Self-paced learning especially powerful for adult learners
Many students prefer to watch a video lecture than attend an actual lecture because they can pause a video lecture or rewind and watch something again. (Also, many students don’t like dragging themselves out of bed at a particular time, sitting in large lecture halls, being distracted by other students, worrying about their appearance, etc.)
This past weekend, I experienced another huge advantage. I spent part of the weekend refreshing my rusty knowledge of linear algebra. I watched about thirty of Sal Khan’s linear algebra lectures. Since I once knew this stuff well, I was able to skip past material I felt comfortable with, like the tedious algebraic steps to convert an augmented matrix into reduced row echelon form. I needed only a quick reminder of the process, not a demonstration of the mechanics, so I skipped it. I also skipped several lectures, including “Proof of the Cauchy-Schwarz Inequality.” I can always go back and watch it, but right now that material seems of minor importance.
Posted by James on Tuesday, June 07, 2011