The Khan Academy has recently made headlines for its easily accessible educational tools, and its recent publication of materials geared directly towards classrooms following the Common Core Standards. With the influx of technology into schools, resources such as the Khan Academy are becoming more popular as support for direct instruction. However, the model of free, online, tutorial-based, education is contested, and the Khan Academy in particular has sparked debate for both its content, and its delivery methods.
As a future educator, I have been following the debate over the Khan Academy closely, ultimately deciding, based on the information I have read, it is a valuable support tool, but not one to be used in place of direct instruction. During my student teaching I was asked to create a Classroom Blueprint, in which I included research-based methods I believed would be helpful in my classroom. I listed the Khan Academy as one of these research-based methods, after using its official site, reading reviews and opinion articles, and researching the background of its creator. This is an example of my ability to access, analyze and synthesize information from disparate sources, and shows that I am able to use these skills to keep informed of the current trends in education.
Below is the link to the "Research-Based Methods" section of my Classroom Blueprint.