Hold the standard fixed and let the time vary, so pupils proceed only once a unit is mastered.
The inversion is of the usual arrangement, where time is fixed by the timetable and attainment varies. Mastery learning fixes attainment and varies time, which requires somewhere for the fast pupils to go and something for the slow ones to be given, and that is where implementations usually fail.
In practice
- A class where nobody advances until everyone can do it produces uniform attainment and a bored third.
- A training scheme that passes people on a date rather than a standard certifies the date.
- Possible explanations
- The explanation is prerequisite structure: later material depends on earlier material, so a pupil moved on before mastery accumulates gaps that make everything after it harder.
- In its favour
- Trials find real gains, particularly for pupils who would otherwise fall behind, and the logic of not building on unlearned foundations is hard to dispute.
- Against it
- Meta-analytic estimates vary widely with design, and the approach demands flexibility in timetable and staffing that schools rarely have, so measured effects may not transfer to ordinary conditions.
- Standing
- Meta-analytic estimates of the benefit vary widely with design, and the approach is demanding of timetable and staffing in ways trials often do not reproduce.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Learning & Education
- Essay
- Theories of teaching, and what schools are for