Alternative Learning Environment

Mr. Rodney W. Lancaster
"aka" Coach Lancaster
lancastc@mps.crsc.k12.ar.us

BSE, MSE, Ed.S, Ed.D., Doctoral Candidate (abd)

Monday

May 20, 2013 

WORDS OF WISDOM  

Education serves to develop and make explicit the basic abilities of the individual, to be, in brief, environmental at its best.

E.L. Thorndike  

 

The Alternative Learning Environment (ALE) objective is to increase the Web technology assets of each student. This definitely poses more and more challenges to traditional instructional methodologies. At the center of this, is trying to figure out the best way to prepare students after graduation for new learning activities and opportunities that lie ahead of them within the new job markets that they will be entering.

 

Enthusiastic educational instructors are casting the Web technology/Internet in a new light through the emergence of so-called Web-based learning. Technology, which places the learner at the center of online activities, facilitates supposedly new forms of creative collaboration, and consumption of knowledge.

 

 

Proponents anticipate a host of new pedagogical (tutorial) experiences posed by a ‘Facebook generation’ of Tweeters, and ‘Wiki kids,’ whilst at the same time, we the public schools, are delivering courses in virtual environments, rather than real-life environments, to keep up with technological advances. Educationalists have heralded Web-based learning as having potentially groundbreaking paradigm implications for the field of education.  

 

This alternative educational program of blended/differentiated design will be adjusted to each student and their unique needs. The instructional content includes (1). Student and digital content that is 1:1 (one to one) and self -paced, (2). The digital content is not limited to conventional practice on a computer, (3). Digital content is highly interactive, i.e.problem solving skills, (4). Digital content provides immediate feedback, and (5). Digital content can provide a sequence of learning objectives. Coulson, 2012, Mind Research Institute.  

 

Alternative education continues to gain support from school districts in Arkansas, across the nation, and internationally. Some Alternative Learning Environments (ALE) have been inappropriately labeled as “in-school suspension” or the “behavior room.” In reality, ALEs were designed for students who need modifications in both learning environment and curriculum pacing. According to the Arkansas Department of Education (ADE), “Highly-Qualified Teachers deliver rigorous curriculum in innovative strategies to students that have been carefully selected for the extensive interventions provided in this non-traditional setting” (AETN, 2012). 

The ALE program, unlike traditional classrooms is not constrained to a specific classroom setting or class schedule. The requirements and expectations of ALE courses are thus, detailed in a written ALE plan from parent/student learning objectives developed and supervised by a public school administrator.
 

Mindful of your children’s educational needs, Manila High School proudly offers the emerging Web-based curricula of the “My Skills Tutor” program for the ALE program of enhanced web-based learning. 

       
Hello, my name is Rodney W. Lancaster and I am the director of the Alternative Learning Environment at  Manila High School.