PILOTed

New Report on the K12 Learning Management System (LMS) market

Tying together data, learning standards, and digital content is becoming one of the next hurdles or opportunities for K12 Education, with Student Information Systems (SIS) and Learning Management Systems (LMS) jockeying for school and district leadership.

Simba Technologies has recently announced their PreK-12 Learning Management Systems: A Market Overview, and here are some observations from their analysis.

Image by cindiann via Flickr

The ideal system would allow teachers and students to sign in to the LMS from anywhere, and get access to all their district resources (intranet, hosting, social networking, storage, applications, content, portfolios, grades, assignments, etc.) with no further logins. This is complicated because of the wide range of resources available, along with diversity of functions that different districts, schools, and teachers deploy.

Despite these obstacles, something like 75% of all districts have implemented some type of learning management system. Some districts are attracted to simple “LMS Lite” alternatives of tools that are really designed for other purposes but can perform some LMS features, while other are looking to deploy more robust systems. Tools in the specialty category include Renaissance Place from Renaissance Learning for K12 content, and PD 360 from School Improvement Network for Professional Development.

The choice for broad powerful systems is primarily driven by a focus on management and organizational functions. Federal and state policies and regulations are key drivers of these comprehensive systems, with the need for the aggregation and disaggregation of data, along with the movement toward digital assessments and personalized instruction which are embedded in the Common Core standards. Over half of districts surveyed by Simba have policies moving their districts in this direction.

Interestingly, the features deemed least important by district personnel were collaborative and presentation tools.

While Blackboard commands more than 50% of the higher education LMS market, Simba’s report indicated that in K12, the big three (Blackboard, Pearson Learning Studio, and Moodle) account for 30% of the market. The total market, though, is not huge yet. Simba projects that sales of LMS’s in K12 will reach about $375 million in two years.

This is just a few of the findings of the report, which “examines the role of Learning Management Systems (LMSs), which already are beginning to reshape the delivery, management, and administration of educational content in the U.S. PreK-12 sector, enabling cost-savings, convenience, new more personalized pedagogical models, and new opportunities for system and content providers.”

You can order the PreK-12 Learning Management Systems: A Market Overview by following the link or calling 240-747-3091.

 

Related articles

• Angel is Going Away? (elearningcentralia.wordpress.com)
• Will Social Media Replace LMSs in Higher Education? (carolhbates.com)
• OpenClass: Google Launches a Free LMS (q-ontech.blogspot.com)
• Acquisition of Wimba and Elluminate by Blackboard (PilotEd)
• The Ed Tech Market (PilotEd)
• Freeing the LMS (downes.ca)

Picturing to Learn Science

Picture this.

There is a group of scientists discussing a concept. One of the scientists has a new idea. What do you think he or she does to explain it to the others?

Most likely, she grabs a pencil and paper and makes a drawing to illustrate the concept. And what happens? The process of drawing clarifies various issues in her mind. Discussing the drawing with the other scientists allows them to question her assumptions and address any misunderstandings.

Imagine if we used this technique to teach science in schools. Imagine that students drew their understandings of complex concepts to explain their insights to each other and to their teachers.

This is actually the Picturing to Learn methodology pioneered by Felice Frankel. Ms. Frankel is a science photographer who teaches at MIT. Ms Frankel elaborates:

This whole notion of visually representing an idea, in order to communicate or teach, makes the students clarify in their own mind the essential pieces of the idea, creating a visual metaphor.

Making a drawing in order to explain is a means of clarifying in your own mind what you want to say, it forces the students to think deeper. In the process, students reveal any misconceptions in scientific understanding, even with very smart students. This is non-threating and double feedback for the teacher: it shows her what the students are misunderstanding, and if the same misunderstandings continually crop up, it shows the teacher that she needs to adjust her teaching.

Kids are unbelievably visual; it’s the world they are growing up in today. This technique not only matches how scientists themselves communicate, it syncs with how students think. Visual thinking is how we understand science, it’s how Einstein was able to first grasp the concept of relativity.

Through NSF grants, Frankel has introduced this technique in universities, high schools, and middle schools. In one example, a college student received an A in chemistry, and was able to answer a question about which liquid would boil at a lower temperature because she had memorized the formulas and knew when to apply them. When asked to draw the process, she (and others in the class) completely missed the actual reason some liquids boil at different temperatures, the effect of molecular bonding. The teachers were astounded that their students could parrot back the right answers on tests, yet have such large gaps in their conceptual understanding.

At a Middle School in Harlem, Frankel conducted a summer boot camp for teachers. The teachers worked in groups to create pictures explaining the water cycle, which is often taught in 7^th and 8^th grade science. This not only provided a non-threatening way for the teachers to address their own knowledge gaps, it also inspired them to use Picturing to Learn with their own students, and Frankel said the teachers have responded that their students have made unbelievable strides in their comprehension and interest. The teachers reported that over ¾ of their students’ drawings show problematic explanations, many of which would never have been caught with standard textbook problem sets or tests.

Ms Frankel is currently developing rubrics to make it easier for teachers to adopt Picturing to Learn in their classrooms, and can work with school, districts, or content providers that want to incorporate these techniques in their science curriculum, and can be reached through her website: http://www.picturingtolearn.org/