Teacher residency programs, which are modeled on medical residencies, are growing in popularity as a way to improve teacher effectiveness. Future teachers learn the craft by working for a year with experienced teachers, who provide guidance, feedback and support. But Summit’s program is the first of its kind to prepare teachers to lead classrooms structured around personalized learning, said Pam Lamcke, director of the program.
Personalized learning enables students to learn academic content at their own pace, moving on when they show mastery of material in a variety of content areas. A pioneer in personalized learning, Summit developed its online Summit Learning Platform with help from Facebook engineers. Students choose how to learn from playlists of videos, animations, exercises and texts. Teachers “facilitate,” but let students take the lead. For most of the school day, students work on projects, individually and in groups. The goal is for students to become self-directed learners.
Summit is offering its online learning platform and model, along with training, tech support and mentoring, at no charge to interested schools. Some 330 schools nationwide — 70 percent are traditional public schools — are Summit Learning Program partners this school year with more expected in 2018-19. Funding from the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative, created by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan, supports the program.
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