Guide to Using Khan Academy for Parents and Mentors

Contents

• An overview of KA
• Steps to start
• Additional resources

On a mission to provide a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.

Welcome to Khan Academy!

Benefits

• Strengthen your child’s knowledge and fill in gaps in their learning.
• Build your child’s confidence and engagement in learning.
• Access detailed data about your child’s learning progress.
• Don’t break the bank – it’s free to use any of our resources.

Every learner is different and has different learning needs. That’s where Khan Academy comes in. We are a non-profit on a mission to provide a free world-class education for anyone, anywhere. Our free online learning resources and real-time data create an individualized learning experience for your child.

We offer content across topics ranging from math and science to economics and art history. In math, we also offer adaptive skills practice that allows for even deeper personalization and mastery-based learning.

This guide is meant to provide parents and mentors insights into supporting an individual student in an informal learning environment using Khan Academy. Many of the coaching approaches we share stem from math-based learnings but are applicable in other subjects as well. Learning should be:

• Personalized for learners to move at their own pace.
• Focused on mastery to fill learning gaps in foundational understanding.
• Interactive and exploratory.

Access is completely FREE. No contract is required. There is no spam and no ads on our site.

Highlights of Khan Academy

• A galaxy of infinite practice from basic addition to calculus.
• Curated tutorials across subjects with lessons, skills practice, and explorations.
• Real-time individual and class data at your fingertips.
• A personalized learning dashboard.

Steps to Start

Step 1: Try it out

1. Sign up for an account at www.khanacademy.org using an email address to try out all the functionality.
2. After creating your own account and exploring the site, sign up your child for individual accounts at www.khanacademy.org/createchild.

All accounts for ages 13 and older have full coach and learner functionality. For children under 13, a Child Account is created. These accounts have restricted or modified features to protect the child’s privacy. See the appendix for more on privacy considerations and child accounts.

Step 2: Finding a place to start

Set the Stage

When getting started, set a positive mindset around Khan Academy. Framing Khan Academy as a fun activity or reward instead of studying or a chore is one effective tactic to motivate learners. It can make a big difference in how kids view using it. Spend a few minutes figuring out how you want to create an inviting learning environment.

Finding a Place to Start

Common uses to get started with Khan Academy when it comes to math include:

• Self-Directed Activity: If your aim is to provide a fun, educational activity for your child, the first time your child logs in, they will be asked to take a pretest to figure out where to start. Then, their homepage will suggest skills personalized for them. Given your child is learning on Khan Academy recreationally, if they so choose, feel free to encourage them to explore and try out new areas as well.
• Study Aid: If your child needs extra practice on specific skills, search for the names of those skills in the search box in the upper right. Alternatively, check out the Common Core mapping to see how specific Khan Academy content aligns with your child’s grade level curriculum.
• A Core Curriculum: If you are homeschooling your children or want to provide a learning option outside of school, the Common Core mapping is a common starting place to align to grade level curriculum. We encourage parents to tailor the content lists to each child’s particular needs.

A note on assigning content: Creating a hardcopy worksheet or list outside of Khan Academy is the recommended method to share a curriculum of content with your child. Common Core mapping: www.khanacademy.org/commoncore.

What if My Child Needs Help Outside of Math?

Khan Academy can be beneficial for non-math areas as well. If your child needs to focus in another subject area, they can use the search box to find the relevant content. See the list below to see what topics Khan Academy offers. Each topic is listed in order of more basic or conceptual content and builds to more advanced content, so starting at the top is recommended if there is not a set curriculum your child needs to follow.

Step 3: Start Using KA with Your Child

Khan Academy allows your child to learn at their own pace. As their Coach, you have access to tools that allow you to support your child’s learning journey.

As a parent or mentor, here are a few suggestions on how to use Khan Academy:

• Check on stats: Use the KA data reports to find out how much time your child is spending on KA, what their focus is, and what they are struggling with (click “COACH” => “Manage students” => Click on each child’s name to see their data).
• Have routine check-ins: Work with your child to establish milestones on what they will accomplish that week or month. It helps provide transparency, as well as build motivation through periodic milestones. It is recommended to keep a physical notebook or tracking list to track milestones and mark them off.
• Encourage and support: Use the data provided in KA to identify your child’s strengths and empower your child to overcome any challenges. For example, you might acknowledge an impressive badge that was recently earned, or encourage your child to take the hints or watch a video for a skill that they might be struggling with.
• Learn with them: Role model what lifelong learning looks like. Either choose a new topic to learn together or just learn a topic separately.
• Advocate for them: Talk to their teachers or other coaches about how to get involved and be supportive, or how Khan Academy can be integrated into their formal education.

Profile

Quick and easy way to see a learner’s proudest accomplishments and how many skills, videos, and energy points have been earned.

Focus

See exactly which skills and lessons your child is spending their time on over a day, week, or month. This report easily shows how a learner has spent the majority of their time, which enables coaches to see if they are on task, struggling, or ready to move forward.

Activity Report

Use when you want to take a closer look at how much time a learner spent on KA over a day, week, or month. This data can help facilitate conversations around work ethic, recognition, accomplishments, and more.

How to Use the Data

As a coach, you see the same data that your child will see. Visit your profile (https://www.khanacademy.org/profile/) to see your own personal learning progress. For your child’s progress, visit https://www.khanacademy.org/students. Click on your child’s username and you’ll be taken to their profile. In the left-hand column, you can select from the various reports. Below are a few reports that may be most helpful to look at:

Achievements

See which badges have been earned. Pick out a couple for your child to focus on – for example, the Magellan sun badge for 100 skills mastered.

Additional Resources

Explore more Coach Resources at: www.khanacademy.org/coach-res/for-parents.

Tips on Coaching if You Don’t Know the Content

Some coaches know the content that their learners are tackling. However, not every coach feels comfortable being the teacher. If you don’t know the content, that’s okay! Here are a few simple ways a coach can help without needing to know the material upfront:

1. Learn with them: Education is about learning how to approach new problems and content all the time. Role modeling this behavior can be incredibly powerful. Practice your skills, watch lessons, create CS programs alongside the learners. Explore the data together. Treat them as a peer as you learn. Ask each other questions and discuss what you are learning. This can also be a great way to bond.
2. Be the cheerleader: Sometimes a coach is most powerful as a cheerleader. Encouragement can take you pretty far. Telling someone to “keep up the hard work” or “try one more time” encourages perseverance and helps motivate learners.
3. Use the data: One parent notes, “The data reports are so helpful. I check to see how many problems my kid tried and if they watched the video. If I don’t see the camera symbol, I know they haven’t watched the video and I tell them to check it out. If I don’t see the question mark symbol, I know they didn’t look at any hints, so I nudge them to take a few.”

If You Do Know the Content

Many content-expert coaches facilitate learning by providing alternative explanations and examples when the learner does not understand the available material.

Motivated Learners

These learners often progress through KA at impressive speeds! If your motivated learners have already gone through all the material that you’ve prepared for them, here are some suggestions:

• Allow them to continue to move at their own pace by having them select which lessons and skills practice they would like to learn.
• Give them a project that will deepen their conceptual learning of the skills they have just mastered.
• Sharpen their social skills and conceptual understanding by having them peer tutor other learners (siblings or friends).

Disengaged Learners

These learners may be uninterested in KA and use time on the computer to goof off or procrastinate.

• Diagnose the problem: Do they have all prerequisite skills necessary for the skill being worked on? If not, consider giving them time to complete the prerequisites first. Is there a situation outside of school that is affecting their concentration?
• Find incentives and motivators: Set appropriate milestones and celebrate small successes, share data with other coaches or family members/influencers, encourage and reward.

Struggling	Needs Practice	Practiced	Level One	Level Two	Mastered
Student A	Student B	Student C	Student D	Student E	Student F

Common Core Mapping for Grade 6

Code	Description	Exercises
Ratios and Proportional Relationships	Understanding ratios and proportions	Exercises related to ratios
The Number System	Understanding numbers and operations	Exercises related to number operations

Improvement in Attitude/Work Ethic

Dependent Learners

These learners may work diligently, but they tend to ask for help frequently, be insecure in their own answers, and need lots of guidance.

• Emphasize a series of learning habits such as taking hints, watching a video, and asking a peer before directly asking the teacher a question.
• If they ask you to check their answers before they submit their final answer, encourage them to double check their work and submit their final answer when they feel ready.

Education is not just about learning specific content, it is also about learning how to learn.

Different Types of Learners

Type of Learner
Motivated Learners
Disengaged Learners
Dependent Learners

Privacy Considerations

Your privacy and your child’s privacy is of utmost importance. No one has access to your data or your child’s data unless explicitly given permission. Our site is free to use and completely free of ads and spam so that each learner can focus on learning.

Privacy Settings Affected Areas

1. Profile

   You can unlock your child’s profile by clicking the “Profile is private” tab at the bottom right of your profile summary to toggle between settings.

2. Community Forums

   For child accounts (for users under 13 years of age), posting in discussion forums is not an option.

   For accounts for users over 13 years old and Google Apps for Education accounts, any postings in forums are public to all users. You can view all user postings by visiting their profile and clicking “Discussions” in the left-hand column.

3. Learning Data

   Progress of your child’s learning is only available to their coaches. For child accounts, parents can select whether to allow for coaches other than the parent account.

   For all accounts, the learner must accept a coach request in order for a coach to have access to their data. All the data a learner sees is available to their coach.

For more on our Privacy Policy, visit: Khan Academy Privacy Policy

How Child Accounts are Different

• The parent who creates the child account becomes the child’s permanent coach.
• The child cannot enter certain information (e.g., email, full name) in their profile, nor make their profile public.
• The parent account has the option of disabling other coaches from gaining access to the child’s Khan Academy data.
• The parent manages the child’s password and can change it at any time for any reason.
• The child cannot post public messages in discussion forums.
• Child accounts are reserved solely for the use by a parent or legal guardian of a child. Violation of this policy may result in deletion of the account entirely.
• Note: accounts via Google Apps for Education are not considered child accounts and have unrestricted access to all of the site’s features.