Ms Manju Rana, Director Schools, Seth Anandram Jaipuria Group of Schools

Adaptive learning, simply defined, is the personalized learning that adapts to the needs of a student. It involves customized learning pathways, periodic assessments, and prompt feedback to drive a student’s learning experience for better outcomes.

At the core of adaptive learning is the idea that each learner is unique.The pace at which one student assimilates information and develops an understanding of a subject differs from the pace of another. The one-size-fits-all generic approach of teaching may not suit the studentswho require a teacher’s special attention to clear doubts and cover learning gaps before moving on to the next lesson.In adaptive learning, individual learning needs of students can be effectively addressed. But there is a catch.

Adaptive learning involving in-person teacher participation has a limited scope.A teacher can at best adapt to the learning requirements of only a few students. This is where technology steps into the breach.

Adaptive learning becomes accessible to a large number of students through web-based technological platforms and data-driven intelligent systems. Usually, it happens in two ways: firstly, an educator designs a teaching sequence which charts the course of a student’s learning; secondly, a learning programme powered by smart algorithm assesses the progress of a student and decides the learning path.

This type of technologically powered adaptive learning benefits students in achieving the best learning outcomes. Students get to determine the pace of their learning, clear doubts, revise content, and get customized guidance from teacher, whenever needed. The algorithm or the expert teaching sequenceassesses the performance, gives real-time feedback and helps the learners move ahead to the next step in the learning path.

Adaptive Learning In Schools:

Adaptive learning has found relevance particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic. It is a strategy actively employed by some schools and EdTech platforms to cover the learning lossin students.

• Adaptive learning is being used especially for the children with special learning needs.
• Schools and EdTech platforms are designing customized adaptive learning modules to target specific learning gaps in students.
• Language learners, especially learners of a foreign language, find adaptive learning very useful.
• Adaptive learning suits objective knowledge better than subjective knowledge that involves research, thesis etc.

Adaptive learning has emerged as a big thing in the first-world countries. In India, the digital divide and the high number of school-going population (250 million at present) restrict its widespread use at present, but adaptive learning indeed has the potential to drive the growth of quality education and assist in transforming the country into the knowledge superpower envisioned in the National Education Policy 2020.

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