3+ AI trends in education

Introduction to AI trends in education

Since the corona pandemic in 2020, a lot has changed in the educational landscape. High schools and universities made a switch from physical lectures to online lectures. 

From my view and experience, educational institutions succeeded in the transition from offline to online education. Now they face a new challenge: Integrating the possibilities of AI within the study material and courses to increase educational quality.

This article is based on the scientific research paper of Chassignol et al. (2022). Let’s find out what the latest AI trends in education are.

Quick stats

• Revenue in online education is projected to reach $166.60 billion by 2023
• Predicted value of AI market in education to reach $80 billion by 2032
• The AI market in education has a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 76.9% since 2018
• Generative AI in education is expected to grow from $11.3 billion in 2023 to $51.8 billion by 2028

(Source: Rask.ai).

What are the latest AI trends in education?

• Personalized learning
• Tutoring systems for appropriate feedback
• Assessment as a way to track students’ performance
• Gamification and simulations

Personalized learning

Every student has his or her own pace of learning and understanding the course material. This leads to students who are constantly ahead of the material and get bored, while others need more time to absorb all the knowledge. 

Artificial intelligence is a solution to this problem, and it’s called personalized learning. This approach provides educational content to students based on their individual and unique desires. It supports the design of educational content for each student’s needs, pace of learning, and knowledge level.

Personalized learning can be combined with gamification techniques to improve the quality of education. In particular, gamification elements such as leaderboards and points can be helpful to keep track of students’ progress and performance.

Tutoring systems for appropriate feedback

Giving effective and targeted feedback to students is one of the most important responsibilities of the teacher or lecturer. However, the large number of students these days is a problem to do this in a proper way. To conquer this challenge, universities implement Interactive Learning Environments (ILE) to improve the quality of feedback.

ILE is a complex term that implies using a combination of e-learning techniques and technologies. The main idea of ILE is to teach students how to gain knowledge and a deeper understanding of a subject based on their prior experience with the subject. 

An example of ILE is Learning Management Systems (LMS). LMS goes in connection with AI computer tutoring and there are two types of computer tutors: Computer-Based Instruction (CBI) and Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS). 

In CBI tutoring, students write down an answer and then receive feedback from their lecturer. In ITS tutoring, students are allowed to enter information for each step of the process as if they were working on the problem on paper. The system provides feedback based on all students’ answers. The main difference between these two systems is that ITS allows students to interact at the step-level, rather than only giving feedback after the completion of the task.

Assessment as a way to track students’ performance

This trend is linked to the previous trends and specifically to the ITS concept. On the one hand, ITS may be used as a tutoring system that gives feedback on an assignment or study schedule. On the other hand, ITS is capable of identifying learning gaps in students’ performance. This works as follows.

The teacher evaluates a sample set of student responses. Then, the ITS creates a computer model incorporating the rules of the teacher grading decisions. The model then can be used to grade other students’ assignments. 

Gamification and simulations

Educational games and simulations are interactive learning tools that use game elements in the course material. Examples of game elements are goals, rewards, rules, and feedback. The simulation of real-world scenarios and problems makes the study material tangible for students. 

AI helps to create realistic characters and scenarios for educational games and simulations. The more realistic simulations are, the better students can improve their problem-solving and decision-making skills.

Summary of AI trends in education

In this article, we covered the latest AI trends in education. The educational landscape is evolving rapidly and AI is increasingly being incorporated into it. 

The forecasts are promising and according to Rask.ai, the predicted value of the AI market has a reach of $80 billion by 2032.

In conclusion, the main AI trends in education are personalized learning, tutoring systems, student performance tracking, and gamification and simulation.

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References

Chassignol, M., Khoroshavin, A., Klimova, A., & Bilyatdinova, A. (2022). Artificial Intelligence trends in education: A narrative overview. Procedia Computer Science, 136, 16-24.