Dot Learnt

“What is possible when we change the design and delivery of traditional education for the children that teachers find hard to teach?“

These are the words that greet viewers on the Innovation for Learning (IFL) homepage.

An Illinois-based nonprofit formed in the early nineties, IFL looks to develop innovative technologies to improve early elementary education. Think low-cost-special-purpose handheld devices that allow K-2 teachers to easily differentiateinstruction for all students.

More recently, IFL has launched a computer program that helps teachers track student success. These simple handheld computer devices provide teachers with reports about which kids are learning what, when and how much.  In hopes of going global, IFL has initiated a partnership with Stanford University to bring the computer system to rural communities around the world. (more…)

A small group within Colombia has attempted to not only reinvest in the education system, but also redefine conventional schooling. Fundación Escuela Nueva, meaning the New School, is a schooling system established in 1975 that has reinvented the traditional orientation of the classroom. Internationally recognized, the system has been extremely successful in the development of student learning, but one can only wonder about the potential of the system if simple technologies were introduced as well.

Escuela Nueva encourages students to actively partake in their education by granting students the permission to take hold of the classroom and teach their peers. Such an environment proves conducive for open discussions and allows creativity to flourish. Teachers act as moderators, allowing the students to truly seize their curriculum while teachers solely facilitate the organization of the class. Furthermore, lessons specifically target the skills and knowledge that students need in their day-to-day lives. (more…)

It is time to demand disruptive innovation in education. Improved schools? No, entirely different schools? Let’s toss out traditional notions of schooling all together, and explore alternative ways to learn.

Alongside the dramatic political revolutions transpiring in emerging economies, a more discrete revolution is unfolding in education. Charles Leadbeater and Annika Wong’s report, Learning from the Extremes, explains what we can learn from the world’s emerging markets about education. (more…)