In November of 2015 Salman Khan delivered a speech at TED Talks Live in New York, New York. He presented his thoughts on the most effective way to help students master their subject matter to an auditorium full of educators. Salman Khan is a Business graduate of MIT and Harvard who first gained recognition on YouTube where he posted Math tutorials for his cousins. What started with his YouTube channel led him to found Khan Academy, a free online education service that has helped over 10 million students to better understand all subjects in the classroom.
In his speech at TED, Khan discusses the subject of mastery-based learning. Khan describes mastery-based learning as a method where “instead of artificially constraining when and how long …show more content…
From that foundation of the basic knowledge of that skill, higher levels of skill can be built. I think this is a powerful comparison to make. It is easy to understand and very much lays the foundation for Khan’s argument. To further give insight into to what he views are flaws in the educational system, Khan asks the audience to imagine that we treated building a home in the same way. He goes on to set the scene that a contractor is given two weeks to build the foundation. Upon inspection, the foundation is not quite ready but the contractor must move on to the first floor, then the second and third, while never quite completing the previous. Ultimately the home collapses and we blame that the contractor simply could not do it. This example sounds outrageous but as educators, the audience sees the parallels and khan even draws a few laughs. It is a simple example that everyone …show more content…
He asks how many cancer researchers or organic chemists does the world miss out on because they believe they simply are not smart enough? Khan states to allow everyone to reach their full potential is a social imperative and with a new technological age upon us, it can be done. This is another powerful argument. I think his use of the term “social imperative” makes a strong statement of how important it is to allow students the tools they need to
In his speech at TED, Khan discusses the subject of mastery-based learning. Khan describes mastery-based learning as a method where “instead of artificially constraining when and how long …show more content…
From that foundation of the basic knowledge of that skill, higher levels of skill can be built. I think this is a powerful comparison to make. It is easy to understand and very much lays the foundation for Khan’s argument. To further give insight into to what he views are flaws in the educational system, Khan asks the audience to imagine that we treated building a home in the same way. He goes on to set the scene that a contractor is given two weeks to build the foundation. Upon inspection, the foundation is not quite ready but the contractor must move on to the first floor, then the second and third, while never quite completing the previous. Ultimately the home collapses and we blame that the contractor simply could not do it. This example sounds outrageous but as educators, the audience sees the parallels and khan even draws a few laughs. It is a simple example that everyone …show more content…
He asks how many cancer researchers or organic chemists does the world miss out on because they believe they simply are not smart enough? Khan states to allow everyone to reach their full potential is a social imperative and with a new technological age upon us, it can be done. This is another powerful argument. I think his use of the term “social imperative” makes a strong statement of how important it is to allow students the tools they need to