I'm a 5th grade teacher, and I plan to use Khan Academy for additional enrichment for my advanced students.
I have one student who is VERY advanced and will likely breeze through all of the 5th grade math content without breaking a sweat. Will he be given access to 6th/7th grade math content as well? Or will he be "stuck" with only 5th grade content since I created his account for my 5th grade math class?
Hi Charity,
An interesting aspect of Khan Academy is that it's been created with the self-directed student in mind. So while it's possible to add a coach/teacher such as yourself, it's by no means a requirement -- and everything on the website is designed with the first assumption that learners don't have a coach.
As a result, your student is able to do whatever skills he wants. He can click on "Subjects" in the upper left and pick any topic on Khan -- so when he finishes fifth grade, he's just a couple of clicks away from moving on to something else.
I working in a grade 5-6 school and am working with six precocious fifth-graders myself. What I've learned (been told, really, but confirmed that it's true) is that students like this are usually better off getting a deeper understanding of the things they're learning, rather than just racing ahead and trying to learn as many different, new things as they can. So rather than trying to finish all of fifth grade before the rest of their class does and racing on to sixth or even seventh grade, I try to find more complicated versions of what their class is doing.
Here's a prime example: if the students in their class are working on adding/subtracting fractions with unlike denominators, I teach these six kids the Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic. I split them into groups of three and had them compete to write out the prime factorization of whole numbers on huge sheets of paper, then offered 50 bonus points if they could find any repeated factorizations. :-) But that led them to the realization that (a) every number has a prime factorization and (b) each one is unique. Boom. Then I had them do the Factors and Multiples section in Pre-Algebra on Khan and whaddayaknow? It applies to all those problems.
So that's my advice -- you'll find better, deeper exercises for your stand-out fifth-grader by selectively going into Pre-Algebra than just continuing on to sixth grade. In general, I think it's a bad idea for strong students to learn new material from Khan Academy videos (sorry, Sal), if they have a human that can lead them instead. They end up with a very shallow understanding -- just enough to be able to pass the exercises -- and then run into trouble later on when the topics get tougher.
There's little I enjoy more in my volunteering than those 30-minute sessions -- have fun with it! :-)
Doug
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