Operating System for the Classroom

By now most people have heard of Sal Khan and the Khan Academy.  If you haven’t, the following brief video introduction is worth watching, but more importantly you just need to check out one of the 2000 or so videos on the site.

What I love most about what Sal has done is that he started with a tactical problem (how do I tutor my cousins) and through brute force execution turned that into a solution for a truly strategic problem.  His goal is not just to teach kids about math, science and other topics, but rather to become the “operating system for the classroom.”  If you think that mission is crazy, then you have to watch this talk by Sal given a few years ago at the MIT Club of Northern California.  If you watch the bit starting at 17:55 you’ll see Sal’s vision for “flipping the model” and how online, video lectures can become the operating system for teaching.

Check it out.  Amazing!