August 9, 2012

What is Personalized Learning?

Aug. 9, 2012 at 03:40 PM | By Emily Kissane | Comment Count

Personalized learning helps students gain a greater understanding of their own interests, strengths, and areas for improvement. Based on these insights, students are then able to set academic and personal goals in order to develop individualized plans to meet those goals. Each step of personalized learning is designed to facilitate student achievement now and into the future.

Benefits of personalization are amplified with the creation of individual support networks in which each student has a group of adults and peers that offer support, encouragement, and provide feedback. Networks can help students identify and pursue academic and career goals as well as provide additional structure to keep students on track.

Using technology to enable the personalization and planning process also benefits students if it is used to enhance communication. Technology should not replace face-to-face interaction. For instance, prior to the widespread adoption of technology, student college and career plans were on paper and stored in a file cabinet in the counselor’s office. This method of college and career planning is static and has limited impact on achievement. Today, electronic plans streamline the counseling process to allow for greater personalization and communication between the counselor and the student.

Like other changes that shift school culture and practice, personalized learning requires commitment of time and resources by everyone involved. School leaders need to ensure that support is in place at every touch point to develop the capacities necessary for successful implementation and, most importantly, student success.