We offer a unique and growing learning platform, designed from the ground up for a mobile, social world. It uses a simple question and answer format combined with a proprietary adaptive algorithm to deliver better and more convenient learning experiences. SpacedEd delivers "Addictive Learning That Sticks." /
The SpacedEd service is based on a patent pending method developed and used at Harvard Medical School, of which we are the exclusive commercial licensee.
Officially we are Spaced Education, Inc. but our friends just call us SpacedEd. We are headquartered in Burlington, MA.
The Problem
Existing learning methods, online and offline, are often inconvenient, boring, time-consuming and ill-suited to the younger generations of digital natives. /
The Solution
SpacedEd is a social learning platform for developing and delivering online learning that offers an addictive learning experience directly to users in a simple “question a day” format. Anyone from an individual to a company or school can create and deliver courses using our tools. Anyone with access to the Web via a computer or mobile device can sign up and take courses.
Our Approach
/The SpacedEd approach is predicated on a set of core principles:
· Short Repeated Bursts: Because it uses a regular schedule and an adaptive algorithm, learning can be delivered in small amounts that can take as little as 3 minutes a day.
· Push Learning: The learning comes to you on a regular schedule. You don’t have to remember to do it or set aside large chunks of time.
· Adaptive: The daily content adapts based on past performance automatically to drive long-term retention while requiring less time.
· Immediate Feedback: Once a question is answered, detailed educational feedback is provided. Users are also given performance data (their course progress and performance relative to peers) which feeds their addiction to the courses.
Proven To Work
Our method has been proven to work. Data from over 10 large randomized controlled trials (RCTs) demonstrate that it is effective, efficient, addictive and changes behavior. View some key highlights. /
Team
Duncan Lennox, Co-founder & CEO
A 20 year veteran of the technology industry, Duncan has spent the last 16 years in the field of learning technology.
Prior to SpacedEd, he was the Principal Consultant at blurgl, Inc. a learning technology consulting company he founded in 2006.
Before that, he spent over a decade as a board member and Chief Technology Officer of WBT Systems, an enterprise eLearning software company that he co-founded in 1995.
He holds a B.Sc. (Hons.) in Computer Science from University College Dublin, Ireland.
Barry Paul, Co-founder & CTO
Barry has 20 years experience building enterprise and consumer applications including eLearning systems.
In addition to his own technology consulting company, Swami Systems, (which built the social music site Bossa Live) he has previously held senior engineering positions at WBT Systems, Siemens Medical Solutions and Cinemaware.
He holds a B.A. (Hons.) in Computer Science from Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland and is a Ruby on Rails expert.
Advisory Board
Harold D. Copperman, President & CEO, HDC Ventures
Mr. Copperman has served as CEO and President of HDC Ventures, Inc., a management and investment group focusing on enterprise systems, software and services since March 2002. From January 2001 to March 2002, Mr. Copperman was a consultant and a private investor.
From 1993 through 1999, Mr. Copperman served as Senior Vice President and Group Executive of the Products Division at Digital Equipment Corporation where he was responsible for the companies six computer systems business units and worldwide manufacturing and distribution. He managed 22,000 employees generating $7 Billion in annual revenues.
Prior to joining Digital Equipment Corporation, Mr. Copperman served as President and CEO of the Information Services and Computer Systems units of JWP, Inc. From 1989 to 1991, he served as President and Chief Operating Officer of Commodore Business Machines, Inc. Prior to that he served as Vice President and General Manager, Eastern Operations for Apple Computer, Inc. (1987-1989) and from 1967 through 1987 held a number of sales, marketing and executive management positions with IBM Corporation.
Mr. Copperman has served on a number of public company Boards including America Online, Inc., 800 Software, Epicor Software and AXS-One. He currently sits on the Boards of Avocent Computers (NASDAQ: AVCT) and ID Systems (NASDAQ: IDSY) as well as a number of private companies.
B. Price Kerfoot, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Kerfoot is the inventor of Spaced Education, the learning method on which SpacedEd is based.
He is a staff surgeon (urologist) at the Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System and an Associate Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. The focus of Dr. Kerfoot's research has been the application of rigorous clinical trial methodologies to the evaluation of online educational technologies.
Since 2004, Dr. Kerfoot has worked to develop spaced education as an effective means by which students and clinicians could improve their learning and retention of core medical concepts.
He holds degrees from Harvard (M.D. & Ed.M.), Oxford (M.A.) and Princeton (A.B.). Dr. Kerfoot is currently the recipient of the “Rising Star” Award from the American Urological Assoc. Foundation.
Paul Kenny, Managing Director, Eden Partners
Mr. Kenny is Chairman of Daft Media Limited, Ireland's largest property website. He is also a director of a number of other private companies in Ireland.
In the past 15 years, he has co-founded a number of Internet start ups: clevercactus a P2P personal information platform, WBT Systems, an eLearning infrastructure software company, and EUnet, the then largest ISP in Ireland.
Prior to that, he spent 12 years in venture capital and investment banking in New York, London and Dublin.
Approach
SpacedEd is a platform designed to allow learners and teachers to harness the educational benefits of spaced education. Spaced education is a novel method of online education developed and rigorously investigated by Dr. B. Price Kerfoot (Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School).
It is based upon two core psychology research findings: the spacing effect and the testing effect. In more than 10 randomized trials completed to date, spaced education has been found to:
· Improve knowledge acquisition,
· Increase long-term knowledge retention (out to 2 years),
· Change behavior,
· Boost learners' abilities to accurately self-assess their knowledge.
In addition, spaced education is extremely well-accepted by learners.
The spacing effect refers to the psychology research finding that information which is presented and repeated over spaced intervals is learned and retained more effectively, in comparison to traditional bolus ('binge-and-purge') methods of education.
The testing effect refers to the research finding that the long-term retention of information is significantly improved by testing learners on this information. Testing is not merely a means to measure a learner's level of knowledge, but rather causes knowledge to be stored more effectively in long-term memory.
The spaced education methodology is content-neutral and thus can be utilized to learn most anything. Potential applications range from teaching chemistry concepts to high school students to reinforcing Arabic language skills among health workers in the Middle East. It can also be used to reinforce educational material which was initially presented in the classroom. The full multi-media capabilities of the Internet can be harnessed to create a rich and effective learning experience.
The "spacing effect" refers to the psychology research finding that information which is presented and repeated over spaced intervals is learned and retained more effectively, in comparison to traditional bolus ("binge-and-purge") methods of education.
Since its discovery in the late 19th century by the German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus, the spacing effect has been extensively studied. Even though this research has repeatedly demonstrated the spacing effect’s potent ability to improve learning retention, these findings have only had limited translation into formal educational practice. Recently, the spacing effect was found to have a distinct neurophysiological basis: Sisti et al (2007) showed that spaced learning in rats improved neuronal longevity in the hippocampus (a region of the brain which is important for long-term memory).
1. Ebbinghaus H. Memory: A Contribution to Experimental Psychology. New York: Dover Publications, Inc.; 1964 (Original German text published 1885).
2. Sisti HM, Glass AL, Shors TJ. Neurogenesis and the spacing effect: Learning over time enhances memory and the survival of new neurons. Learn Mem 2007;14(5):368-75.
3. Pashler H, Rohrer D, Cepeda NJ, Carpenter SK. Enhancing learning and retarding forgetting: choices and consequences. Psychonomic bulletin & review 2007;14(2):187-93.
4. Cepeda NJ, Vul E, Rohrer D, Wixted JT, Pashler H. Spacing effects in learning: a temporal ridgeline of optimal retention. Psychol Sci 2008;19(11):1095-102.
5. Moulton CA, Dubrowski A, Macrae H, Graham B, Grober E, Reznick R. Teaching surgical skills: what kind of practice makes perfect?: a randomized, controlled trial. Ann Surg 2006;244(3):400-9.
6. Toppino TC, Kasserman JE, Mracek WA. The effect of spacing repetitions on the recognition memory of young children and adults. J Exp Child Psychol 1991;51(1):123-38.
7. Hillary FG, Schultheis MT, Challis BH, et al. Spacing of repetitions improves learning and memory after moderate and severe TBI. J Clin Exp Neuropsychol 2003;25(1):49-58.
8. Menzel R, Manz G, Greggers U. Massed and spaced learning in honeybees: the role of CS, US, the intertrial interval, and the test interval. Learn Mem 2001;8(4):198-208.
9. Pavlik PI, Anderson JR. Using a model to compute the optimal schedule of practice. J Exp Psychol Appl 2008;14(2):101-17.
10. Glenberg AM, Lehmann TS. Spacing repetitions over 1 week. Memory & Cognition 1980;8(6):528-38.
11. Landauer TK, Bjork RA. Optimum rehearsal patterns and name learning. In: Gruneberg MM, Morris, P.E., and Sykes, R.N., ed. Practical Aspects of Memory. New York: Academic Press; 1978:625-32.
The "testing effect" refers to the research finding that the long-term retention of information is significantly improved by testing learners on this information. Testing is not merely a means to measure a learner’s level of knowledge, but rather causes knowledge to be stored more effectively in long-term memory.
Some elegant research was recently reported by Dr. Karpicke, Dr. Roediger and their colleagues demonstrating the profound improvement that testing (retrieval practice) can generate on longer-term retention of knowledge. Further evidence suggests that testing with fill-in-the-blank questions (free recall) produces greater improvements in retention, compared to testing with multiple-choice questions (cued recall).
1. Karpicke JD, Roediger HL, 3rd. The critical importance of retrieval for learning. Science 2008;319(5865):966-8.
2. Roediger HL, Karpicke JD. Test-enhanced learning: taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychol Sci 2006;17(3):249-55.
3. Carpenter SK, Pashler H, Wixted JT, Vul E. The effects of tests on learning and forgetting. Mem Cognit 2008;36(2):438-48.
4. Larsen DP, Butler AC, Roediger HL, 3rd. Test-enhanced learning in medical education. Med Educ 2008;42(10):959-66.
5. McDaniel MA, Roediger HL, 3rd, McDermott KB. Generalizing test-enhanced learning from the laboratory to the classroom. Psychonomic bulletin & review 2007;14(2):200-6.
6. Morris PE, Fritz CO. The improved name game: better use of expanding retrieval practice. Memory 2002;10(4):259-66.
7. Bjork RA. Retrieval practice and the maintenance of knowledge. In: Gruneberg MM, Morris PE, Sykes RN, eds. Practical aspects of memory: current research and issues. New York: John Wiley & Sons.; 1988 (pp. 396-401).
8. Glenberg AM. Influences of retrieval processes on the spacing effect in free recall. J Exp Psychol Hum Learn Memory 1977;3(3):282-94.
9. Logan JM, Balota DA. Expanded vs. equal interval spaced retrieval practice: exploring different schedules of spacing and retention interval in younger and older adults. Neuropsychology, development, and cognition 2008;15(3):257-80.
Key Highlights
Our method has been proven to work. Data from over 10 large randomized controlled trials (RCTs) demonstrate that it is effective, efficient, addictive and changes behavior. Some key highlights are:
Characteristic / Claim / Evidence /Effective / Generates improved long-term retention of knowledge in only minutes a day. / · Increased retention of knowledge for 2+ years (compared to self-study) in RCT of 524 physicians.
Changes Behavior / Proven to positively impact on-the-job performance and change even engrained behavior. / · Decreased unnecessary cancer screenings by 26% in RCT of 95 VA primary care providers, representing a potential cost savings of $650,000 per annum in test costs alone.
Efficient / Adaptive algorithm reduces time to acquire same amount of knowledge as non-adaptive methods / · 38% increase in learning efficiency due to adaptive algorithm (compared to non-adaptive method) in RCT of 93 medical students.
Addictive / Learning pushed on a daily basis requiring no more than 5 minutes a day and delivering instant feedback on progress is proven to be addictive. / · 77-95% of the 3500+ users to date request to enroll in more courses.
· Completion rates greater than 70%
· Preferred 3:1 over web-based teaching modules (a gold-standard of e-learning) in RCT of 724 physicians.
Research
Spaced education is a novel method of online education based upon two core psychology research findings: the spacing effect and the testing effect. Spaced education was initially developed and then rigorously studied by Dr. B. Price Kerfoot (Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School) as a method to improve the long-term knowledge retention of medical trainees. In over 10 large randomized trials completed to date, spaced education has been found to"
· Improve knowledge acquisition,
· Increase long-term knowledge retention (out to 2 years),
· Change behavior, and
· Boost learners’ abilities to accurately self-assess their knowledge.
In addition, spaced education is extremely well-accepted by learners.
The spaced education methodology is content-neutral and thus can be utilized to learn most anything. Potential applications range from teaching geography to school children to documenting competence in accounting skills among small business owners. The full multi-media capabilities of the Internet can be harnessed to create a rich and effective learning experience.