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The Death of the Test

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Time to Know Uses a Start-up Approach to Revolutionizing Education

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074 By S. Sokol
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076 Photography by Avi Levine
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079 While educational methods have changed over the past Minister of Education, and Nir Barkat, Jerusalem’s tech-
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081 few centuries, the basic structure of the classroom has savvy mayor.
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083 remained untouched. One teacher versus ten, twenty But how is Time to Know different from other educational
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or two hundred students – the basis has always been software already used in schools? Can this startup justify
086 teacher [standing ] facing said number of students the conceit that their product represents a revolution
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088 [sitting]. Time to Know is an Israeli start-up comprised in teaching methodology? The concept behind Time to
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of high-tech insiders as well as pedagogic experts that Know is simple yet impressive. Every student in a class
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has set out to, in no immodest terms, revolutionize the is provided with a low-powered Netbook computer and
093 classroom. It is no wonder then that their approach to is networked with his peers and teacher, who is able to
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095 education is heavily tinged with a start-up approach. monitor every student’s progress. There is an option of
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The new digital teaching platform, in essence, a setup either using a pre-organized syllabus, complete with
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for linking students with their teacher and each other exercises, lessons and animations, or a tailor-made lesson
100 in an interactive network, is already in place in select created by the teacher and suited for the individual class
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102 schools in Tel-Aviv and Texas and is causing a buzz both or course.
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in Israel as well as the States. Lessons are viewed simultaneously on the students’
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CEO Yossi Ben-Dov is certainly ambitious. When asked screens, and materials are shown on a whiteboard by the
107 where he imagines his company to be heading as his use of an overhead projector. Students are then paired
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109 product leaves the beta stage, he states emphatically “I up by the teacher to engage in testing and practice
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want to see every student in Israel using [this] product.” sessions to utilize their newly learned skills.
112 The release of the Time to Know software in the United The system, according to Ben-Dov, is revolutionary in
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114 States is intended, not only to further the advancement the sense that it frees teachers from a dependence on
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116 of education, but to pay for a massive rollout of the frequent testing in determining the progress of students,
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platform in Israel. Ben-Dov is excited to inform me through real-time monitoring.
119 that there has been interest by both Gideon Saar, the Ben-Dov hopes to remove computers from the lab or
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The program is certainly proving
successful. Schools in Texas, Tel-Aviv
and Modiin are currently testing the
program and more school districts in
Israel are slated to sign on
from the back of the classroom and integrate them into
the core curriculum.
As one school superintendent says, “Time To Know is
not separate from the teaching and learning process− it’s
completely integrated.”
While computers have been used in primary education
since the early days of the Apple II, Time to Know might
really be bringing about a paradigm shift. That is, if they
can succeed in convincing the administrators of failing
school districts to invest in the necessary hardware
infrastructure necessary to run their product. However,
with atom processor powered Netbook computers
becoming more and more popular and affordable, it
seems that within a few short years, even the hardware
will not prove a barrier to adoption.
As Ben-Dov says, with a smirk on his face, “Three
hundred dollars for a computer is much less than an
average middle class parent spends on his child’s mobile
phone plan in America.”
Earlier this year, when one school in Tel-Aviv trial-
testing the platform, claimed budgetary restraints for
axing the new program, teachers, parents and students
alike raised such a fuss that the school was forced to
backtrack and reinstitute the use of Ben-Dov’s system.
“You can teach any kid if they’re engaged, because they
are ready to learn, and that’s the difference between a
regular classroom and a Time To Know classroom,” raves
Phylia Stewart, a teacher at the Lancaster elementary
school in Texas.
The project was initially envisioned as a philanthropic
enterprise and as such has been dependent on grants. As
of yet, it has not become profitable. Billionaire Shmuel
Meital provided much of the seed funding in the form
of a charitable grant.
Ben-Dov has not divulged how much money has been
spent so far in developing the interactive teaching suite,
but he was willing to say that it has run into the tens of
millions of dollars.
The composition of Ben-Dov’s staff reflects this
dedication to education. As he is quick to point out, not
many companies employ a CPO, or chief pedagogical
officer. Moreover, out of three hundred and fifty people
on staff at Time to Know, one hundred and twenty have
a background in education.
The setup
Dov Weiss, Chief Pedagogic Officer [CPO] termed the
Time to Know syllabus “blended learning,” meaning that
while the use of computers is key to the method, it is
only part of a larger holistic teaching method that plays
to the strength of computers in education but does not
integrate technology for technology’s sake.
At most, only fifty percent of classroom time will be spent
on the computer. This is in part because the computer
is only part of the core curriculum formulated by Weiss
and in part to prevent vision problems stemming from
prolonged staring at a screen.
With such a setup, there is always the risk that students
will prowl the web for non-educational purposes.
Anticipating this, Ben-Dov and Weiss formulated the
software in such a way that students are not able to
access a task manager or leave the software environment
without permission from their teacher acting as the
system administrator.
Academic support
With an advisory board that includes winners of
the prestigious Israel Prize and academics from both
Harvard and Berkeley, offices in California, Texas and
Israel and pilot programs being run on two continents,
the management of Time to Know have every reason to
sound confident when speaking of their product.
Funding may soon become a problem, and there are still
issues with the upfront costs of setting up this system,
even for Israeli schools that receive the software and
backend support for free, but if these hurdles can be
overcome, then Time to Know has a great chance to
change the antiquated structure of both the American
and Israeli classroom.
///
Another Israel Review