U.S. Schools Look to SAM Learning as Example of an “International Best Practice” in Education

ORLANDO, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SAM Learning U.K. quietly began pilot testing its high school exit exam prep program in a Bronx high school last summer. The company hoped that its student-driven learning program — which is used by nearly 50 percent of the U.K. high schools — would be as well received here as it is in British schools. Now that over 32,000 hours have been logged at pilot schools from Florida to New York to California, it seems the U.S. students are just as excited about SAM Learning as the Brits.

“Student-driven learning is like giving students a personal assistant but that assistant isn’t peering over their shoulder all the time”

Student-driven learning is a new idea for U.S. schools but not in the U.K. where SAM Learning has been refining the concept for over five years. These days, over one million students each year log on and spend hundreds of thousands of hours practicing for exams with SAM Learning’s program. It has been proven effective by four years of independent research that tracked the national exam results of over 730,000 British students.

The primary point behind student-driven learning is that students are empowered to be successful with choices: the route they choose, the skills they practice and the time they commit. It flips the table on other learning software that emphasizes a teacher’s time-intensive role in dictating every step his or her students take. SAM Learning’s program is self-directed so that teachers can use it as a supplement, relying on its intrinsic motivation and a step-wise approach to building skills and practicing for exams.

“Student-driven learning is like giving students a personal assistant but that assistant isn’t peering over their shoulder all the time,” said David Jaffa, founder and president of SAM Learning, U.K. “Our pedagogical structure meshes with how students think and reflects what is important to them. We have found that once students get started, they become so engrossed in SAM Learning’s program that they log in dozens of hours because they enjoy using it and they can see measureable progress.”

“We are finding that school districts are very interested in SAM Learning’s approach to test prep in the United Kingdom,” said Jim Frenchak, a former U.S. teacher and administrator who is now introducing SAM Learning to American schools. “I have never seen so many students from such diverse situations respond with nearly universal passion to an educational program. Every student ‘gets it.’”

The company has translated math and science content from U.K. to U.S. learning standards and aligned the content to the standards from National Science Teachers Association, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, and the state standards and HSEEs of CA, FL, GA, MA, MS, MI, MO, NY, PA, TX, VA and Washington DC. Case studies and a white paper are available at www.samlearning.com.

See the HSEE prep program at the Association of School Curriculum Directors Conference in Orlando, Florida this week at exhibit booth 304.

About SAM Learning U.K.

SAM Learning U.K. (www.samlearning.com) is based in London, England. The company publishes an online high school exit exam program for mathematics and science that is correlated to the state standards for CA, FL, GA, MA, MS, MI, MO, NY, PA, TX, VA and Washington DC. It is also aligned to the standards of the National Science Teachers Association and National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. For more information, call 800-481-8101 or email info@samlearning.com.