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In 2023, artificial intelligence technology experienced a significant surge. This started with introducing groundbreaking language models and culminated in creating entire metaverses built upon them.
ChatGPT made a significant impact by creating diverse text materials. At the same time, MidJourney advanced to become the leading neural network for image generation. Numerous similar technologies emerged, sparking competitive innovation and driving the evolution of AI forward. Naturally, these advancements have significantly impacted the field of education. To be more precise, the education sector has eagerly adopted artificial intelligence to enhance its effectiveness and quality.
This raises the question: What new advancements will artificial intelligence bring to education in 2024? What truly innovative technologies are being actively used in education today? We bet you haven't heard of at least half of them! We've compiled a comprehensive list.
Converting text to video and creating video lectures
Numerous studies suggest that we retain 80-95% of video information better than text. This is likely due to the characteristics of the modern human psyche, including "clip thinking" and the need for visualization, which new technologies have shaped over time. This is why both the students and educational platforms (including, by the way, Lectera) prefer video lectures. AI has responded to this demand by creating numerous services that can convert text into video format with just a few clicks.
For instance, services like Google's Synthesia or Lumiere operate by allowing you to upload a text file, which AI then converts into an audio track (reading it aloud) and overlays onto a pre-selected avatar, animating it. Some advanced services even let you choose a real person or celebrity as your avatar. The outcome is a video where a fictional character or real person recites your text in any language, complete with lip movements and gestures, creating the appearance of a comprehensive video lesson. Premium subscriptions for these AI services allow you to add various backgrounds and interactive sections, making the video more realistic and engaging. This can also be achieved with other AI services like Easygenerator or Articulate 360. Imagine a video where Newton himself explains his third law!
While it's easy to tell an AI-generated video apart from one created and edited by a human upon closer inspection, this doesn't impact the perception or effectiveness of the information being delivered. For example, the International University of Applied Sciences in Germany uses this method to generate video lessons for over 100,000 students. So far, they have released a total of 28,000 educational videos using a neural network. This demonstrates how an AI text-to-video converter cuts down the time needed for content development and release and enables the scaling of any educational program. Just imagine the time and resources required to produce 28,000 videos manually!
How you can utilize this for personal or professional use: In just a few minutes, convert text material you find difficult to remember into a video for personal use.
How you can use this for your business or work: Diversify your content by creating a "mascot" to read your materials and aid in training employees, clients, or students.
Virtual tutors and coaches
While AI can't fully replace teachers, it can serve as an excellent coach or tutor! AI has several advantages over human teachers: it's available 24/7, never gets tired, doesn't need breaks or days off, and is often free. In contrast, hiring an experienced professional can be pretty expensive. Tutor bots are handy for schoolchildren and students looking to deepen or test their knowledge in specific subjects. You can ask the bot any question within the compulsory area, request simple explanations about complex topics, engage in scientific debates, and even seek help when solving challenging mathematical problems at any time. The Character AI website offers various tutors to suit various preferences. Initially, the platform was designed for text-based role-playing games and interactions with fictional characters from video games, comics, and TV series.
However, today, Character AI also includes specialist bots from various industries, scientists, and authors of different methods and theories. You can even consult with Isaac Newton himself for explanations! You can even "clone" a real teacher: upload their photo, describe their personality in the bot description, indicating their area of expertise, and include other critical behavioral traits. This opens up many opportunities for universities and educational platforms, as users can create their bot tutor or professor entirely free.
Google has developed an app called Socratic, which helps students tackle challenging tasks by analyzing a photo of the problem and even offering solutions. Meanwhile, Khan Academy has introduced Khanmigo, a virtual mentor powered by GPT-4 directly on their platform. Khanmigo supports teachers, students, and parents throughout learning by answering questions, providing prompts, and evaluating results.
The main drawback of using AI for learning and teaching is that language models still struggle to eliminate hallucinations. Hallucinations occur when a bot fabricates or distorts facts, almost as if it's experiencing a delusion. Consequently, there's always a risk that the bot might provide incorrect answers or unreliable solutions.
How to utilize this for personal or professional use: Contact the appropriate chatbot for the topic you need support and help with.
How you can utilize this for your business or work: Develop your own AI assistant on a popular platform to promote your company or integrate it into your platform, similar to what Khan Academy did with Khanmigo.
Psychological support bots
AI can also be used similarly to other systems to offer various types of support to students, including psychological assistance. For instance, the psychotherapeutic chatbot Woebot helps address common modern-day issues like anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, and more. In education, AI manages learning-related stress and optimizes study load distribution. Through testing and communication with the user, the bot can identify internal struggles and conflicts, detect symptoms of chronic stress, and recommend that students or teachers adjust their approach to learning.
AIs can also monitor disturbing content on social networks, such as posts about self-harm, to help prevent mental health deterioration or even suicide. They passively track students' mental health and, if needed, alert school psychologists, teachers, or the students themselves.
How you can utilize this for personal or professional use: Reach out to a psychotherapist bot anytime, day or night, when you need psychological support.
How you can utilize this for your business or work: Integrate a virtual assistant to help your students manage stress from their academic workload or offer access to such a bot as a promotional benefit.
Analysing academic performance for "early intervention."
"Early intervention" involves taking steps to alleviate a student's academic performance before they develop knowledge gaps, low scores, or learning difficulties. This means timely adjustments to their educational path, such as replacing ineffective teaching methods with ones better suited to the student, altering schedules, and modifying assessment methods.
If the student or teacher handles these actions personally, the AI will indicate who needs them and when. The AI continuously monitors and analyses each student's academic performance, identifying those in the 'risk group' and signaling those requiring a tutor or additional support. One example of such a platform is BrightBytes, which can be integrated into a teacher's database to include test results, grades, and general student information. Similarly, Renaissance Star 360 produces performance ratings and offers predictions and reviews to facilitate early intervention.
How to utilize this for personal or professional use: You can utilize AI for self-assessment by manually uploading your test data. This will help you identify areas where your knowledge is lacking and determine if your performance is average.
How to utilize this for your business or work: Evaluate your educational course for many underachievers to assess its effectiveness and identify weaknesses.
An entire educational AI system from Google
Google is at the forefront of artificial intelligence development. In the spring of 2024, the company introduced a new family of models called LearnLM, based on Gemini. Designed explicitly for educational purposes, LearnLM is so revolutionary that it has become a standout innovation in education, completely transforming traditional approaches. LearnLM features an advanced language model with minimal risk of hallucinations, ensuring maximum accuracy and speed. Additionally, it integrates various AI services and technologies into a unified system, including:
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The Circle to Search function for Android devices allows you to highlight any text or image fragment directly on your phone screen to obtain information, decipher terms, or find solutions to problems. This feature is especially useful for schoolchildren.
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New tools for watching YouTube videos enable you to 'raise your hand' during the video and ask LearnLM clarifying questions, making it feel like a real-time lesson tailored just for you. LearnLM can also create tests for any video to help you check your knowledge afterward and explain any unclear points. Additionally, LearnLM is valuable even with long, hour-long lectures.
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Enhanced search results: LearnLM can now provide a brief overview of all search results, present the material in more straightforward language, or divide and structure it for better comprehension.
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Custom versions of the Gemini chatbot can provide personal experts and teachers in any field. The Gemini Advanced version allows you to customize the chatbot according to your aims and preferences. For example, you could indicate That they are your advanced mathematics teacher. It would help if you learned how to solve these problems today. You would like them to be motivated and positive.
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Google Classroom is an online school service that permits teachers to plan online lessons, find and gather engaging materials, and personalize presentations for each student. The virtual assistant manages all the work with AI assistance.
As you may have noticed, Google is actively involved in all areas of AI development, which we touched on above separately. They continuously monitor societal trends and demands, promptly releasing enhanced alternatives to meet these needs.
How you can utilize this for your business or work: Master these tools and integrate them into your work or your company's operations!
Customisation of programs and training systems
Adaptive AI platforms like Smart Sparrow and Docebo support the creation of individual learning plans for any subject, tailored to user profiles and information about them, such as academic performance, preferences, and average learning pace. Google has also supported this area by releasing tools for personalized learning, including:
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Illuminate. Transforms long scientific articles into short podcasts in minutes using AI-generated voices. With Illuminate, you can listen to scientific papers on the go or perform routine tasks. It doesn't just read the text; it turns it into a dynamic scientific conversation using two voices, making the presentation feel like an honest discussion, as if real presenters are discussing the subject.
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Learn About. This tool converts any material into a format that suits the user's needs. The same content can be transformed into slides, graphics, videos, web pages, quiz cards, or tasks. Users can interact with these formats, ask the built-in bot for explanations, add supplementary information, or make notes.
How you can utilize this for your personal use: If you find a particular format challenging, convert it to a different one.
How to utilize this for your business or work: Allow your students or employees (during corporate training) to choose the format they prefer to study the materials.
Conducting educational MR events
A study on the impact of Mixed Reality (MR) on education found that using Microsoft Hololens 2 increased student engagement by 35% and improved test scores by 22%. MR, which includes Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR), allows students to apply their knowledge practically or observe events that can't be replicated in real life, such as shipwrecks, nuclear explosions, or hazardous chemical experiments in the lab. It was also discovered that MR technologies helped reduce teachers' workload by 15%.
In 2023, Coursera partnered with several American universities, including the University of Washington and Duke University. Through this partnership, students gained access to virtual reality to study Chinese, public speaking, and physiology. One of the most user-friendly VR platforms, Google Expeditions, facilitates interactive exploration of global locations for a deeper understanding of areas or cultures, including museum exhibits.
How you can utilize this for your personal use: Employ VR simulators, such as virtual workshops, to enhance your skills or explore exhibitions, other cities, and restricted areas from the comfort of your home.
How to utilize this for your business or work: Hold a lesson in virtual reality, selecting a location relevant to the lesson's subject.
Courses on generative art and the use of AI
AI has not only transformed education but has also driven educational innovations to keep pace with AI trends. In addition to AI developers being among the top professions in 2020, there are now more courses and thorough training programs on effectively using AI in your work. This mainly pertains to Chat GPT and neural networks like MidJourney or DALL-E, which have created a distinct skill set for working with generators. Nowadays, there are courses on crafting queries in MidJourney to produce high-quality images and understand AI art, such as distinguishing it from human-created art. Education like this is already available on Coursera and at major public universities, such as through Oxford's online platform.
How you can utilize this for your personal use: Enrol in MidJourney training and start monetizing custom AI image creation.
How you can utilize this for your business or work: Develop an AI course for your audience, too!
The advancements in AI have revolutionized education and continue to enhance it. AI speeds up learning and improves quality, conserves resources (including teaching), eliminates routine tasks, and engages students in the educational process. Modern AI goes beyond just checking texts for errors or answering questions-today, it is a comprehensive companion throughout all stages of research and study, taking on auxiliary, supportive, and even mentoring roles.
