What are the benefits of an expertly curated learning pathway? 

Like that provided by a major publisher's textbook - [CPM](https://cpm.org/), a school district's mandated curriculum - [IM's Open Up Resources](https://im.openupresources.org/) or a learning game - [ST Math](https://www.stmath.com/), [Dragonbox](https://dragonbox.com/), or [Amplify Fractions](https://www.amplify.com/programs/amplify-fractions/).

I ask this question with no particular age-level in mind, but I could see how the younger a learner is, the more useful a defined learning pathway would be - partly due to the inexperience of the learner

Research has been done on the idea of learning maps as a way of assisting learners along a learning pathway. See [Gates Learning Maps](https://intentionalfutures.com/insights/portfolio/individual-learning-maps/) projects. 

One led by Jere Confrey's team has had some interesting [research results](http://www.oecd.org/education/2030/A-Synthesis-of-Research-on-Learning-Trajectories-Progressions-in-Mathematics.pdf) and a [design concept](https://sudds.ced.ncsu.edu/).

However, I still find it difficult to believe that the future of learning will involve standardized linear learning pathways... true personalization will bend and weave the trajectory of each learner, right? As [Knewton described](http://www.lmi.ub.edu/cursos/s21/REPOSITORIO/documents/knewton-adaptive-learning-whitepaper.pdf) or InBloom [once visaged](https://datasociety.net/pubs/ecl/InBloom_feb_2017.pdf)... Or as a math prof recently argued to me, "Whose canon?" when discussing canonical examples to teach undergraduate intro stats.

In an age of brokering experiences, I offer my [non-expert postgraduate data science pathway](http://bit.ly/futureEducation) and ask the question another way, 

> 
> Why pay for an expert's subjective structuring of content when you can
>  structure your own learning based on your own personal interest and
>  passion projects for free?
> 
> 
>