Schwartz, R. (2018, May 04). Structure Helps Promote Student Agency. Retrieved May 09, 2018

At Silicon Schools Fund we invest in schools that take new approaches to education. We recently wrote that many schools are starting to create flex time periods during the day, where students work independently, often online, while teachers perform high-leverage activities such as student mentoring and small-group instruction. For flex time to work well, schools have to accomplish a tricky balance between fostering autonomy in students while still holding them accountable for ambitious learning targets. Together with Relay Graduate School of Education, we observed eight examples of flex time in schools, utilizing a data collection tool and protocol. We interviewed teachers, administrators, and students. We entered with hypotheses about what makes flex time effective and several learnings emerged including: