out corrections for spelling and grammar errors; and more recently, intelligent software now offers feedback on elements of structure and style—such as whether a student has a topic sentence at the beginning of each paragraph and whether each paragraph contains evidence related to the topic sentence and the essay’s thesis. But software cannot give feedback on many of the qualities that really define great writing—such as whether the students’ rhetoric and logic will resonate with her intended audience. It takes a human to give feedback on the more nuanced aspects of human communication.

The same holds true in other academic domains. Software can’t tell students if their research questions for a science project are worthwhile and reasonably scoped; nor can it tell them which engineering and design challenges they should tackle to improve a simple machine. And software can’t coach soft skills—such as working effectively in teams, navigating interpersonal conflict, setting personal goals, and persevering through obstacles. In sum, the skills students will need to future-proof their careers against the rise of machines are also the skills they can’t learn from machines.