Translator: Christopher Phillips Reviewer: Denise RQ
Pivotal moments really can create
who we are today and very much shape who we become tomorrow.
When I was a student,
I was part of a group that went to the DC metro area to try to figure out
what business could do to try to improve education for every child.
What I remember most about my first classroom visit in DC
was the sound of dripping water from a dilapidated building.
There was this classroom full of maybe 20, 25 students,
and there was one student sitting at a desk,
captivated by the water dripping from the ceiling.
I won't forget that scene
because there wasn't much learning going on,
but I also won't forget his eyes.
He saw me when I looked at him, and he knew he deserved better.
That was a pivotal moment for me.
At that time, I decided not to take a traditional path from business school
and to devote my career, really my life's work,
to try and figure out a way
to make quality education available to every child,
regardless of what language they spoke, regardless of where they called home,
regardless really of their ZIP code.
Do you know how important your ZIP code is
to giving you access to a quality education?
Of the 40,000 ZIP codes in the United States,
two outside the Boston area are considered
the most highly educated ZIP codes in the country.
So it seems to me we have a choice.
We can load up our minivan and take all kids
to the best neighborhoods with the best teachers and the best education,
or we can figure out a way to make ZIP code irrelevant
to a child’s ability to learn, to realize their learning potential,
and I believe, in doing so, realize their human potential.
I am very, very excited about the future of learning,
despite what you might read in the paper every day,
because I think it rests in the promise of blended learning.
Blended learning - learning that combines
the traditional face-to-face classroom experience,
that all of us perhaps grew up with,
with new innovative learning technologies
that have the power, in my mind, to democratize learning.
So I want to tell you a little story, I want to talk about three things,
three things that I think are converging now
that are going to permanently, and I think, positively, change education.
The first is the economic tsunami that we've all weathered.
26 of 50 states are going to dramatically decrease their investment in education
as the result of what has happened in the past several years; 26 of 50.
And as a result, schools are being forced to do more with less,
while classroom sizes get larger,
and while the learning readiness of the students in that classroom
continues to get broader and broader and broader:
broader socioeconomic, broader cultural, broader language skills.
So what is a teacher to do?
I want to tell you a really encouraging story about a teacher.
Her name is Wendy Funk, she's a teacher in California.
She saw, over the past two or three years, her class size go from 18 to 28 students.
In the United States, the average classroom size is about 25 students now,
but that's up from 16 in 1980.
So Wendy looked at her classroom, and she said, "What am I going to do
to make sure that every child gets what they need when they need it?"
What is a teacher to do, even a great teacher like Wendy?
Wendy's pivotal moment came when she turned to blended learning.
She turned to blended learning that was supported
by an intelligent, adaptive learning technology
that I'll tell you more about later.
So she asked her kids to spend 100 minutes a week on this adaptive software program
and to rotate, part live class with her, some time on the adaptive program,
and the results were nothing but astounding.
In six months, her classroom achieved
the equivalent of a full year of learning; in six months.
So with the help of these adaptive technologies
that I'm going to introduce you to,
we could actually increase the velocity of learning.
So it doesn't matter what a child's starting point is.
It doesn't matter what they know when they start.
What matters is the journey and where it takes them.
And that brings me to the second major force
that's changing education in a positive way.
I mentioned it a few minute earlier: intelligent adaptive learning.
How many of you have ordered something from Amazon or Netflix
that you never - more on that later -
that you never intended to buy?
Because these software programs that we use get to know us through use.
They get to know us through use.
And sometimes, they're right; oftentimes, they're right.
We've brought that kind of capability to learning
so that these adaptive technologies learn the learner as the learner learns.
Sounds funny, but it's true.
They actually learn the learner as the learner learns.
So that they can help determine what next lesson,
what next learning experience a child should have,
based on what they demonstrate they know, and what they don't know.
So let me share with you an example that might help.
Behind me, you'll see a virtual manipulative, a learning tool.
This is designed to allow students to explore a lot of different ways
to solve problems.
But what is happening in the background, what's happening under the hood
is that the adaptive engine is collecting a lot of information
as the student plays what the student thinks is a game.
In fact, this engine will collect about 50,000 data points per student per hour.
Did they hesitate when they picked up the mouse?
Did they get the right answer immediately?
All of those data points go into
what lesson or what learning experience that child receives next.
So let’s say we have a classroom, and in there, we have two students:
one's very advanced, and one is struggling.
The adaptive engine asks the two students to build the number 48.
The first student says, "Well, I know how to do that.
I'm going to take 4 groups of 10, 1 group of 8, and I get my number, 48."
Doesn't hesitate, doesn't ask for help, is confident.
The second student says, "I'm not quite sure, but I do know my ones.
And I'm going to push over individually 48 ones."
In a multiple choice environment, both students are correct, right?
They both got the right answer.
But you can see that each of those students demonstrated
that they had a different level of understanding of mathematics.
And therefore,
where they should progress to next shouldn't be the same,
it should be different.
With the help of blended learning solutions
like intelligent adaptive technologies,
students are actually put in the driver's seat
so that they can literally help architect their own learning path.
So that that first student might be sent to a subtraction lesson
and be asked to build the number 48, starting from 100,
whereas the second student, who was struggling,
might get a lesson in fives and tens
so that that student can have a better opportunity to master
what they weren't able to demonstrate that they mastered before.
But the most important thing here
is that both students get what they need, when they need it.
Both students are engaged, they feel successful.
They're not stigmatized, they're not embarrassed.
Both students are supported in an environment
that is highly personalized to their own unique learning needs.
This is the promise of intelligent adaptive learning.
It'll never replace great teachers.
But it can support great teaching as those classrooms explode.
That brings me to the third force that is shaping the future of learning.
My husband and I were in a electronics store recently
trying to buy a flat-screen TV - probably for the Super Bowl -
(Laughter)
We went in there,
and there was a little girl, maybe three or four years old with her father.
And while her father was engaged with the salesman,
she went over to the wall
started pressing all the TVs hanging on the wall.
She wasn't really satisfied, she went to the next one.
Wasn't really satisfied, went to the next one.
She turned around and said,
"Daddy, we can't buy our TV here, they're all broken."
(Laughter)
Grace is part of a new generation of learners.
She's used to having immediate responsiveness at her own personal touch.
She feels in command of her environment with her touch.
And most kids don't have the opportunity
to experience blended learning in their classroom.
And we have to inspire Grace to new levels of creativity,
because the world that she's going to inherit,
the jobs and industries that she's going to encounter,
might not even exist yet.
So we have to help Grace learn how to learn
and understand the value of working through persistence.
And in this environment that I was explaining to you,
getting the wrong answer doesn't mean failure.
It's just the first step to a deeper understanding of subject matter.
So when I think about my career, and I think about 20 years ago in DC,
I oftentimes think about that classroom.
I think about that child whose eyes I met,
I think about the desk he was sitting in, and I think that about that drip.
And I think about how many other students in classrooms across the United States
are uninspired and perhaps overlooked.
But don't be discouraged, be determined.
Because that drip doesn't have to be a ticking clock.
That drip can just be a cause of motivation for all of us to make sure
that, regardless of ZIP code, we can bring these blending technologies
to every child and help to unlock the learning potential of every child.
Because you know what? When you think about it, these are our future leaders.
These are our future innovators, our future doers.
These kids are our future.
So I want to leave you with a quote from a famous anthropologist, Margaret Mead.
It guides me in my work.
She said, "if children do not learn the way we teach,
we must teach the way they learn."
Thank you.
(Applause)