Is personalized learning the key to helping struggling students succeed?
Unlike the traditional teaching and learning model, personalized learning puts students in the driver’s seat of their own learning. Traditional teaching and learning center around a one-to-many model with one teacher for many students.
Most parents will have already experienced the struggles connected with the traditional model. In a large group of students, is it possible for every student to be able to learn at the same pace as the rest of their classmates? The answer is no.
Every student learns differently and at their own pace: a group learning environment where students learn an idea or grasp a concept at the same time as their classmates can cause struggles for students who are not learning at the same pace. In the traditional classroom, an otherwise bright student can miss a concept and fall behind. This can create a cycle of poor grades and low confidence that can be challenging to overcome.
Personalized learning helps all students
By eliminating the one-size-fits-all approach, personalized learning programs focus on student individuality. Rather than leading a group of students through the same exercise, the personal approach allows students to take control of their learning, with their needs, skills, and interests guiding the pace and intensity of their education.
There are three main factors guiding a student’s personalized or customized programs:
- Customization: whether it is understanding Shakespeare or completing a unit on fractions, customized learning programs help students reach a specific goal using their unique learning needs. A student could be a visual, auditory, or kinaesthetic (or another type) or learner; customization allows both student and teacher to work according to the student’s needs.
- Pacing: a major struggle for many students is that the class will move on to a new subject before they have had a chance to fully grasp the current topic. Pacing allows students to spend as little or as much time as they need on a concept before moving on. Pacing also helps students from feeling frustrated or bored with their learning.
- Goal-Setting: with personalized learning, students are able to set their own learning goals themselves. Whether the goal is to not fail the next test or to get the highest mark in the class, students work toward their own unique goals. Incorporating their interests and preferences into the learning help keeps students motivated to achieve their goals.
Assessments Provide Insight
Identifying students’ unique learning needs is the starting point for all personal learning. All customized programs at GradePower Learning begin with a comprehensive learning assessment to determine each student’s individual learning needs. The assessment provides insights into how a particular student learns, which allows our educational professionals to design a program to match those needs exactly.
Personalized programs are critical to GradePower Learning’s success with students of all ages. Once students realize they have the skills necessary to complete a task, their interest and effort increases and they begin to see success. Pulling that out is the objective of GradePower Learning: to help students of all ages have those “a-ha!” moments necessary to spark a lifelong love of learning.
Contact your local center today to learn more about how GradePower Learning can help your child learn with a personalized program best suited for their needs.
