What is Personalization?

Abstract

I N THE long history of formal education, schooling has rarely been personalized. It would be easy to compile a long list of famous individuals from the past who have been expelled from schools for their purported inability to learn. It is interesting to speculate whether such notably creative people as Charles Darwin, Patrick Henry, James Russell Lowell, Sir Isaac Newton, Louis Pasteur, Sir Walter Scott, and Daniel Webster were actually advantaged by being pushed out of the schools of their time. In more recent years, Madame Curie, Orville Wright, Albert Einstein, and Marlon Brando shared their fate. But a truly personalized school would be able to recognize such budding genius. Indeed, it would be able to diagnose and support the whole range of human talents. A personalized school is one in which each individual person, whether student or teacher, matters a great deal and has a program that is good for him or her.

Flipped learning in an EFL environment: Does the teacher’s experience affect learning outcomes?

“…Because the students have already listened to their teachers explaining what was to be studied during class, more time is available for students to do practice exercises and tasks under the direct supervision of the teacher. With individualized instruction being an essential aspect of education (Keefe, 2007), it is vital that teachers look for ways to increase the possibility of making this a major part of their classrooms. The increased opportunity for personalized coaching which comes with the flipped classroom is perhaps the greatest benefit of this approach to teaching.…”

Exploring the Application of Flipped Classrooms on EFL Saudi Students' Speaking Skill

“…Since the early years of the twenty-first century, educational circles have been rebelling against the traditional form of classrooms where the instructor is the central focus of the class. The need for personalized instruction that meets students' different learning styles -and one that serves the ultimate goal of education (i.e., for students to learn) -is, and should be, the priority (Baker, 2000;Davies, Dean, & Ball, 2013;Keefe, 2007). In the realm of language learning and teaching, praised the use of language laboratories (Morton, 1960), which enabled students to extend their learning beyond the limits of class time (as cited in Leis, Cooke, & Tohei, 2015).…”

Leadership for Personalized Learning in a One-to-One Computing Environment

“…Personalized learning has been around at least 50 years, but remains largely ill-defined, evolving based upon context and purpose (Sebba, Brown, Steward, Galton, & James, 2008). Keefe (2007) traces the first use of the term personalized learning to Fred Keller's Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) at the University of Brasilia in 1962. PSI featured self-pacing, mastery requirements before moving on to new material and the use of proctors to foster testing, tutoring, and personal interaction (Keefe, 2007).…”

“…Keefe (2007) traces the first use of the term personalized learning to Fred Keller's Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) at the University of Brasilia in 1962. PSI featured self-pacing, mastery requirements before moving on to new material and the use of proctors to foster testing, tutoring, and personal interaction (Keefe, 2007). Later variations in personalized learning include work by Anne…”

“…Personalized learning has evolved over time, donning many definitions and conceptualizations (Childress & Benson, 2014;Horn, 2016;Keefe, 2007;Lee, 2014;Sebba, Brown, Steward, Galton, & James, 2008). Schools attempting to implement personalized learning strategies often do so differently.…”