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It feels weird and unfair to focus solely on Kahn here when he’s competing with some random teacher or professor’s droning, confusing, non-interactive lecture t

by rzz3 1mo ago

It feels weird and unfair to focus solely on Kahn here when he’s competing with some random teacher or professor’s droning, confusing, non-interactive lecture that’s less engaging and just as lacking in interactivity or application. I also don’t think he ever purports to be “all you need” to learn. It reminds me of the people who criticize Duolingo because you can’t actually reach perfect fluency through their app--like wasn’t it always obvious that it was never meant to be the only education you need; wasn’t it always obvious that you need to actually _speak_ a language to learn it? And yet it’s still a great app that has helped millions of people learn languages.

runarberg 1mo ago
I agree that it is unfair and perhaps even unnecessary to focus solely on Khan here. But I think it must be acknowledged he has caused (intentionally or not) a ton of damage to the state of education. He sparked a movement of “innovation” and “disruption” that managed to push a lot of unproven teaching methods that ran against standard pedagogy which made a lot of entrepreneurs a lot of money. I don‘t think Khan is solely to blame for this. These entrepreneurs would probably have done equal amount of damage without Khan, siphoning funds away from proven solutions like paying teachers and providing school lunches, and into ballooning administration costs and 3rd-party tech companies. However Khan is for better or for worse the face of this movement and will justly or unjustly get that blame. Duolingo is however less ambiguous. There is very little language learning going on on their platform. You trick people into playing their stupid game and watching their stupid ads, thinking that they are learning, when in fact they are not.
- jonfromsf 1mo ago
  What entrepreneurs in the US have made huge money from EdTech exits? I can’t think of any. So this critique doesn’t seem fair to me. (India is another story. If you are referring to ByJu, which was absolutely a predatory enterprise, I agree with you)
- blackoil 1mo ago
  These platform exists because traditional methods are failing students in education. Some of them are scam but blaming it on Khan is BS.
  - runarberg 1mo ago
    Traditional methods are failing because of austerity and capitalism. Pedagogy is a science which has expert studying these things. And most teachers are well aware of the science and know what works. Stuff like instant feedback has been known to work better since behavioralism in the 1950s. Problem is that whenever these solutions are applied they are used to cut corners and make education cheaper, resulting in a net loss. This is a problem of austerity. Note that I was explicitly not blaming this on Khan, I was merely stating that he is the face if this movement and as such will get a lot of the blame, regardless of how much he deserves it. My personal feelings about him is that he is actually an excellent teacher, and has independently discovered what pedagogical scientists have known for decades. He however allowed his discoveries to be packaged as a neat capitalist solution, and then has watched as his “discoveries” were used to excuse austerity (and made a bunch of money doing so). At best he is naive, and at worst he is an active participant. Either way he deserves at least some of the blame (though personally, I would rather blame the system, and point to him as being a part of it)

by rzz3 1mo ago

runarberg 1mo ago

I agree that it is unfair and perhaps even unnecessary to focus solely on Khan here. But I think it must be acknowledged he has caused (intentionally or not) a ton of damage to the state of education. He sparked a movement of “innovation” and “disruption” that managed to push a lot of unproven teaching methods that ran against standard pedagogy which made a lot of entrepreneurs a lot of money. I don‘t think Khan is solely to blame for this. These entrepreneurs would probably have done equal amount of damage without Khan, siphoning funds away from proven solutions like paying teachers and providing school lunches, and into ballooning administration costs and 3rd-party tech companies. However Khan is for better or for worse the face of this movement and will justly or unjustly get that blame. Duolingo is however less ambiguous. There is very little language learning going on on their platform. You trick people into playing their stupid game and watching their stupid ads, thinking that they are learning, when in fact they are not.

jonfromsf 1mo ago
What entrepreneurs in the US have made huge money from EdTech exits? I can’t think of any. So this critique doesn’t seem fair to me. (India is another story. If you are referring to ByJu, which was absolutely a predatory enterprise, I agree with you)
blackoil 1mo ago
These platform exists because traditional methods are failing students in education. Some of them are scam but blaming it on Khan is BS.
- runarberg 1mo ago
  Traditional methods are failing because of austerity and capitalism. Pedagogy is a science which has expert studying these things. And most teachers are well aware of the science and know what works. Stuff like instant feedback has been known to work better since behavioralism in the 1950s. Problem is that whenever these solutions are applied they are used to cut corners and make education cheaper, resulting in a net loss. This is a problem of austerity. Note that I was explicitly not blaming this on Khan, I was merely stating that he is the face if this movement and as such will get a lot of the blame, regardless of how much he deserves it. My personal feelings about him is that he is actually an excellent teacher, and has independently discovered what pedagogical scientists have known for decades. He however allowed his discoveries to be packaged as a neat capitalist solution, and then has watched as his “discoveries” were used to excuse austerity (and made a bunch of money doing so). At best he is naive, and at worst he is an active participant. Either way he deserves at least some of the blame (though personally, I would rather blame the system, and point to him as being a part of it)