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  • - Hey everyone, Sal Khan here from Khan Academy.

  • Welcome to our daily homeroom live stream.

  • If it's your first time and are wondering what is this?

  • This is a live stream that we started doing

  • every day since school closure started happening

  • 'cause we realize as a not for profit with a mission

  • of free world class education for anyone anywhere,

  • we have a role to step up.

  • It's our duty to step up to support teachers, parents,

  • and students as we all navigate through this crisis.

  • And so we've been trying to put as many supports out

  • as possible teacher webinars, parent webinars,

  • (mumbles) class schedules, frameworks for learning plans

  • for students, and also this homeroom.

  • And this is a way to stay connected

  • in times of social distancing

  • and to just talk about interesting things.

  • Many of which might be related to the crisis

  • or whatever else is on folks' mind.

  • I do like to remind folks as I just did,

  • that we are not for profit

  • and we can only exist through philanthropic donations.

  • So if you're in a position to do so

  • please think about donating,

  • we were running at a deficit even before the crisis

  • and now we're seeing about two and a half

  • to three times the traffic we normally see,

  • and you could imagine that plus all of the other programs

  • and content we're trying to accelerate

  • are only making our costs go up higher.

  • I do wanna give a special thanks

  • to several corporate partners that stepped up

  • over the last couple of weeks when they realized

  • how big the need was to support everyone

  • on the education front for COVID.

  • Special thanks to Bank of America, Google.org,

  • Fastly, AT&T and Novartis.

  • They've made a huge difference,

  • but we still are running at a deficit.

  • So any more help from either corporations

  • or individuals is very, very much appreciated.

  • So with that we'll get into the heart of this live stream

  • and sometimes we have guests and sometimes we don't

  • or I guess you could say today I am the guest.

  • And so we could treat this livestream as really

  • just a ask Sal anything so you can get on the Facebook

  • and YouTube message boards and literally ask me anything

  • and I have team members that are helping me

  • surface interesting questions.

  • But we also said that given that this is the end

  • of Teacher Appreciation Week

  • that we wanna make sure teachers feel supported

  • especially as they're all trying to navigate

  • this world of distance learning or making videos.

  • And so I'm also happy to answer questions for teachers

  • who are wondering what are tips we might have

  • for making content, for making videos

  • and what are the tools we have?

  • So feel free to put those questions in.

  • I already have a question from Facebook

  • Jay is asking,

  • "I must admit that I would be happy

  • if I just knew the name of the tablet

  • that Sal uses to present.

  • That is the biggest challenge when teaching remotely.

  • I cannot tell you how many times teachers have said,

  • if only we had tablets like Sal uses."

  • All right I will tell you the name of the tablet

  • I actually have it right over here,

  • and I'm not normally about product endorsement.

  • So I'm not sure if this is the best tablet out there

  • or what but it's definitely met my needs.

  • So let's see this is the Intuos Pro Medium Pen Tablet.

  • I think it costs 100 or $200, it looks like this,

  • and it will come with a pen that...

  • Whoops I'm pressing buttons on it,

  • I hope (mumbles)...

  • It comes with a pen that looks like this.

  • This camera is kind of a reverse mode.

  • So there you go.

  • So that is the tablet and I think the cost really increases

  • as you go from the small, to the medium, to the large.

  • For many years at Khan Academy I had the small version,

  • which was I think was $70,

  • and you can go pretty far with that.

  • So yeah hopefully that is useful

  • and obviously this is useful.

  • Tablets like this are useful

  • for making Khan Academy style videos.

  • And I actually use a tablet like that with a pen

  • and I use Camtasia to record my screen

  • and this is the microphone that I have.

  • This is a Samson...

  • And once again,

  • I'm sure there's other good microphones

  • let's see Samson CO3U,

  • I just realized it wouldn't make do much good

  • if I'm reading the model number

  • when my mouth is on the other side of the microphone.

  • But just with that and Camtasia

  • you can make exactly the types of videos I make.

  • And obviously, this is useful for all of y'all

  • who are also doing live, Zoom or Google Hangout

  • type sessions as well 'cause you can share your screen

  • and then use your art program.

  • Oh, and I use SketchBook Pro for the art program,

  • but you could use others.

  • I like to just use something that's quite responsive.

  • Some of the art programs that get super fancy

  • there's a little bit of a lag and that bothers me.

  • So that's what I try to do,

  • and I've been working with some teachers

  • running some live sessions as well.

  • And so I use the exact same tools for that

  • where I can share my screen and share the art program.

  • I will say a low tech hack for the live sessions,

  • and actually in theory you could do this

  • for your videos as well,

  • is those those small whiteboards that we have students

  • do their problem on,

  • you can literally just have one of those

  • and write with a with a marker.

  • I've actually found that to be reasonably good

  • especially for the kind of the live sessions

  • when you're trying to work with students.

  • So from YouTube Matthew Masters asks,

  • "Sal, do you think there will always be a place

  • for classroom learning

  • or will online learning eventually become the standard?"

  • Simple answer is yes I think

  • there will always be a place for classroom learning,

  • or I hope there will always be a place

  • for classroom learning.

  • Especially for students who haven't reached adulthood.

  • So I would say for K through 12 for sure,

  • because in theory yes students could learn

  • a lot of the academic skills

  • potentially on their own time and pace,

  • on things like Khan Academy,

  • and or you can have Zoom sessions

  • and you can have this kind of distance type of learning,

  • but that's only part of what

  • really makes the school experience powerful.

  • There is a whole other level

  • of having incredible teacher mentors,

  • being able to form bonds with them,

  • being able to do extracurricular activities,

  • all of the socialization that goes on in school,

  • knowing how to work in groups,

  • knowing when to communicate,

  • when not to communicate, know how to get your point across.

  • These are all super important skills

  • that you'll never see on any standardized test,

  • but we all know that they're very, very important

  • for overall life and success.

  • So, I've always said If I had to pick

  • between an amazing teacher and amazing technology

  • I would pick the amazing teacher every time

  • and I would prefer to have that amazing teacher in person,

  • so we should definitely strive for that.

  • And I think I would want it for my own children

  • and frankly all children.

  • And so I think the interesting question

  • over the COVID crisis is,

  • how do we get as close to that as possible

  • given the constraints that we have of social distancing?

  • And then longer term,

  • hopefully when we get out of this crisis sooner than later.

  • How do we leverage the best of both worlds?

  • So I think hopefully we're gonna go back to school,

  • kids are gonna be to get that socialization,

  • they're gonna be back in those classrooms

  • with their amazing teachers,

  • but then everyone has built a stronger muscle

  • for sometimes maybe the distance learning does work

  • maybe over summers, maybe over breaks, maybe after school.

  • It doesn't have to just be

  • between the teachers and the students,

  • it could be older students and younger students

  • or it could be the peers working together,

  • so I think that would be a good takeaway

  • from this whole process.

  • I think higher education, there are some real questions.

  • I loved my college experience,

  • I loved sitting in the dorm and pontificating

  • about philosophical questions

  • and I met my wife and many of my best friends in college.

  • So I definitely think that was a very valuable experience,

  • but there's a lot of students

  • who, there's huge trade offs.

  • They need to help support their families,

  • they might want you to start make money

  • while they're in college,

  • and so I think in cases like that

  • when just you have more of adult learners,

  • I think there will always be a place

  • for the in person college experience.

  • But I can imagine some adult learners

  • decide that that's not for them

  • and that they could still get their college degree

  • and learn all the material,

  • but do it at their own time and pace

  • and be a little bit more flexible

  • because maybe they hold a job

  • or they have to support their family and things like that.

  • So, my personal view is I hope we only double down

  • on the physical experience but leverage some of the tools

  • we're all exploring with a little bit more as well.

  • So from Facebook, Jaya Gupta asks,

  • "How can I become a good teacher?

  • Because I'm teaching my students,

  • but some students are not taking it seriously.

  • Please tell me dear sir, what to do."

  • Jaya, I won't pretend like I have all of the answers.

  • And I in the Khan Academy journey

  • I've done a certain flavor of teaching,

  • but there's a whole other dimension of teaching

  • which you and many other amazing teachers

  • are doing on a day to day basis

  • that I think I can learn a ton from y'all

  • versus the other way around.

  • My best advice, though, is try to make it

  • as interactive as possible,

  • and when you do that think about it.

  • And this actually goes to the earlier question

  • about in person versus digital.

  • I think there'll always be a place for in person,

  • but we should always be conscientious of what maybe digital,

  • or online, or software, or videos could do.

  • So, if you're just giving a lecture for 10 minutes straight

  • in theory, that could happen over a video.

  • And so if that could happen over video

  • then maybe it should happen over video,

  • but then that liberates you to do something else.

  • And it's not like all of a sudden there's nothing to do,

  • you could have a Socratic dialogue,

  • you could have a simulation,

  • you could have a project,

  • you could put a problem up on the board

  • that's a little bit more challenging

  • and have the students struggle with it a little bit.

  • Have them break into groups

  • and try to come up with their own answers,

  • and then present it and you're walking around nudging them,

  • giving them a little hint for the ones that get stuck.

  • So I think there's a huge opportunity

  • for that classroom to just interact

  • with more with each other.

  • Those students that you might be describing

  • whose eyes are glazed over a little bit,

  • I generally think if you told that student,

  • "Hey, pair up with the person next to you

  • or form a group of three or four, here's a puzzle,

  • here's an interesting challenge,

  • here's a philosophical question."

  • To ponder, their eyes will light up and in a lot of ways

  • it can take a little bit of the burden off of you.

  • I've definitely sat in front of a classroom

  • of students and tried to teach them and you're like,

  • "What are they thinking?

  • They're staring at me, I have to be on for the entire

  • 40, 50 minutes."

  • It's incredibly draining both physically and emotionally,

  • and as soon as you kind of get out

  • of that kinda being the person on the stage

  • so to speak and then you're kind of with the students

  • and you're tackling something with them together.

  • It actually allows you to not have to feel as on,

  • which I've actually personally found good.

  • People might be surprised to hear,

  • I'm very much an introvert I can pretend to be an extrovert

  • (laughs) like I do on this live stream,

  • but I recharge my energy

  • when I'm having one on one conversations with people,

  • when I'm able to go a little bit deeper,

  • when I have a little bit more quiet time.

  • And so for me it's incredibly draining

  • to be on for long periods of time,

  • but it's very energizing if I can sit next to a student

  • and work with them that way.

  • So those are my tips make it as interactive as possible,

  • Have the students help each other,

  • and things like Socratic dialogue, simulations, games,

  • challenging, make it active.

  • I think would move everything in the right direction.

  • So from Facebook Alicia Moody says,

  • "The hardest part of this as a math teacher

  • is supporting my most struggling students

  • who are already behind.

  • I teach high schoolers,

  • some of whom have critical thinking skills

  • closer to fourth to sixth grade.

  • What are your favorite supports for students

  • struggling with connecting

  • the abstractions of algebra with real life

  • when they don't have much foundational number sense,

  • any online games or basics Focused activities

  • targeted towards teens?"

  • Alicia or Alicia,

  • You're asking a central question.

  • And this is something we think a lot about at Khan Academy

  • because you've probably heard me talk about it,

  • and the traditional model kids keep moving forward,

  • they get to C on one test a D on another,

  • that 20% that 30% gap, those things accumulate

  • and then they get to your classroom,

  • and as you mentioned they're kind of operating

  • at a...

  • At least they're ready for the math

  • at a fourth through sixth grade level.

  • So there's a couple things we've done,

  • we've seen and really this is learning from other teachers,

  • we've seen teachers

  • especially teachers who are serving students

  • who might be many grade levels behind

  • who haven't maybe had gotten all the supports

  • they might need to start them at the beginning.

  • So, I'll tell you what you could do today

  • and then I'll tell you what I hope you can do

  • in about two months,

  • 'cause we're working on some things that I think

  • will help solve this problem.

  • So today, I would actually have those students

  • start on our arithmetic course

  • and just go from the beginning,

  • from one plus one straight through the arithmetic course.

  • And they can use course challenges

  • and unit test to accelerate.

  • So what I would suggest is have those students

  • start with the course challenge on the arithmetic course,

  • and then the stuff they got right, that's great,

  • and then the stuff they got wrong

  • they can go into those units and remediate.

  • And if they're getting 70, 80% on the course challenge

  • they should keep taking it,

  • and then they'll get to be able to show

  • the mastery on those skills,

  • and then they can go back and get mastery

  • on the things that they need to fill in those gaps.

  • And then they should do the same thing

  • with our pre algebra course,

  • and if they do that it's kind of going slow to go fast,

  • they're gonna have a very strong foundation,

  • they're actually gonna build a lot of their confidence

  • and you're gonna have a lot more fluency,

  • and they're gonna be ready for your algebra class.

  • A lot of times when a student in an algebra class says,

  • "Hey, teacher, when am I gonna need this in life?"

  • I think they might be asking when are they gonna need it,

  • but it also might be a defense mechanism.

  • In some ways they're trying to protect their self-esteem

  • that this doesn't matter,

  • because they're lost, they have a gap in decimals,

  • they have a gap in negative numbers,

  • and all of a sudden there's an equation on the board

  • that has negative numbers and decimals

  • and even if they're aware that they have those gaps

  • they might be embarrassed

  • 'cause they know it was fourth or fifth grade material.

  • And so I think the best way to short circuit that,

  • "Hey teacher when am I gonna need to know this?"

  • is by making sure kids have that fluency

  • and that strong foundation from the beginning

  • and they have as few gaps as possible.

  • And the example I show

  • is that when you're in PE class, when I was in ninth grade

  • and I wasn't the strongest basketball player,

  • but I didn't ask the coach,

  • "Hey coach, when am I going to have to throw

  • a orange round ball into a 10 foot hoop in life,

  • when do I need to know this?"

  • And the reason why I didn't ask that

  • is even though I wasn't the best player

  • I was able to engage,

  • it was interactive to the previous question,

  • and I was enjoying myself.

  • And so I'm a big believer that if most students

  • are able to fill in their gaps and feel like they can engage

  • all of a sudden they actually will get excited

  • about that topic.

  • Now, a very good answer when someone says,

  • "When will I have to use this?"

  • Sometimes the teacher we sometimes hem and haw and say,

  • "Well, if you become an engineer you'll..."

  • And then the student goes,

  • "Well, I'm not gonna be an engineer."

  • "Well, if you're going to finance."

  • "Well, I'm not gonna go into finance."

  • "Well, if you go into medicine or medical research."

  • "Well, I'm not."

  • And you know...

  • "Well, if you become a lawyer

  • you need these critical thinking skills."

  • And you can imagine it becomes this kind of duel

  • (laughs) between the student and the teacher.

  • I find just tell them straight up,

  • the world is gonna evaluate you by this

  • and it look, you can believe me or not,

  • but these critical thinking skills

  • are going be super valuable.

  • There was one of the early funders of Khan Academy

  • he ran a large restaurant chain,

  • and he told me that he divides his employees

  • by folks who understand algebra

  • and folks who do not understand algebra.

  • And that doesn't mean that you need to do

  • a lot of deep algebra if you're the manager of a restaurant,

  • or if you're the district manager,

  • or if you're the head of marketing,

  • but what that told me and it makes a lot of sense is,

  • for him the folks who knew algebra

  • had the critical thinking skills to tackle complex things,

  • simplify them deductively,

  • make logical deductions about things.

  • But whenever I tell that story to anyone

  • who is kind of like,

  • "When am I gonna need the algebra?"

  • They're like,

  • "Oh, wow."

  • You know, my future bosses (laughs)...

  • I wanna be... (mumbles)

  • When they divide the world into the people who know algebra

  • and the people who don't know algebra,

  • and the people who know algebra get a lot more opportunity

  • and a lot more income,

  • I wanna be divided into the people who know algebra.

  • And it's also frankly just gonna give you

  • a lot more confidence in life

  • because you know that you're gonna be able

  • to tackle problems and deductively reason about things.

  • So from Facebook Jane Molnar asked

  • "Sal, do you have any tips for working at a distance

  • on Khan Academy with children who cannot yet read,

  • but are too old for the preschool Khan Academy?

  • Thank you."

  • So Jane, you kind of just described my youngest child

  • and what I would encourage is

  • take a second look at Khan Academy kids.

  • And the reason why I'm telling you that

  • is 'cause I recently took a second look

  • at Khan Academy kids.

  • The first version of Khan Academy kids

  • starts with the letters, the numbers,

  • and it kind of went through the pre-K

  • and the K and the kindergarten standards.

  • And my son had already kinda known that

  • and when I was putting that in front of him he's like,

  • "Oh, this is easy, this is baby stuff."

  • What's cool is in the last month

  • Khan Academy kids just launched the first grade standards,

  • and I'm finding that that is really hitting the sweet spot

  • for my five and a half year old

  • 'cause he's learning to read he's not fluent at reading yet,

  • and it's really hitting exactly where he needs to be

  • and I'm guessing that's where your child

  • might be ready for as well.

  • So go on to Khan Academy kids

  • you can actually change the grade setting for your child,

  • and now there's actually teacher accounts

  • and which you can also access as a parent,

  • where you can go to your account

  • and if you click on your username

  • it'll say become a teacher at Khan,

  • and you can say you're teaching first grade.

  • And then you can actually assign first grade content

  • to your child as well.

  • So, if your child's account

  • gets turned into a first grade account

  • then he or she will see that first grade content

  • and the system naturally keeps track of where they are,

  • and then makes the recommendations accordingly

  • across math, reading and writing.

  • And then if you're a teacher or a parent

  • you can also direct them to certain activities.

  • You can sample them and then direct them.

  • So I highly take a second look at it

  • 'cause it'll get your child through the basics of reading.

  • So the fact that they're not reading yet,

  • this is definitely going to be useful for them.

  • So YouTube, from YouTube, Alan Yab says,

  • "Hi Sal, what do you think is better

  • remote learning or in person?"

  • Well, it's not a comparison

  • I think they're good at different things.

  • The ideal is in person,

  • but what matters, you know...

  • Let me put it this way,

  • When you, you know, I remember my in person college classes

  • were 300 people in a lecture hall,

  • or actually, maybe it was a lecture hall

  • that could fit 300 people, 100 people showed up.

  • The professor would kind of give the lecture

  • essentially read the lecture notes

  • that he might have been using for the last 18 years,

  • and there's like 20 people in the front

  • who were paying attention

  • and then there's a group of people someplace in the middle

  • or the back and they're trying to stay up,

  • but they're kind of dozing off a little bit.

  • That's not a great in person experience,

  • and I could imagine a virtual experience

  • that is at least as good or better than that.

  • If you just have a video of that

  • you're already maybe as good

  • because you can pause and repeat

  • and watch it at two X speed.

  • And then you can imagine a Zoom session or Google Hangout

  • where the professor is asking questions,

  • having a Socratic dialogue,

  • giving you a challenging problem

  • and making you work in groups on that problem

  • before coming back to the professor.

  • So that comparison

  • is a highly not interactive physical experience

  • versus a highly interactive virtual experience,

  • in that world that virtual is better.

  • Now, the dream scenario

  • is a highly interactive in person experience.

  • So the ideal experience,

  • what I want for my children,

  • what I would want if I'm a student

  • and frankly what I would want as a teacher

  • is everyone's in the room,

  • but it's not just me projecting something

  • that could be a video,

  • it's me facilitating, designing, interactions, dialogue

  • that's gonna form

  • deep meaningful connections with each other.

  • So that's the real value

  • of person to person in person interaction.

  • Now, distance learning is able to do a few things

  • that you can't do in person,

  • if students are traveling,

  • obviously we're in an emergency situation right now,

  • distance learning can be more flexible

  • around time and space, you can run a class at 9:00 PM

  • and it could include people from all over the country

  • or all over the world.

  • So, it does introduce some flexibility there.

  • I think the ideal is a is getting the best of both

  • so that learning is never bound by time or space,

  • but you are for sure getting that in person socialization,

  • that in person connection,

  • which is gonna be very hard to replace by digital

  • until we get...

  • Until virtual reality probably...

  • We have 50 years of development of virtual reality

  • before we can even get close.

  • So let's see other questions.

  • Let's see from YouTube.

  • (mumbles) Kumar asks,

  • "What are the books behind your back?"

  • Well, there's all sorts of books behind my back.

  • This is actually the walk in closet

  • where Khan Academy got started 10 years ago.

  • It's a nice walk in closet, it actually has good lighting.

  • I'm looking at it a window there,

  • we have a nice little garden out here.

  • So you shouldn't feel too bad for me

  • that I'm operating out of a closet.

  • Yeah, but there's just a ton of books here.

  • I mean, these are a lot of science fiction books,

  • got the foundation series,

  • We've got a little Robert Heinlein here

  • we got all around Ron Hubbard battlefield Earth.

  • We've got some Orson Scott Card, Greg Bear,

  • up here I have some philosophical and religious books.

  • I've got the Bhagavad Gita there,

  • I've got some passage meditation,

  • I have a translation of the Quran,

  • I have...

  • Let's see, I have a Bible someplace over here,

  • so I've got some of that stuff.

  • Let's see, that's just some nonfiction.

  • My wife's medical textbooks

  • for medical school right over here.

  • So yes, that's the walkthrough through our closet library.

  • So from YouTube, A asks,

  • "Hey Sal, I just want to know how to organize my time again,

  • I mean, because of this pandemic

  • I'm unable to study like I used to before."

  • Well A, what I would say is

  • structure your day as much as possible

  • and try to Front Load your activity.

  • So what I do is,

  • it's a good habit to just try to wake up everyday

  • at the same time, my body's so used to it

  • I don't even need an alarm clock,

  • my eyes just kind of open (mumbles) at 7:00 AM.

  • It might just be because I'm old now, but...

  • (mumbles)

  • And obviously for that to happen

  • go to sleep at a reasonable time.

  • And I try to front load, you know,

  • first thing I try to do things that give me some easy wins.

  • I make my bed, and you might say,

  • "I don't care if my beds made or not."

  • And I'll say,

  • "First of all, it is very nice at night

  • to get into a well made bed where the sheets are nice

  • and uncreased and all of that."

  • It's a nice thing to have in life,

  • but even more valuable than that

  • it takes you about three, four minutes to make the bed.

  • And by doing that, you're like,

  • "Okay I got a win, this is gonna be a good day."

  • And then I have a little bit of a ritual in the morning,

  • I like to meditate at least 15 minutes in the morning,

  • maybe 30.

  • That just clears my mind,

  • it gets me a really positive frame of mind,

  • all my stresses seem to kind of melt away when I do that.

  • Then I try to do some physical activity,

  • I mix it up a little bit,

  • I might go for a mile run,

  • I might do some handstand push ups,

  • or go do some pull ups in our garage,

  • I have a little pull up bar there.

  • And then I get ready,

  • and then if I...

  • Well, COVID or not I try to do some of the stuff

  • that takes a little bit more cognitive work for me.

  • So, videos take a lot of mental processing

  • and so I try to do those in the morning,

  • and I always tell myself,

  • "Hey Sal, you got 40 minutes before your next meeting

  • just try to accomplish this one or two things,

  • and if you accomplish that give yourself a break."

  • And then I keep doing that throughout my day.

  • And then I'm not hard on myself if by the...

  • And I used to be frankly, by the late afternoon if I'm like,

  • "Hey, you know, I got a lot done Sal,

  • why don't you go for why don't you go for a walk,

  • take it easy a little bit."

  • I have to admit, before I had trouble doing that,

  • I would just keep working, working, working, working

  • until I'm just kind of like so brain...

  • My brain is so fried that I can't do anything else,

  • and that's not so healthy

  • and especially in this time of COVID and social distancing.

  • Another thing that I'm doing,

  • I know this isn't the question you've asked

  • you asked about how to use structure or things like that,

  • but another thing that I've been doing is

  • as much as possible when I have meetings,

  • I try to go on walks.

  • It just gets fresh air

  • and it gets my my blood flowing to the brain.

  • So let's see, Ricky R asks,

  • "Hi Sal, any advice on where I can find a checklist

  • of what my child should know before entering fourth grade?"

  • So, there's two ways to think about it

  • and actually I just...

  • That question makes me realize

  • that I didn't answer an earlier question about

  • how do you remediate students

  • from that teacher who teaches algebra students.

  • So today, what I would do

  • if a student's about to enter fourth grade,

  • I would have them either...

  • I would have them work on our third grade course

  • on Khan Academy,

  • and they can accelerate

  • by taking the course challenges in the unit tests,

  • but if they get through the third grade course completely,

  • they're gonna be very ready for fourth grade.

  • Even better is if they get started on the fourth grade

  • because then when they see it next year in school

  • it'll be kind of they've already been exposed to it,

  • and so they'll have more of a cushion

  • in case some of those concepts

  • are a little bit more difficult to understand.

  • Now one thing that I said I was gonna talk about,

  • but I didn't but now I will,

  • is we are actively working on

  • what we're calling foundations courses.

  • So there's gonna be a foundations for fourth grade,

  • there's gonna be a foundations for algebra,

  • a foundations for geometry, a foundation's for everything,

  • for all of our courses, each of our grade levels.

  • And what that's gonna be is a short course

  • that covers all of the prerequisite skills

  • that you need to engage in that grade level,

  • and the reason why that's a little bit different

  • than just going through third grade is that

  • you actually don't need every third grade standard

  • to necessarily engage in fourth grade,

  • and there's actually certain

  • maybe even second and first grade standards

  • that you do need to engage in fourth grade.

  • And so this is going to be a new course,

  • type of course that we're gonna curate.

  • And you can imagine most fourth graders

  • might know a lot of that material,

  • and so they can take the course challenge and the unit test

  • to accelerate through it,

  • but then the material they don't know

  • they'll be able to fill in those gaps

  • and then there'll be super prepared for fourth grade.

  • So today, use the grade level before on Khan Academy,

  • get your kids to master that

  • and they can accelerate with course challenges in unit test.

  • You might also want to use the arithmetic course,

  • and hopefully in about two months

  • expect to see these foundations courses,

  • which are kind of exactly what students need

  • to get to grade level as quickly as possible

  • or at least to know...

  • At least feel good that they have the foundations

  • to be prepared for grade level as quickly as possible.

  • So from YouTube Quacker Diesels asks,

  • "Hey Sal, how does the Khan Academy staff

  • coping up with this crisis?"

  • It's great question Quacker.

  • (mumbles)

  • I would say overall reasonably well,

  • we were already a reasonably distributed workforce.

  • We had about 35, 40% of our team members

  • were not based in our office here in California,

  • and so we always had a...

  • We were always using Google Meet and Zoom for our meetings,

  • and we always, you know,

  • in almost every meeting we almost always had someone

  • who was distributed or remote,

  • and so that was a pretty easy transition for us

  • to stay functional.

  • We just leaned heavier on those tools.

  • I think the difficult part is

  • people are going through stuff,

  • they're worried about their family members,

  • I haven't heard of any of our team members yet

  • with a family member who's gotten very sick from COVID, yet.

  • Thank goodness, but you can imagine people are worried.

  • I think the biggest drain has been on a lot of parents

  • of young kids.

  • I'm in that bucket, but I'm lucky I have myself, my wife,

  • my mother in law, we're all in the house together.

  • My kids...

  • As teachers have been doing an amazing heroic job

  • at KLS, keeping the kids supported

  • and keeping them learning.

  • So I feel very fortunate there,

  • but we have team members that

  • they might be a single parent,

  • they have a two year old or they have two kids

  • or they might be (mumbles) both them and their partner,

  • but they have two or three young children.

  • You can imagine it's very hard

  • to keep the two or three year old occupied

  • while the same time you're trying to work,

  • so that has definitely caused some stress for folks.

  • And we've been very clear with our team members

  • that if you can try to do it, you can.

  • This is Khan Academy's moment to step up for the world,

  • but this is also a time that we, you know,

  • some of these team members have done such incredible work

  • over the years, we're not going to, you know...

  • They have to take care of themselves

  • and their families first and foremost,

  • but for the most part I think the Khan Academy team

  • is doing well, thanks for asking.

  • So from YouTube.

  • If YouTube...

  • Okay, this is a real time math problem.

  • Avinash Carr says,

  • "A popular website requires users to create a password

  • consisting of digits only.

  • If no digit may be repeated

  • and each word, password must be nine digits long.

  • How many passwords are possible?"

  • This is...

  • I was a little worried,

  • I thought you're gonna give me a hard one,

  • but I'm probably jinxing it because I'm probably gonna

  • in real time make a mistake, but no.

  • So if I understand correctly, nine digits,

  • you're not you can't repeat it.

  • So the way I think about it,

  • think about the leftmost digit.

  • There are 10 points possible digits,

  • so there's 10 possibilities for that leftmost one.

  • And then for the one to the right of that

  • you've already used one of the 10 possible digits,

  • so now you have nine possibilities for the next one,

  • and then you have eight possibilities for the next one,

  • and so it's gonna be 10 times nine times eight times seven

  • and so you're gonna do that all the way down to two.

  • So, if I did that right it's gonna be...

  • Because the last one you're gonna have two digits left

  • because you're using a nine digits long.

  • And I'm assuming we're going with nine digit passwords,

  • obviously...

  • Well, I can see how it could be trick

  • because you say it has to be at least nine digits long,

  • so you're saying it could also be 10 digits.

  • So if I were to say just a nine digit

  • how many nine digit passwords are there,

  • it would be it would be 10 factorial,

  • and then how many 10 digit passwords are there?

  • Well, for each of those nine digit passwords

  • it would kind of determine what that last digit has to be.

  • So, you would then get an extra password

  • essentially for each of those nine digit passwords.

  • So, I think you would get two times 10 factorial

  • is the answer,

  • and you obviously can't have more than a 10 digit password

  • 'cause you can't reuse the digits.

  • Don't know if I did that, right.

  • But here's to making ourselves vulnerable

  • and answering math questions in real time.

  • All right. (laughs)

  • Maybe I'll do one more question to redeem myself

  • just in case I made a careless error on that one.

  • From Facebook,

  • And y'all see I'm reading this real time

  • there's no prep in this,

  • so y'all are getting me as I am.

  • So by Enza Charity says,

  • "Hi Sal, how can I study better

  • while waking up early in the morning

  • without getting distracted?

  • How can I also make my studying more interesting

  • while enjoying and understanding?"

  • With the distraction problem,

  • well there's a couple of things, meditation is great.

  • Your mind just gets a little bit trained to not get

  • scatterbrained I guess is one way to think about it.

  • I think the morning is the best time to do it,

  • try to find a quiet time.

  • And I would... (mumbles)

  • We talked about the Pomodoro Technique in the past,

  • which is, it's called the Pomodoro 'cause it's named

  • after a timer shaped like a pomodoro tomato.

  • But give yourself 20 minutes to say

  • for this 20 minutes I'm gonna focus

  • and do what I need to do,

  • and then I'm gonna give myself a 10 minute break,

  • 20 minutes focus and then give myself a 10 minute break.

  • And there's actually some research on that,

  • that that tends to ease procrastination

  • can allow you to get a little bit more focused,

  • while also being able to recharge.

  • You know, how did you make study more interesting?

  • What I would say, you have an opportunity right now.

  • During the normal school year

  • you have so many things on your plate

  • and extracurricular activities that you're like,

  • "Oh, I just have to cram this so that I can do my homework

  • or so that I can learn for tomorrow."

  • And so you don't have the time and space

  • to ponder and to really enjoy the concept.

  • I hope that now that certain things have been taken off

  • of our plates, social things, et cetera.

  • There's more time to ponder

  • and the pondering is the fun part.

  • So when you're reading, you know,

  • I don't know what you're trying to study, chemistry,

  • and you're like,

  • "Okay, PV equals nRT."

  • Instead of just memorizing that,

  • why does that make sense?

  • All right, well let's just imagine

  • N represents the number of molecules.

  • I mean it's measured in moles,

  • but that's just a quantity of molecules.

  • R is just a constant (mumbles) to make the unit's workout,

  • and then T is temperature.

  • So the number of molecules and the temperature,

  • see the more molecules, the higher temperature,

  • they're bouncing around more vigorously.

  • Yeah, either if I hold volume constant

  • it's gonna create more pressure,

  • or if I hold pressure constant

  • in order to do that I'd have to expand the volume.

  • Or if I hold pressure constant

  • the balloon would blow up so to speak, and you're like,

  • "Oh, that makes a lot of sense, this is intuitive.

  • Of course PV equals nRT."

  • And then it becomes exciting

  • and then when you look around the world

  • all sorts of things make sense,

  • and you start to see it in the real world.

  • I remember the famously Tom Brady in Deflategate,

  • there was this debate about whether his footballs

  • were deflated inappropriately.

  • That was actually a PV equals nRT problem,

  • and I made some videos on that

  • and it's still under debate,

  • but you start seeing these things

  • that you think are these random academic formulas,

  • you start seeing them in the world

  • when you start pondering them,

  • and you start making connections

  • to other concepts in your life.

  • You know, what I remind every student is

  • what you get to learn today on Khan Academy,

  • from your textbook from your teacher,

  • most of these things are the culmination

  • of someone's life work

  • or often times the combination of many people's life works

  • over hundreds of years and you get the answer.

  • Isaac Newton, Marie Curie, they would have killed

  • to have your physics or chemistry or biology textbook,

  • it would have saved them a lot of work, and you get it.

  • And so realize that,

  • realize that there are profound answers.

  • I mean, the nature of DNA, these are mind blowing things

  • that Watson and Crick would have loved,

  • Mendel would have loved to get their hands on

  • and you get those answers.

  • So look at it in that lens you're getting the answers,

  • And do them justice, think about them, ponder them,

  • don't just try to memorize

  • and regurgitate it for the next test.

  • So that's my advice, And I realized I'm all out of time.

  • This was a fun one, and I...

  • Oh, (mumbles) given that this is the end

  • of Teacher Appreciation Week,

  • I wanted to make sure that we give a special shout out

  • to all the teachers everywhere.

  • So I will see you on Monday,

  • but we're gonna go out with a special thank you

  • to all of the amazing teachers around the world,

  • from our team at Khan Academy.

  • See y'all on Monday.

  • - To Mrs. Cordell, my fourth grade teacher.

  • - To miss Peterson.

  • - To Mr. Gobet.

  • - To Mr. Jones.

  • - To Ms. Wolf.

  • - To Mrs. Young.

  • - Mr. Chavez.

  • - Mr. Bodie, fifth and sixth grade.

  • - To Mr. Blake.

  • - To Mr. Lester.

  • - To Mr. Howard.

  • - To Mr. Zarnecki.

  • - Dr. John.

  • - To Mrs. Alvarado.

  • - To Gail Wills and Janice Souza.

  • - You know, Mrs. Mayhew.

  • - To my high school humanities teacher.

  • - To Mrs. valentine my kindergarten teacher.

  • (upbeat music)

  • - Who taught me how to analyze literature and to write.

  • - Who first introduced me.

  • to the magic of TV and film production.

  • - Who helped me find my voice in writing.

  • - Who encouraged me to write my first program.

  • - Who helped me figure out how to think about and what

  • I think about so many different things in the world.

  • - Who brought so much love and joy into the classroom.

  • - And demanded excellence while treating us with respect.

  • - Who helped me get over my fear of public speaking.

  • - Who gave me a book, began my love of science and fiction.

  • - Who believe in us even when we blew everything up.

  • - Who taught me the value of telling stories to teach

  • and listening to other people's stories.

  • - Who is such an amazing woman

  • I named my daughter after her.

  • (upbeat music)

  • - And for making us all feel special all the time.

  • - And you were exceedingly patient with me.

  • - For helping me discover my love for writing.

  • - For pushing me to always be the best version of myself.

  • - And for teaching me that I could

  • accomplish anything I put my mind to.

  • - For telling me I was good at math.

  • - For making sure that I knew I could do accelerated work.

  • - For encouraging my love of reading and writing.

  • - For making me feel welcome in her classroom

  • as a recent immigrant to the United States.

  • - For inspiring me to become a kindergarten teacher in turn.

  • You've touched so many lives,

  • both your students and your students, students

  • more than you'll ever know.

  • (piano music)

  • - Thanks Mrs. Mayhew.

  • - Thank you Mr. Blake.

  • - Thank you Mr. Chavez.

  • - Thank you Mr. Gobet.

  • - Thank you Mrs. Cordell.

  • - Thank you Mrs. Graham.

  • - Thank you Mr. Lester.

  • - Thank you, Mr. Howen.

  • - You've made a huge impact on my life and so many others,

  • thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • - Thank you.

  • (piano music)

- Hey everyone, Sal Khan here from Khan Academy.

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