Priceless treasure guide disguised as the confused ramblings of a misanthropic iconoclast. Seeking the next level is not a quest for the timid, not for the easily discouraged.
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05 September 2010
Khan Academy: Evolving to Define the Future of Education
Khan Academy is a rapidly growing set of online learning videos. Microsoft's Bill Gates has enrolled himself and his son, Rory, in Khan's free online school, heaping praise on Salman Khan's online labour of love.
The above video describes some of Khan's future goals for his ambitious project, and how it may well change the future of education.
Unlike overpriced university programs, Khan omits the indoctrination and focuses strictly on the education. Even better, he makes subjects easier to learn -- even the very difficult subjects such as differential equations. Khan is expanding the number of videos and video courses on a regular basis. And as you can see from the video above, he never stops planning for the future.
Check out Khan Academy and the Khan Academy YouTube Channel to learn something you didn't know before.
Hat tip to News Alert
Bonus!: The following video is a delightful 1 hour 23 minute inside look into the origins and future of Khan Academy, presented by MIT alumnus Salman Khan to the MIT Club of Northern California.
Khan looks like another bullshit act from the third world. He wants the whole world to learn, the children, grannies and everyone. So what's stopping anyone from picking up a good book and starting today?
ReplyDeleteThis is great. I hope they can expand their menu of courses.
ReplyDeleteSalman Khan grew up in New Orleans and was educated at MIT and Harvard. There is not much of the third world about him.
ReplyDeleteHis object is to get students past the bottlenecks which stop too many people wanting to get a rigorous technical and scientific education.
BU: Every week he seems to either add a new course/topic or expand an existing course.
Watch the one hour, 23 minute video to get a better idea of what he wants to do with the project.
Alfin I stand corrected. The problem is that one needs to get credentialised to stand a fair chance in the job market. I learnt this to my cost; it matters little what one knows if one cannot get a foot in the door. Yes we know that there brilliant students who are turned off by the tedium of classroom learning, but I suggest to you that they are few and far in between. Take any difficult subject say General Relativity. By now there must literally be hundreds of excellent books and articles to suit all manner of learning styles and pace. Nonetheless it is all for nought if one does not make an intensive effort to study them. The problem in the US as I see it is twofold. One, there are too many feral youngsters that make schoollife a misery for the earnest learner. Imagine being unable to go for a pee the whole day for fear of bullies. The other is the ruling impression that US educators and some students have that all children are Einsteins in waiting, that they can just breeze through their studies with little effort, whereas in reality most of them have to work hard at getting the basics right.
ReplyDelete