Author
Michael B. Horn
Articles
Blog Posts/Multimedia
How Machine-Based Tutoring Could Disrupt Human Tutors
The lessons from disruptive innovation suggest that these technologies may never be as good as the absolute best human tutor, but they will be plenty close.
Virginia: Moving Forward or Backward?
A bill introduced to fix the state’s funding problems of online learning in a way that would strengthen students’ ability to tailor an education for their unique needs will now do the exact opposite.
Bright Spots Shine in Blended, Online Learning
A month has passed since the first-ever national Digital Learning Day. Given the excitement generated from teachers and others tuning in to the National Town Hall meeting and given today’s National Leadership Summit on Online Learning up on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. that iNACOL sponsored, I thought it was worth noting some great examples that weren’t highlighted during the day’s festivities.
Hewlett Assessment Competition Comes at Critical Time
The political incentives to create high-quality assessments aren’t particularly strong, so having philanthropists invest dollars to create these assessments and continue to push innovation is critical.
School Finance in the Digital-Learning Era: A Review
Imposing a new funding model on top of the existing business typically doesn’t work. Instead management needs to create an autonomous organization that can craft its new business model from scratch as the innovation demands–serious business model innovation.
California Initiative Brings Breath of Fresh Air
It’s an embarrassment that California, the state that led the technology revolution in America, is, according to Digital Learning Now, last in the nation in using technology to transform its education system from its current factory-model roots into a student-centric one.
Is Mandating Online Learning Good Policy?
For someone who advocates for a transformed student-centric education system powered by digital learning, you might think my quick answer would be an emphatic yes, but I’m not so sure.
What Can We Learn about Learning?
Bror Saxberg, the chief learning officer of Kaplan, Inc., is a man for whom I have great respect. Whenever I have a question about the science behind learning, he is the first person I turn to. He verses himself in the latest in cognitive and neuroscience research and applies his multiple degrees to great use.
Colorado’s Crummy Policies Lead to Crummy Virtual Schools
An investigation of Colorado’s full-time virtual schools has revealed some dubious results and practices, which led the state’s Senate President to call for an emergency audit of all of Colorado’s virtual schools. But the state shouldn’t be shocked by the report. As the truism goes, you get what you pay for.
K-12 Education Technology Market Map launches at Philanthropy Roundtable
Innosight Institute joined the NewSchools Venture Fund and Education Elements in releasing a K-12 education technology market map at The Philanthropy Roundtable’s K-12 Education conference in San Francisco October 12, 2011.
Education Entrepreneurship, Disruption Alive and Well
ImagineK12, an incubator modeled after Y Combinator to help education startups “get it right and get funded,” held its first demo day for its first cohort of 10 companies Sept. 9 in Palo Alto.
Cramming Computers: It’s Still the Same Old Story
People should not take from the New York Times article that technology will not be a significant part of the answer for the struggles of the country’s education system. It will likely be the very platform for it.
EdTech Market is Growing–If You’re Disruptive
An article by Katie Ash in Education Week about a new report by the investment bank, Berkery Noyes, caught my eye recently because of its analysis about the education technology market. According to the piece, “companies focused on technology-based instruction and tools for data collection and analysis are thriving in the K-12 market.”
‘Quality Control in K-12 Digital Learning’: A stimulating, quality read
At the end of July, the Fordham Institute launched an important new series to examine how to create healthy policy for the emergent and disruptive force of digital learning that is sweeping through our education system.
Why Digital Learning will Liberate Teachers
Teachers will be critical to our nation’s future in a world of digital learning—and if we do this right, they should not just be different, but they should also be a whole lot better, as it liberates them in many exciting ways.
Why ‘Soccer Moms’ Matter for Digital Learning
A strong majority of already-active parents over time will demand a digital learning-powered system that disrupts the classroom as we’ve known it.
Ignoring Bad Incentives
One way to unlock innovation in our school system and help it transform into a student-centric one is to get out of our own way and eliminate disincentives. But waiting for superheroes across the country to ignore them is not a sound strategy.
Online Learning Begins to Explode into the Mainstream in Blended Schools
Across America a skyrocketing number of K-12 students are getting their education in blended-learning environments. Over 4 million K-12 students took at least one online course in 2010 and this space is growing now by a five-year compound annual growth rate of 43 percent.
The Magical – and Flawed? – DARPA Analogy
President Obama’s 2012 budget proposes to create an Advanced Research Projects Agency for Education—also known as ARPA-ED—to address what the administration says is an under-investment in learning technology. Creating agencies to spark innovation modeled on the “best practices” of DARPA may very well fail, not because they are implemented unfaithfully, but because the circumstances in which each operate are starkly different.
Is There a K-12 Online Learning ‘Bubble’?
This bubble might not fit the technical definition of the term but it has some elements of that, as well as a few others that should give all of us at least some pause.
Audio Excerpt: Disrupting Class by Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn & Curtis W. Johnson
An audio excerpt from “Disrupting Class” by Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn & Curtis W. Johnson
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