Turn On Your Laptop, Class is in Session
 

"half of all high school courses in the United States will be consumed over the Internet by 2019." But despite the benefits, the spread of Internet schooling has been obstructed by teachers' unions, who are organizing to cut off state funding for virtual schools. In related news, Wired reports that three universities have pre-ordered iPads as a possible replacement for textbooks. The most important news and commentary to read right now. - The Slatest - Slate Magazine

Interesting.

Part of my job is to coordinate all of the e-learnng courses offered in our district (and within a consortium of other districts, too). Our biggest challenge is not the teacher's unions, but in the completion rate for students. So far, it is abysmal compared to traditional courses. I think we are on a steep learning curve, however, and that it will only get better.

We live in interesting times. I'd encourage my own children to take SOME e-learning courses, but I wouldn't want them to take such courses exclusively.

Interesting. Parents could "home school" kids and then sign up for distance learning services. I like the idea.

and just count the number of on-line degree programs now available...extending it to the high school level is the next logical step.

Of course, once the students figure out that no one knows who's actually testing and turning in the homework, a whole new industry will be born.

We do the virtual school thing for my son (4th grade).

Our biggest issues are with regular schools. If he is not in their building they don't get the money. Ours is paid for like any public school, with tax dollars. They don't think we should get this option.

We have text books. Some classes are given in a webcast with a teacher where my son talks over a speaker or chat pod to ask questions. Some classes are taught by me. Some things are taught through online tutorials. For our state there are 6-8 field trips per month. We can go to as few or many as we like as long as the lessons assigned are being completed. The field trips allow us to meet other kids in the school. My son is now about 8 days from completing his required course work for 4th grade. We have a month left. Now we do independent studies. My son has chosen 4 biographies to read for Social Studies and Language Arts and we are dissecting 8 animals for science. How many 4th graders get to do that?

This is great for us. It is not for everyone. Some parents are not capable or willing to put the effort into the education of their children.

Stephanie, that sounds fantastic! For a motivated kid with motivated parents, I expect they can learn a lot more. Just curious, what is the cost?

Tax dollars pay for it. It costs me nothing.

Now, the independent study stuff is on me. It cost me $40 for the dissection kit and I bought the biographies. We also supplement his online education with swimming for a PE, Guitar and Violin lessons for music and a Chinese language tutor. None of which is required but is considered part of his school day.

I've taken an online grad level course and thought it was excellent... no reason not to extend the benefit to earlier education as well.

Higher education is absurdly primitive. For example; if the best Anthropology lecture series is given by a professor at the University of Montana, why aren't the students at Stanford University given the opportunity to hear it?

The best lecturers in the world should be selling their talents to Universities worldwide. It's amazing how many professors, with NO gift for instruction, will waste the time of thousands of students. They will usually spend a lot of time lecturing on a tiny fragment of research that they conducted, but has no real importance to the general field. And some of the really bloated pompous ones will force the students to buy a textbook that they have written. And that book is usually so poorly written that it's not on any other schools required reading list.

Web based lectures are an opportunity to dramatically improve the quality of education, particularly at the higher levels.

Moses.... +1.

+2 Moses

I, personally, love the fact that a lot of universities have started putting lectures in Podcasts. I like downloading and listening in the car. That should be available to students as credit.

+3 Moses..... why couldn't the university of Montana charge for that lecture? Apple is discounting bundles of '10' ipads to universities

I've wondered about this for a while.

It is INSANELY expensive to fund conventional schools in every town. Not to mention the obvious corruption and b@stardization of the system by the teachers' unions and school boards. Personally I'm 100% behind efforts to offer alternatives to students, which are probably to their benefit (versus sitting in a classroom with 40+ of their closest friends, often listening to some tenured, union, "don't-give-a-f*ck" teacher drone on about whatever for eight hours a day. I'm all for it.

And don't give me that crap about "oh the kids need social skills". Bull. They're going to get those anyway through participation in other events as part of their communities. VERY overrated as justification for what conventional education costs.

I'd love to see some statistical data on how well these programs do for elementary/secondary educational levels.

And +4 to what Moses said.

Don't even get me started on the racket that is "school textbooks". In addition to being a ripoff that would make your average mob boss jealous (sell for $300, offer "buyback" for $20 and make obsolete in two semesters by changing two illustrations and the cover art), the over-centralization in the industry (for elementary/secondary in particular) is a problem. Most textbooks are produced in Texas and decidedly SLANTED information (TX board of Ed) makes its way into the books used by kids nationwide. This is a BIG problem when it comes to questionable things like "Creationism" or "Intelligent Design", and there are lots of cases about certain aspects of American history being omitted or downplayed and others over-emphasized. NOT a good thing.

My wife just posted this on her facebook page..... man, some teachers came out strongly against it

Great idea, Moses. It will NEVER happen. The idea of injecting capitalism, merit and competition into academia is just an arrogant insult to the profession. The entire public "education" universe is a total scam. Teachers are against it? Imagine that.

I think it will happen, by 2019..... but it should happen NOW, never is a long time. Maybe students will get a little capitalism and demand it. How could teachers be against it and still act like their for better education ..... this is what was said, "As a person with a degree specializing in education, Id like to say...REALLY?! Children with special needs need interaction with other children (like all children) and need one on one physical attention to help them. Online classes are distracring, for reasons such as this article explains, video games, online networking, TV, no one monitoring them. Most children especially those without the funds for a lap top, do not have the supervision at home to keep them on task and motivated. School can be the safest place provided for some. To take that away would be disasterous.

Meaningful posts require some understanding of the subject matter. Sorry that's so hard. Indeed, if this thread were moved to PARF, we'd learn that the problem is exceedingly simple. It's the union's fault. Crowbob......if you took a step back and had another look, you'd notice that capitalism ultimately is going to infect, and destroy, every system. Including and especially this one.

Three of my sisters are school teachers. A number of my friends are, also. My old college roommate (an Atheist, interestingly enough.....and a Libertarian. Imagine our discussions in college) is a teacher. When I met with him a couple of summers ago, he painted a picture of students learning at their own pace, using computer technology. Computers can get you information about as fast as you can learn to ask the right questions. Plus....computers can assess your progress and find new problems for you to solve. The teacher then becomes less of a babysitter and more of a coach. At the end of the conversation, I was excited about the prospects for education and when I discussed it with my other teacher friends and relatives, they already understood the upcoming changes and were as excited as I.

One last splash of cold water: Ultimately, capitalism is likely to SMASH the teacher's unions and get control of the education industry. The result will offer some opportunities and certainly changes, and/but will be sorely disappointing in other ways. Think "FoxNews Education." Think "McEducation." Coca-Cola is very interested, and already involved, in education.