INTRODUCTION
Why should you consider purchasing an adaptive learning platform to use as part of the maths program at your school?
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Teachers have an incredibly difficult task in the modern classroom supporting students’ individual learning requirements. The days of one-way transmission of information from teacher to student are long gone and there is now an expectation to adapt and individualise learning for each student. Technology is one way of supporting a teacher to achieve this – the platforms on this page can achieve outcomes that would be difficult for any human to manage. For example, all the platforms listed on Compare the Macaque, to a lesser or greater extent, employ algorithms to adjust pedagogical decision-making as students are working on tasks, often without the requirement for separate assessment activities (Aleven et al., 2016). As students work through the tasks, the smart instructional content analyses the responses and adjusts the pathway that a learner makes accordingly (Vander Ark, 2013).
Are all the platforms different versions of the same thing?
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Not all adaptive learning platforms are created equally. The sophistication of the software will inform how well the platform adapts to the individual needs of the learner. Smart learning algorithms keep user experience in mind when delivering “just-right” content to the learner (Vander Ark, 2013). Price is often a consideration when choosing a maths platform, and there is not doubt that you get what you pay for. If you are looking at products in the same price range then you should consider how well each meets your curriculum goals and how your learners will cope with the ‘look and feel’ of the technology – some are better suited to different age groups.
Can I trust that the platform is teaching my students appropriately?
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These adaptive learning platforms do not replace teachers. There is not doubt that non-human agents influence contemporary educational practices (Knox, 2015) but the algorithms employed by these maths platforms are only as good as the humans that designed them. Equally, the data extracted from a student’s performance is most valuable if analysed by a skilled educator before being used to inform future teaching.
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The algorithms used by these platforms can perform millions of operations per second. This brings many advantages to the education sector, including minimising human error and bias, as well as reducing cost (Kitchin, 2017). In effect, they can achieve things that a human cannot – at least not as quickly. However, they can only achieve this if humans are inputting and retrieving data in a quality way. They should not be expected to do the job of a teacher – if this is the expectation, students will not benefit from a quality teacher and insightful technology working in tandem.