Future of Educational Technology
After reading the Facer and Sandford (2010)’s article, I was so fascinated to think of how the world in general and the field of educational technology in particular would be like in the next 25 years. As this was the first time I read the kind of study which predicts the future, it was very interesting for me to learn about their research methodology and procedure as well as the diverse multi-disciplinary perspectives about the future world emerged. Among three scenarios, I believed that the first scenario “Trust yourself” which underscores the individualization aspect of the future education system would be most likely to happen. More specifically, the authors foresaw two education systems emerging: 1) Informed choice - education would be highly personalized around individual learning need and interests and 2) Independence consumer - education provided by different sectors (i.e. private, public, and not-for-profit) would be diverse and standardized.
Eventually the idea of personalized education is not novel as it has been discussed extensively by scholars, educators, and school administrators and advocated by a plenty of educational institutions, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations for years. For example, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation, and EDUCAUSE asserted that “personalized learning seeks to accelerate student learning by tailoring the instructional environment — what, when, how, and where students learn — to address the individual needs skills and interests of each student. Students can take ownership of their own learning, while also developing deep, personal connections with each other, their teachers and other adults.” Most recently, in the flagship policy document for educational technology of the U.S. Department of Education “2016 National Education Technology Plan: Future Ready Learning: Reimagining the Role of Technology in Education,” personalized learning was defined as “instruction in which the pace of learning and the instructional approach are optimized for the needs of each learner. Learning objectives, instructional approaches, and instructional content (and its sequencing) may all vary based on learner needs. In addition, learning activities are made available that are meaningful and relevant to learners, driven by their interests and often self-initiated.” You can easily find more institutions and organizations which are interested in and advocating for personalized learning in this article.
From these aforementioned definitions, it is not hard to see a wide range of invaluable benefits personalized learning can offer to learners. Indeed, personalized learning allows learners to adjust learning pace to accommodate their cognitive capabilities so that all the learners have sufficient amount of time to comprehend the learning content, practice, and demonstrate mastery. In addition, as learning is tailored to each individual’s learning needs and interests, it becomes more meaningful and relevant and keeps learners more engaged and motivated. Despite gaining substantial attention from both academia and industry, personalized learning seems to go nowhere at the moment as Katrina Stevens, the Deputy Director in the Office of Educational Technology at the U.S. Department of Education concerned “personalized learning is in danger of becoming diminished to the point where it becomes no more than marketing hype”
I think the crux of the matter is lack of technology to support this learning model. Though at this point computer can mediate a lot of meaningful learning activities which allows learners to learn whatever, whenever, and wherever they want to a certain extent, how they learn with technology still seems not up to par yet. The presence of and interaction with instructor and other learning pals which are often considered of a crucial factor for engagement and motivation are currently a big missing piece in e-learning. Of course, there are still many other issues of e-learning, but in my opinion, I think the lack of human interaction is the most important. Having seen the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence and mixed realities technology recently makes me think that these technologies might be the answer for the problem.
I imagine that in the year of 2042, people are not going to brick-and-mortar schools anymore. Instead, they will just stay home and turn any space in their house to a mixed realities classroom where they can freely choose to reveal their real identity or use an avatar to participate. Learners can choose a private or collaborative classroom as they would like. The learners in the collaborative classroom can be a mix of real humans all over the world and AI-empowered bots which bring dynamic and diverse perspectives to the classroom. The language barrier will be broke down entirely at that time thanks to AI translator bots, so learners can communicate directly to each other in their native language. Similar to learners, instructors can be bots or real humans for learners to choose based on learners’ preference.
Nobody knows what future will hold, but I am really excited and hopeful that my imaginary classroom will become true in the next 25 years.
Reference:
Facer, K., & Sandford, R. (2010). The next 25 years?: Future scenarios and future directions for education and technology. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26, 74–93. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2729.2009.00337.x/full
