What is Khan Academy ??
The
Khan Academy has reinvented distance learning.
Salman
Khan, who founded the Khan academy, is harnessing the power of the internet to
teach 100,000 pupils a month from the comfort of their own home.
Pupils
watch the lessons on their computers and then get together in the classroom to
work through exercises and receive tutoring from their teacher.
Mission:
Their
mission is " literally a
free world class education for anyone, anywhere".
Evolution:
Its
rise has been quick, already trialled officially in 25 Californian high schools
and big names in the technology industry have already put their names and their
finances behind it.
The
biggest ones are Google and the Gates Foundation.
Eventually the organisation has grown up substantially. Even
teachers in schools are asking students to do problems in Khan Academy website
as home work. It has even covered important lessons from difficult subjects
like physics and made learning easier.
For example:
Application
Of POM Principles:
Theory Y
Management:
Theory Y managers are of the view that people often tend to
seek and accept responsibility and often take initiatives themselves to reach
their goals. The students can teach the basic concepts themselves and then, the
teachers could use their time in the class to cater to specific needs of each
student. It is a win-win situation for both students and teachers when it comes
to the learning experience. This is exactly how the Khan Academy has set about
its mission of changing education for the better. Teachers can focus on the
learning curves of individual students and apprise themselves of topics which
the students are finding difficult to understand.
Turning
upside down
Just
over two years on, with over 600 videos watched a minute, over 160 million
lessons delivered and over 3,200 videos online, the site is still growing.
The
plan is to create a "blended classroom". What this means is that
videos are watched at home and exercises are done in the class with the help of
the teacher.
If
widely adopted this would turn the traditional system of education which
centres on the classroom on its head.
With it
already reaching more students a week than the Open University has had in its
entire history, the idea has caught on worldwide.
One
third of the site's traffic comes from outside North America, mainly from the
developing world.
But who
knows what the classroom of our children's grandchildren looks like?
Salman
Khan hopes he does.
"This
is reaching 100,000 students a month right now but it could reach 100 million
students a month," says Khan.
"It
could do that forever because this stuff doesn't grow old."
