Data Dive
Data Dive
The evolution of personalized learning in recent years has led to a much better sense of how this teaching and learning approach is supposed to work, a more sophisticated understanding of how districts are prioritizing personalized learning strategies, and a growing body of data from school systems that have had initiatives in place for at least a few years.
Blended Learning
A key feature in nearly all personalized learning initiatives is so-called blended learning, which combines the use of digital learning tools with face-to-face teaching. The Learning Accelerator, a nonprofit advocacy and research organization, created a framework for how blended learning should work when implemented effectively.
SOURCE: The Learning Accelerator
District Priorities
Among administrators whose districts were implementing personalized learning, “curriculum changes” was the top response to a survey question that asked if respondents were considering seven different personalized learning strategies, according to the results of a survey of 200 district leaders by the Education Week Research Center and EdWeek Market Brief.
SOURCE: Education Week Research Center/EdWeek Market Brief
What School Leaders Want Learning Technologies To Do
In interviews conducted for a 2014 study commissioned by the nonprofit organization Digital Promise, 20 school and district leaders provided insight into their personalized learning and technology needs. An original Education Week Research Center analysis of the interview data found that the leaders made six main demands of personalized technologies:
SOURCE: Education Week Research Center/EdWeek Market Brief
Tracking Student Engagement
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district in North Carolina is in its third year of a personalized learning initiative. It released data last month comparing engagement for personalized learning students with all district students in grades 5-12.
Notes: The Personalized Learning (PL) Student Survey is administered to all students in PL classrooms. The Gallup Student Survey is administered to all students in grades 5-12. The evaluators used the Engagement Subscale of the Gallup Student Survey and created a subscale of seven items from the Personalized Learning Student Survey to measure engagement.
SOURCE: Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools
Read the complete special report, Personalized Learning: The Next Generation.
Coverage of the implementation of college- and career-ready standards and the use of personalized learning is supported in part by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Education Week retains sole editorial control over the content of this coverage.
A version of this article appeared in the October 19, 2016 edition of Education Week as Data Dive