The One World Schoolhouse: Education Reimagined

by Salman Khan

Mastery learning techniques were soon being applied in various pilot programs around the country. In study after study, mastery learning kicked butt when compared to conventional classroom models. One research paper concluded that “students in mastery learning programs at all levels showed increased gains in achievement over those in traditional instruction programs.… Students retained what they had learned longer under mastery learning, both in short-term and long-term studies.”5 Another study found that “mastery learning reduces the academic spread between the slower and faster students without slowing down the faster students.”6 Shifting the emphasis from students to teachers, yet another study recorded that “teachers who [used] mastery learning… began to feel better about teaching and their roles as teachers.”7