Disrupting Class

Disrupting  Class: How Disruptive Innovation will chance the way the world learns

By Clayton Christensen, Michael Horn, and Curtis Johnson

 Chapter 1: Why Schools Struggle to Teach Differently when each Student Learns Differently

1. Explain the difference between interdependence and modularity.  How is education currently organized?

         All products and services are created in a way in which they have a particular design and architecture to them. The design that a product has determines all of the parts needed in the product and in which way they must interact with one another. This is interaction and where parts fit together is called interface. Products can be designed in two ways: interdependent and with modularity.  When a product is made and the design is interdependent then one part relies and depends on how another part is made and designed. In other words, the components of this product are dependent on each other. Therefore, these parts must be designed together to make the final product or the product will not function properly. On the other hand, modularity within a product refers to the components ability to not depend on each other and, therefore, can be designed separately. With a modularity design, the parts have flexibility and will still fit together even though they may be designed by different makers. This flexibility makes it possible for the product to either be made with interdependent parts or by different organizations.

           Education also has an interface that determines how its different parts work together to create the whole, because it is considered a service. Today, education is designed through this notion of interdependency. Education is dependent on other components in four main ways, as the author mentions: temporal (material instructed in high school is dependent on material instructed in junior high), lateral (changing how Spanish grammar is taught is dependent on the strategies English grammar is taught), physical (certain ways school buildings and classrooms are laid out prevent project-based learning even though this strategy is known to be highly effective), and hierarchical (different educational laws at different levels ranging from local all the way up to federal).

Chapter 2: Making the Shift:  Schools meet Society’s need

2. Explain the disruptive innovation theory.  What does this have to do with schools?

           “The disruptive innovation theory explains why organizations struggle with certain kinds of innovation and how organizations can predictably succeed in innovation.” Innovation is an essential part of a business model. Innovation allows companies and organizations to improve their products for their customer, for example, making them more effective or easier to use. There are two contrasting innovations: sustaining and disruptive. Sustaining innovation refers to ones used by organizations to increase customer performance by increasing their own performance. Whereas, Disruptive innovations decrease performance for the customer as well as the organization.

           In general, schools have shown an increase in performance. They have shown improvement within the aspect of sustaining innovations. The authors of the book present this argument that the emerging use of technology and schools could very be a disruption in the system. As this could be an innovation of the system that results in servicing more struggling student and non-consumers.

Chapter 3: Crammed Classroom Computers

3.  Why doesn’t cramming computers in schools work?  Explain this in terms of the lessons from Rachmaninoff (what does it mean to compete against non-consumption?)

           President Clinton attempted to make computers an integral part of education, making them as intriguing as video games, and having teachers use computers and technology to teach in the classroom. However, this idea of cramming computers into schools has not been completely successful because educational software has not become an essential part of the curriculum yet. The goals President Clinton set out are still not accomplished after so many years. Schools continue to use technology to only supplement the traditional ways of teaching continuing schools on the path of sustaining innovations rather than disruptive.

           In terms of the change from sustaining innovations and disrupting in the Rachmaninoff experience, customers struggled to see Rachmaninoff in concert, and Edison’s phonograph was not up to the quality of music for customers at the time. The recordings could be played anywhere, but without the quality customers chose not to buy the phonographs. After these sustaining innovations, RCA Victor had to bring the same quality to the phonograph to that of hearing Rachmaninoff in person. This ultimate change opened the doors for customers who were not yet consuming, to consume, creating a disruptive innovation.

           This new disruptive innovation, therefore, competes against non-consumption. The competition lies within consumers who possibly cannot afford and/or do not consume a product because of its low quality, therefore, halting a disruptive innovation. Now, computers are competing with people, teachers, or others in education who will not consume and accept this new innovation. Computers will not become a disruptive innovation within education until it wins over these “non-consumers.”

Chapter 4: Disruptively Deploying Computers

4. Explain the pattern of disruption.

           Disruptions continue to share the same pattern over and over, depicted in an S-curve. Non-consumption is the first obstacle for these disruptions. In terms of technology, time allows for improvements and cost decreases. The pattern continues as the disruption replaces the old model and then gradually turns into a sustaining innovation as it is used more and more. Then the growth made by the innovation plateaus as it reaches it maximum potential within the organization.

5. Explain the trap of monolithic instruction.  How does student-centric learning help this problem?

           The trap of monolithic instruction is, much like how a factory is run with groups of product, to keep teaching students in large groups in the same manner. This may work for some students, however, it has the tendency to leave other students behind. In terms of assessments, monolithic instruction does not accomplish the goals of why assessments are put into place in the beginning. Checking for understanding in order to move forward and also comparing students is lost with monolithic instruction. The teacher may see the class is moving forward to the next topic, but the teacher may be unaware if all of the students, individually, are keeping up.

           When compared to student-centric learning, monolithic instruction does not hold up. Student-centric learning refers to focusing on teaching the individual where learning is centered around the student. Centering learning around the student brings attention to the pace the student is learning the material, assessing the particular student’s understanding, and then determining whether the individual student should move forward. Although it seems the student-centered approach is better than monolithic, monolithic instruction wins out because of the difficulty in creating student-centric learning. The authors of the book make the argument that this is where computers come into play. Computers can help teachers customize learning to each student, thus improving each individual students success.

Chapter 5: The System for Student-Centric Learning

6. Explain public education’s commercial system.  What does it mean to say it is a value-chain business?  How does this affect student-centric learning?

           Today, public education runs on what they call a value-adding process or VAP.  The VAP brings in raw materials, transforms them by adding value to them, and then ships them out as a higher value product. In education this refers to students being brought into classrooms, adding value to them by way of the curriculum, and then shipping them out of schools with a higher value. This higher value resulting in more knowledgeable, educated citizens into the society. Education uses this value-chain business to produce something that is more valuable than it was initially.

           In terms of student-centric learning, this concept of education using this value-chain business model can be used with technology. Computers and educational software can be used to add value to students, however, there is also a negative aspect of this. Computers and software in this VAP system will be very expensive for schools to implement. Until this disruptive innovation becomes more prevalent to lower the cost, computers and software will remain too expensive. The only way to complete this disruptive innovation is to spend the time and money to eventually have computers and educational software and integral part of learning, which will eventually increase the ability for student-centric learning.