This is the tenth in a series of AI in Education specials, where I speak to the world’s leading experts about how AI is changing teaching and learning.
And - I actually LOVE the “pay students” approach! My question to you (& anyone who is skeptical - including teachers?!): How many of you would do the job you do if you did NOT get paid?? (NO Teacher has told me they would teach for “nothing”!)
So - if learning is the “job” of students = WHY would you NOT pay them in some way?
And the definition of positive reinforcement is that it is ANY thing that increases the “desired behaviour” - so - if “pay” in any form increases learning - THEN why not use it?!
I LOVE this “pay”concept which is the foundation of any & every token economy that we use in special education - praise included!!
Yet we STILL do not know which academic subjects Alpha actually ‘teaches’!? One can see the approach working for, eg, maths, elements of grammar, writing, comprehension, composition etc. but what about History, Literature, the Humanities? You can guess what I think about totally teacherless teaching across a child/adolescent’s entire schooling. Let the implications of that that sink in. The learning ‘rewards’ analogy with teacher CPD is not appropriate or apt. You can see why. The whole business, the more I read about it seems uber-utilitarian. If all learning is tailored to a child’s immediate interests - as a previous interviewee claimed - then what’s the child really learning. If all pursuits appear to end in self- gratification of one kind or another, what does that say. And this comes from a person initially very taken with Alpha’s efficient, accelerated learning potential, massive SAT scores etc etc. But not at any cost.
Personally, l think these are all valid challenges.
What I keep coming back to, though, is what we're comparing it to. Not the 'ideal' vision we might have for what every school should be, but the reality of what most schools really are. Even in some of the best schools we're still hearing how difficult it is to recruit maths specialists, and we keep hearing stories of 'settling' for whoever shows up to interview.
So I just remain very open - let's see where it goes and wish them the best of luck with it. Flash forward a few decades and maybe the end result lies somewhere between their current model and the vision you're painting implicitly above.
Such an important point. Most teachers compare the default to themselves. And as the article says, a tiny minority of teachers read about teaching at this level.
Since moving to a small school, the tyranny of recruitment has become very clear as we only have around one teacher per subject area.
I agree, pointless to measure it against a mythical ideal. On the other hand, relentless praise from several quarters without a real account of what’s being ‘taught’ does leave open some room for doubt.
Exactly!! They don't publish their graduation requirements, which means that because it's the US they have complete flexibility. There's really no way of knowing what benefit the school is bringing.
I don’t know how to say it any better better, and I usually abstain from blunt judgements, but this:
“Kris argued that whilst rich parents are rich parents, rich kids are just kids, with everything that comes with being a child”
is just embarrassing. I seriously thought about not going any further. Do I have to explain why rich kids are privileged? Some kids struggle to find out where Paris is, others go there regularly in holiday, visit the Louvre and Versailles, speak French, learn a lot about France. They have parents who can foster their vocabulary, provide them with quality educational toys or books, have time to spend with them or can pay someone else to do it.
*I do agree it is a weak piece of rhetoric. But the broader point still stands. Many experimental schools that service rich parents fail drastically. That's the point. There are many ways to triangulate the success/failure of the method even though rich kids are required to run the experiment.
The alpha school point about no teachers reminds me of Alt-school, started by Max Ventilla. They called the teachers 'data detectives'. It didn't work!
There have been a few other similar projects as well that haven't worked. I can't recall the names of all of them.
I think three things make me feel more optimistic about Alpha:
1. They've been in existence for 12 to 13 years already, so that is longer than most of these programmes have survived previously.
2. I could be entirely wrong about this, but I don't think they're raising investment, which is a really big deal because it means they won't be under the same pressures. It's the economics more than anything that tends to kill off ed-tech ventures
3. The all-round competence of the team; the fact that they have people like Karl, Becky, Peps, Sarah and Zach all working on this, and not just them, but their engineers are more knowledgeable about cognitive science than, sadly, the vast, vast majority of teachers.
A bit like I said when speaking with Craig, whether or not they will succeed is still an open question, but I do genuinely think the way they're going about this is new. It is different from what's happened in the past. They have a greater probability of success than previous efforts, and I really do hope that they succeed because we will all learn a great deal from it, and probably be able to improve education for everybody as a consequence.
I find this article really interesting. I’m currently studying for an MA in Education & Technology, and the research is pretty substantial when it comes to the lack of understanding and CPD for staff. This seems to be one of the biggest concerns, particularly with new technologies in general and with AI specifically.
Personally, I believe that teaching will eventually ‘flip’, with teachers acting more as coaches and mentors, organising teamwork, debate, and speaking-and-listening sessions.
Fully in agreement that changes will be slow and incremental. But, what small, realistic steps do you think schools could take now to explore AI‑supported learning without overhauling their entire model?
Thanks for this post - a TOTALLY from a
Different perspective! 👍👍
And - I actually LOVE the “pay students” approach! My question to you (& anyone who is skeptical - including teachers?!): How many of you would do the job you do if you did NOT get paid?? (NO Teacher has told me they would teach for “nothing”!)
So - if learning is the “job” of students = WHY would you NOT pay them in some way?
And the definition of positive reinforcement is that it is ANY thing that increases the “desired behaviour” - so - if “pay” in any form increases learning - THEN why not use it?!
I LOVE this “pay”concept which is the foundation of any & every token economy that we use in special education - praise included!!
MANY thanks to you both for this reminder!! 👍👍❤️
Yet we STILL do not know which academic subjects Alpha actually ‘teaches’!? One can see the approach working for, eg, maths, elements of grammar, writing, comprehension, composition etc. but what about History, Literature, the Humanities? You can guess what I think about totally teacherless teaching across a child/adolescent’s entire schooling. Let the implications of that that sink in. The learning ‘rewards’ analogy with teacher CPD is not appropriate or apt. You can see why. The whole business, the more I read about it seems uber-utilitarian. If all learning is tailored to a child’s immediate interests - as a previous interviewee claimed - then what’s the child really learning. If all pursuits appear to end in self- gratification of one kind or another, what does that say. And this comes from a person initially very taken with Alpha’s efficient, accelerated learning potential, massive SAT scores etc etc. But not at any cost.
Personally, l think these are all valid challenges.
What I keep coming back to, though, is what we're comparing it to. Not the 'ideal' vision we might have for what every school should be, but the reality of what most schools really are. Even in some of the best schools we're still hearing how difficult it is to recruit maths specialists, and we keep hearing stories of 'settling' for whoever shows up to interview.
So I just remain very open - let's see where it goes and wish them the best of luck with it. Flash forward a few decades and maybe the end result lies somewhere between their current model and the vision you're painting implicitly above.
Such an important point. Most teachers compare the default to themselves. And as the article says, a tiny minority of teachers read about teaching at this level.
Since moving to a small school, the tyranny of recruitment has become very clear as we only have around one teacher per subject area.
I agree, pointless to measure it against a mythical ideal. On the other hand, relentless praise from several quarters without a real account of what’s being ‘taught’ does leave open some room for doubt.
Exactly!! They don't publish their graduation requirements, which means that because it's the US they have complete flexibility. There's really no way of knowing what benefit the school is bringing.
And, as the saying goes... follow the money.
I don’t know how to say it any better better, and I usually abstain from blunt judgements, but this:
“Kris argued that whilst rich parents are rich parents, rich kids are just kids, with everything that comes with being a child”
is just embarrassing. I seriously thought about not going any further. Do I have to explain why rich kids are privileged? Some kids struggle to find out where Paris is, others go there regularly in holiday, visit the Louvre and Versailles, speak French, learn a lot about France. They have parents who can foster their vocabulary, provide them with quality educational toys or books, have time to spend with them or can pay someone else to do it.
Please.
*I do agree it is a weak piece of rhetoric. But the broader point still stands. Many experimental schools that service rich parents fail drastically. That's the point. There are many ways to triangulate the success/failure of the method even though rich kids are required to run the experiment.
The alpha school point about no teachers reminds me of Alt-school, started by Max Ventilla. They called the teachers 'data detectives'. It didn't work!
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/03/07/altschools-disrupted-education
There have been a few other similar projects as well that haven't worked. I can't recall the names of all of them.
I think three things make me feel more optimistic about Alpha:
1. They've been in existence for 12 to 13 years already, so that is longer than most of these programmes have survived previously.
2. I could be entirely wrong about this, but I don't think they're raising investment, which is a really big deal because it means they won't be under the same pressures. It's the economics more than anything that tends to kill off ed-tech ventures
3. The all-round competence of the team; the fact that they have people like Karl, Becky, Peps, Sarah and Zach all working on this, and not just them, but their engineers are more knowledgeable about cognitive science than, sadly, the vast, vast majority of teachers.
A bit like I said when speaking with Craig, whether or not they will succeed is still an open question, but I do genuinely think the way they're going about this is new. It is different from what's happened in the past. They have a greater probability of success than previous efforts, and I really do hope that they succeed because we will all learn a great deal from it, and probably be able to improve education for everybody as a consequence.
I find this article really interesting. I’m currently studying for an MA in Education & Technology, and the research is pretty substantial when it comes to the lack of understanding and CPD for staff. This seems to be one of the biggest concerns, particularly with new technologies in general and with AI specifically.
Personally, I believe that teaching will eventually ‘flip’, with teachers acting more as coaches and mentors, organising teamwork, debate, and speaking-and-listening sessions.
Fully in agreement that changes will be slow and incremental. But, what small, realistic steps do you think schools could take now to explore AI‑supported learning without overhauling their entire model?