Design Spotlight

 

Personalization at Scale

Andrea Goetchius and Dana Britt, Design and Implementation Consultants

They say everything is bigger in Texas, but we’d like to propose a new ending to that adage.  For us, everything is bigger in Georgia -- Fulton County, Georgia to be exact. That’s because in the past year we’ve worked with nearly 100 schools across 5 waves to roll out personalized learning.  In doing this, we’ve had to grapple with questions such as: How do you personalize learning for 100,000 students at a time?  And what does training look like for that many schools and teachers?

Education Elements partners with districts across the country to strategically execute a plan for personalized learning.  We have expertise in implementation and know the potential successes and pitfalls.  Because of extensive knowledge of what works, we’ve even developed a framework called the Core Four to help districts divide PL into manageable focus areas, and these four areas drive the learning in our workshops.  But when we began working with Fulton, we quickly realized in partnership with the district that they had a need and interest to define personalized learning on their own terms.  Like we said, everything’s bigger in Fulton, so we have not four but seven principles of personalized learning that get at a diverse range of personalization: Choice & Voice, Just-in-time Direct Instruction, Flexible Pacing, Varied Strategies, Mastery-based Assessments, and Choice for Demonstrating Learning. 

Our charge has been to bring these seven principles of personalized learning to life, and in doing so, to help educators rethink how school could meet every student’s needs, interests, and skills.  In one recent workshop we expanded from a traditional 3-station rotation to include eight flexibly paced centers that allowed participants to take an experiential deep dive into the principles.  For example, in the mastery-based assessment station, participants experienced a traditional time-bound learning environment versus a mastery-based one -- all through folding origami shapes.  At the just-in-time direct instruction station, participants first took an assessment to place them into leveled groups based on their misconceptions of the principles.  If participants displayed mastery, they were free to move on to another station entirely.  Upon completion of the centers, we asked participants to define the principles for themselves.  Much like we want students to explore, create, and innovate in their learning  -- we want district staff, administrators, teachers and coaches to do the same.

Want to see how we did it?  Check out the session agenda here!

 

 

NEW White Paper: The Core Four Elements of Personalized Learning

It takes four core elements to succeed with personalized learning.  Learn what they are and how you can put them to use in your district:

 

 

 

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More Useful Resources

• Want to know more about working with  Ed Elements?  Check out the stories of four of our districts
• Start your Personalized Learning Journey on the right foot.  Download the Personalized Learning District Framework
• Download the Personalized Learning Playbook from our website for FREE, enjoy the graphics from the book, and join our Personalized Learning Community to discuss the playbook, ask questions and share thoughts.  You can also buy it from Amazon here!
• What have other districts done that you should avoid?  Check out the 6 Personalized Learning Risks That Districts Should Avoid