Adaptive Software

It is my experience and it is generally accepted that mixed-ability classrooms are the norm these days. As a teacher I am personally interested in differentiated instruction. It is for this reason that I am interested in personalized learning. Today the reality is that any teacher would be involved in producing individualized learning plans for students. As we read, there is little doubt about the future of personalized learning. It is the Holy Grail of teaching. Except that it is not easy to practice and becomes incredibly difficult for any teacher to do for large number of students. It is for this reason that differentiated instruction in classrooms advocated today is clearly identified as not personalized learning or individualized instruction. However, the promise of the future is that personalized learning will be a reality for the majority of students. In my opinion, we would have achieved the Holy Grail of Teaching. Adaptive Learning and Adaptive Learning is one way of attempting to achieve personalized learning, the Holy Grail of Teaching. It is for this reason that my vote goes to Adaptive Software and you should also give this one a thumbs up.

I have never experimented with adaptive software before but I think there are a range of applications and benefits of adaptive software in education that I can explore. Two examples that came to mind were adaptive learning and adaptive assessment. An example of an adaptive learning software (still quite elementary) would be Brainscape flashcards. Based on confidence levels that students rate in answering flashcards, Brainscape uses an algorithm to ensure that the cards rated with low confidence appear more frequently in the deck of cards. In this way, Brainscape claims that they enforce metacognition (rating of confidence) and spaced repetition of cards ensures students learn faster as backed up by a few studies. See the white paper on their website (https://www.brainscape.com/). I also think we will see more adaptive assessment software being adopted in future, as there seems to be support for the idea that they are more accurate in determining students’ level of ability as questions are determined by a students’ previous answers and in such a way each question can narrow the range of ability more precisely. Secondly, they could provide a more positive experience in assessment for students as they face questions they are confident in answering, they won’t feel overwhelmed by an onslaught of questions they can’t answer. A blog that explores this issue can be found at https://blog.criteriacorp.com/what-are-adaptive-assessments/. This also made me think about the possibility of adaptive feedback on assessments and the potential that it might have for large class groups such as a mainstream program that I teach in which has over 900 students.