editor One of the biggest education trends of the past decade has been personalized learning. This education approach focuses on students’ individual needs, not their age or background, and aims to help them achieve their most significant potential. Personalized learning platforms can extend the learning experience at home to provide students with more flexibility It has the potential to revolutionize the way education is delivered and has the potential to change the way we think about education forever.
What is Personalized Learning (PL)?
Personalized learning aims to help students learn the most critical skills, not just pass tests. It focuses on the needs of the student and aims to help them achieve their most significant potential. To set yourself up for success in bringing personalized learning into the classroom, start by building relationships with your students. The key to personalized learning is understanding the unique characteristics of each individual, which is why it’s also often referred to as individualized education.
Does PL work?
Personalized learning is all about finding the right fit for each student. It’s not enough to understand the needs of your students – you also need to find the right tools and techniques to address those needs.
In other words, personalized learning is about finding the right combination of curriculum, classroom management, and teaching strategies to help each student learn the most critical material. PG in Digital Marketing students can use personalized learning to create digital marketing campaigns tailored to the needs of their individual clients. The best part is that personalized learning isn’t just theory – it’s backed by tons of data.
Evidence-backed proof
A study published in 2020 by the Journal of Research on Technology in Education found that Pre-K to 8th-grade students who received personalized learning were more likely to outpace their peers academically significantly.
Another case study in 2018 saw PL as a remarkable tool for students with disabilities. At that California charter school, disabled students who received personalized learning had only a 0.4% disciplinary suspension rate, compared to the 5.8% rate of the local unified school district.
These are just two of the wealth of studies over the decades that show PL to be a powerful tool for student success.
What can teachers do to implement personalized learning?
The biggest challenge of personalized learning is collecting the data needed to assess each student and customize their learning experience. Technology is the best way to implement personalized learning in the classroom.
Online resources and apps can help teachers assess students, identify their strengths and weaknesses, and provide personalized learning experiences. They also give the teachers much-needed data about each student’s progress, offering insights that can be used to customize their learning experience further.
How do you determine if a PL tool is good?
A good PL tool will have the following features:
- Assessment – The tool should allow teachers to assess students to determine whether students are on track to achieve their goals.
- Diagnostic – The tool should allow teachers to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each student and provide them with a personalized learning plan.
- Long-term Goals – The tool should allow teachers to track a student’s progress over time, ideally across grade levels.
- Engaging – The tool should be engaging and exciting to use. Students should be able to use the device independently, and it should provide enriching activities that cater to each student’s learning style.
- Flexibility – The tool should be flexible enough to be used outside the classroom, either as software that can be installed on a computer at home or as a website that can be accessed from the internet.
- Integrity – The tool should be developed in a way that is ethical and backed by solid research and experience.
What’s an example of good PL software?
There are many different examples of good PL software that are already implemented in schools nationwide. This article will focus on one: i-Ready.
What is i-Ready? i- Ready is online software that assesses students and provides instruction with games and other activities to help students learn. The program’s diagnostic portion gives teachers a good overview of each student’s progress and helps create a personalized learning plan.
Who invented i-Ready? The creators of i-Ready are Curriculum Associates, a company specializing in educational software. They began as a workbook publisher in 1969 before developing the first i-Ready program in 2011. When bringing Personalized Learning into the classroom, it will best succeed if a teacher does their research and selects the program that best suits their needs. Restructuring how you engage with students can be tricky, but the evidence is clear that PL is a great way to improve student achievement.
