Now that we have some idea how Artificial Intelligence (AI) will impact Millennials, banking and financial institutions, and small businesses, how will it impact the classroom?
Educators have pinpointed 10 ways it will influence the way we educate our kids. They include:
- The automation of basic activities.
- Adapting the curriculum to the needs of the students.
- Identify where courses should be improved.
- AI “tutors” offering additional support to students.
- Provide helpful feedback to students and teachers.
- Alter how teachers and students interact with information.
- Change the role of teachers.
- Help make trial and error learning less threatening.
- Offer new ways to find, teach, and support students.
- Change where students learn, who teaches them, and how they learn basic skills.
It is not uncommon for today’s teachers, whether they do their work in elementary, secondary school, high school, or college, spending their evenings and weekends grading papers or exams. No doubt a teacher or two would much rather use this time to interact with students, spend more time preparing classes, or even work on their own personal development.
Help is on the way thanks to AI. The technology can automate grading for such things as multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank tests. Moreover, computer scientists are working toward the existence of software that will grade essays.
In addition, AI software will allow teachers to individualize learning. This will allow students to learn at their own pace with teacher assistance.
Since teachers are concentrating on educating their students, they can be unaware of gaps in their lectures and in educational materials. Such gaps can cause confusion among some students about certain concepts. AI can find a trend of too many students submitting a wrong answer to a particular question or homework assignment and alert the teacher to the problem. This will permit teachers to change their presentations in a manner that will solve the issue. Students can be given a more customized message that helps them understand concepts. Meanwhile, AI is providing them with constant feedback that helps them better understand concepts.
Just as in other segments of the economy where AI is or will change the human workforce to work more in conjunction with the technology, teachers too will adjust to this working pattern. Teachers will enhance the lessons that AI has taught the students with actual hands-on experiences.
AI will open up trial and error as a form of learning and allow students to experiment and learn without fear of failure.
As AI becomes more ubiquitous in the field of education, it will help colleges recruit students and help students select courses. It could customize every aspect of the educational experience to be closer to their needs and goals. For example, some colleges are already offering AI-guided training that help students make the transition from high school to college. Some day AI may help students select a college that has the program that fits with their interests.
And, just as AI has revolutionized how we get our information, it will do the same in education. Doing research will involve AI and result in the development of information sources never seen before.
In short, AI will revolutionize education to a point where students can learn anywhere and at any time wherever they are in the world. For better or worse, it may also hasten the replacement of teachers in certain areas of the educational process.