Personalized learning policies and strategies in K–12 education: Where, when, and for what?

Abstract Scant information exists about the distribution of national personalized learning policies/strategies worldwide and their focus. To address this research gap, this study conducts a narrative review of personalized learning policies/strategies in the globe and analysis the identified personalization parameters and components. Particularly, twenty policies were identified and reviewed. The obtained results revealed that most of these policies addressed personalized learning in a very superficial way, which could be due to the lack of understanding this concept. Additionally, while several personalization parameters were identified (e.g., age, culture, etc.), limited attention was paid to learners’ psychological and cognitive differences, calling for more focus on these individual differences. The analysis also reveals that personalized learning policies/strategies need to define assessment mechanisms for personalization and for the policy/strategy itself to assess the effectiveness of personalized learning. The findings of this study can contribute to the literature by highlighting to various stakeholder, including policymakers and educators, the areas of improvement in terms of writing personalized learning policies/strategies and also in terms of implementing them.