Hi all,

Does anyone have any experience with Competency Based Education in their school district? Pros and cons? My district is considering implementing some version of CBE, and am looking for feedback/personal experiences.

At first blush it seems like a wonderful thing for gifted kids - wondering if that's true.

Thanks!

Pinecroft

Run.

We had a thread on CBE recently. Here you go:

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted....s/218632/Competency_Based_Education.html

Thank you Platypus! I had done a search, and came up empty (well, with a zillion other things...). Guess I didn't search specifically enough. :-)

Very interesting thread, and helpful.

Puffin - why do you say run?

CBE done "right" (mastery based movement; able to test out of 'required' courses or chunks of courses, etc.) seems like a great thing. I can see how to do it at middle and high school fairly easily, but elementary seems harder. Particularly in a regular public school setting... Anyone have insight on that - experience of what has worked/failed?

Another potential benefit of mastery-based/standards-based/competency-based education is that it allows me to write reduced-work accommodations for students who need it that are based on demonstrated mastery of the learning standards.

Like many other ideas, the strength or weakness of this is largely in the implementation.

Sure-- but ask yourself this-- don't appropriate standards-based learning and curricular design sound pretty good in theory, too?

Just noting that.

DD lived with "CBE" as a component of her 'assessment' scheme her last 3y with her online public charter school. Basically, the teacher convened with students a few times during the year, and ran down some checklist/rubric. That was it. As far as we could tell, just like with common core standards, it NEVER served as a 'floor' for instruction-- just a ceiling, and gold stars for getting there. There was no "Okay, you know this-- moving on." NO pretesting-- which is an essential component of CBE if it's going to work for high-ability students.

HTH. I was underwhelmed and DD was downright mystified by the process. It felt like... well, I won't say. It's not family friendly.

Pretty much what HowlerKarma said. If you had a good teacher/student ratio and a flexible system then it could be good but what it seems to end up at is a everybody reaches the minimum standard . Here it appears to result in kids doing the minimum work to achieve especially boys. Also since our system works on 30 kids a class the ones who are already at standard get to wait not advance. From time to time there is talk of letting kids who ard ready sit the exam when ready but that would probably require computerised testing and NZ has always had long answer type exams not multi choice. Then the kid would be a subject short until the beginning of the following year anyway.

I am pleased to read this post as it is very useful for the students. You can use these types of services to take help for writing college assignments and practical notebooks. The edubirdie is a good service that gives plagiarism-free write-up. I am really happy with this.

A service that writes papers, intended for students to pass off as their own, does NOT help these students in the long run. Turning in an essay which one purchased may get one a decent grade, but it is fundamentally dishonest. This provides bad karma. For example, some of the many possible downsides and negative outcomes:
- The student does not learn, practice, or polish their research and writing skills.
- The student does not develop their "voice."
- The paper is not in the student's "voice."
- The data collected by the company may be sold.
- The records from using the service, including payment for the paper, could provide "leverage" to be used against the student and/or their family throughout life.

I would recommend AGAINST using this service, or similar services.

I would also recommend caution about the person who posted this resource, as they are new to the forum, this is their first post, it is their only post in more than 2 months of membership, and it is off-topic... not related to LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS or to Competency Based Education/Learning. It would be better placed under Recommended Resources.

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BTW, thank you Platypus, for posting the link to the prior discussion thread on CBE, which contains a wealth of information.
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We find that a competency based model works great but my daughter is not in a public school setting. She is in a school with a 1-1 program. A minimum number of sessions must be held for each course but no maximum. The student needs to take as many additional sessions as needed to demonstrate mastery of the required material. On the other hand for my daughter the required material is generally acquired pretty quickly or she demonstrates prior knowledge. This means that she and her teachers can go into more depth, examine nuances or look at additional information not included in the basic required curriculum. She tends to become fascinated with certain parts of the material and they spend time doing extra research. As with many things I think it depends on how it is implemented. With our kind of program it’s perfect for a kid who is motivated to learn as much as they can. YMMV