Introducing the EdPlace Recommender
After 18 months of innovation, product development and testing, we’re delighted to announce the launch of AI within the EdPlace learning platform.
The EdPlace Recommender provides each child the most relevant activity for where they’re at in their academic journey. It offers a truly personalised learning experience, without requiring any additional time or effort from you! What’s more, we have invested in an independent review to ensure that it positively impacts our students’ progress, engagement and confidence. Interested in learning more? Step right this way…
The EdPlace Philosophy
At EdPlace, ‘created by teachers, enhanced by technology’ is our mantra. We’re passionate about finding exactly the right blend of human expertise and innovative technology to boost the learning experience for students. This is why every interactive activity available on EdPlace is written by a fully qualified classroom teacher and aligned with the English National Curriculum. You can have complete confidence that the work your student does is both relevant and appropriate.
We’re confident that coupling our thousands of activities with our new smart recommender will have a real impact on understanding and progress. But, in this relatively new era of AI, we wanted to be certain. For this independent evaluation, we enlisted the skills of The Brilliant Club, renowned for both their research skills and educational background.
Our Independent Evaluator
The Brilliant Club is an award-winning university access charity that supports students from less advantaged backgrounds to access the most competitive universities. Their consulting team supports organisations who want to ensure better outcomes for future generations through data analysis and impact reporting.
We believed that we could develop an algorithm that had a positive impact on 3 key student areas:
Student progress
Student engagement
Student confidence
Method
For this study, The Brilliant Club conducted a Randomised Control Trial. They created, at random, 2 groups of students. Those that would use the new recommender, and those that remained on the old version. The randomisation meant that any changes seen could be attributed only to the impact of the new recommender and no other external factors.
They then compared the data from both groups, for a period of time before and after the recommender trial, comparing the differences they observed.The results below were found using a ‘difference-in-differences’* analysis (To find out the real nitty gritty, please see the full report here)
Findings
We were very excited when the study showed positive trends in all 3 areas of student progress, student engagement and student confidence. Below is a short summary of the key findings, available at length in the full report.
Student Progress
For each activity a student completes on EdPlace, they are given a score and this builds up over time to give a clear overview of student understanding. The analysis looked for a change in the average scores and revealed 2 outcomes:
1) The study found that those students using the new recommender increased their scores by 4.4% more than those who did not.
2) Students using the new recommender increased their speed on the average time taken to complete an activity. They did this 18% quicker than their peers who used the old recommender.
Student engagement
It makes sense that the more work a student does on EdPlace, the better their understanding of a topic will be. But, the key thing here is motivating students to increase the amount of time they choose to spend learning which results in greater progress.
The study found students using the new recommender increased the number of worksheets they completed in a month by 25.8% over their peers.
Student confidence
Now, this one is a tricky thing to measure. To do so, The Brilliant Club created a formula using students’ average scores and how quickly they completed activities.
Again, the findings were very positive as we observed that students using the new recommender demonstrated 16% higher confidence levels than their peers without access to the new technology
What does this mean for my student?
While this all sounds good, what does it mean specifically for your student? Well, we’ve seen that students using the new recommender on EdPlace are getting a much more personalised experience, which is making them study that bit longer, in turn improving their average scores, and enabling them to do this at a quicker rate. Our tech is helping students to maximise their learning and because we’re online, this can be done anywhere and on-the-go at their convenience!
It doesn’t matter whether they’re top of the class and looking for a challenge, or working to catch up, our new recommender is proven to support each individual child, help them build their confidence and reach their potential - which is really what we’re all about.
And for me?
We’re confident that our new recommender will positively impact EdPlace parents and educators too.
When you’re trying to get a million-and-one things done, it provides peace of mind that your student is working on the right stuff and maximising their learning time! There’s no need for you to be a curriculum specialist or a master timetabler, we do that heavy lifting for you.
The personal recommendations suggest activities aligned to the English National Curriculum, giving your student exactly what they need to suit their learning style and support their current stage on their personal learning journey. Because we know how important it is for parents and educators to understand how children are doing, we’ll update you on their weekly progress too. What’s more, our recommender is constantly reassessing your student’s understanding and updating what it suggests, so if they have a wobble in one area, or really grasp another quickly, it will adjust what it’s recommending straight away. Working smart is the name of the game!
If you’d like to read the full report by The Brilliant Club, please head here
* The Brilliant Club report - EdPlace Recommender page 1
