Learn Lots!

This post will be particularly good for me as I tend to be an eternal optimist, which means I sometimes fail to consider the downsides of any idea.  Here goes! Is someone else already working on this problem?  If so, how are they doing? School of One is focused on offering each student a personalized education.  However, since their model is based on an algorithm, from what I've seen, students spend most of their day at a computer.  That's an idea I can't get on board with.  On the other hand, the philosophies and practices at High Tech High   seem to match well the ideas I've had, including giving students the chance to explore their own personal interests through projects.  I will definitely be doing some more looking into this option! If others have failed in solving this problem, why did they fail? I believe most charter schools are founded on the idea of doing things differently.  However, from my experience, they end up doing the same...

In my mind, there are two main categories school subjects fall under: art and science.  Art embraces intuition and aesthetics while science depends on logic and reason.  Both increase our understanding of the world and our ability to think and as such, both are invaluable to learning. In any system of education, I believe students should have experiences in both a studio and a lab setting.  The studio setting allows learners to create, receive and give critiques, and incrementally improve their work.  The lab setting allows learners to experience the scientific method firsthand as they hypothesize, test their hypotheses, and record their discoveries.  No education should be considered complete without both kinds of experiences.  Such settings also allow learners to work closely with and observe experts, absorbing the vocabulary and dispositions of both fields. I also believe it will be natural for certain students to prefer one environment over the othe...

According to the reactions I've received when talking to people about my proposed solution, we're definitely doing something right!  My process involved showing people the visual model I developed and then asking them the question, "If a school existed like this, would you send your children to it?"  After talking to dozens of people, I haven't received a single no. I have also received a lot of qualified yeses.  However, each of these have included fantastic ideas of how to make the model stronger.  For example, one person was concerned about the type of assessments the school would be utilizing.  Another wanted to make sure this kind of education would hold weight in the larger picture of education by asking, "If my kids attended your school, would they be able to get into college?"  These comments have solidified former ideas and given rise to some new ones. My conclusion: the premise we're building on, namely allowing students to spend part o...

What does your solution do? It offers learners the opportunity to use their time in school to learn not only about things that that are important to teachers and parents, but things that are important and deeply interesting to them. How does it work? Beginning in kindergarten, learners will spend 10% of every day learning about something they want to learn about.  That percentage increases by 10% every two years until by their senior year of high school they're spending 70% of their time learning about things they love. Why would someone want it? I believe that as humans, we all have an intrinsic desire to learn about something.  And I believe most of us secretly wish we had more time in the day to follow our dreams and passions.  Therefore, incorporating such a model into schools just makes sense. Picture of the Solution