What’s Next in Education

Let’s admit it, we all do enjoy prognosticating the future and predicting what will happen next or reading someone else’s predictions: who will win the football game or the Senate election? what will be a friend’s or family member’s reaction to a birthday gift? how hard is the calculus test really going to be? what questions will I be asked in my job interview? 

We try to predict or seek predictions about anything and everything all the time. While we often consider ourselves expert enough to make reasonable predictions about the fortunes of, say, the Red Sox repeating as MLB champions, the cost of replacing all four tires on our car (why are these always higher than our predictions?), or the time it will take to drive to Maine on a Friday afternoon, we are not similarly equipped with the expertise to predict the future of education. Yet, there are a remarkable number of organizations, media outlets, and researchers who step into the void annually to offer up predictions on this topic. Here are a few that have come up most often recently:

Immersive Learning includes the use of several variations of simulated reality: Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), Mixed Realty (MR), and Extended Reality (xR) (from https://edtechtimes.com/2018/09/27/how-immersive-learning-technology-is-bringing-education-and-training-into-the-future/)

Might the future standard educational curriculum and pedagogy include a fourth “R”? Reading, WRiting, ARithmetic, and (fill-in-the blank)_____Reality.

“A public, permanent, shared database used to compile, connect house and encrypt digital data. With blockchain, information is not centralized in any one location. The publicly-accessible, easily-tracked, and verifiable nature of the blockchain makes records extremely difficult to corrupt.” (from mdreducation.com)

Certainly, many are predicting that technology applications will instigate changes in eduction (and a good number of these are already in use), but some have included non-technology “applications” in their experts’ predictions as well: 

“An educational approach that aims to customize learning for each student’s strengths, needs, skills and interests.” (from understood.org)

“Collaboration; communication; critical thinking; and the ability to make quick decisions from a set of information” (from forbes.com). The business world still needs the human brain engaged with other human brains and working together.

A teaching method in which students gain knowledge and skills by working for an extended period of time to investigate and respond to an authentic, engaging, and complex question, problem, or challenge. (from https://www.pblworks.org/what-is-pbl)

No more 19th century, pine-and-metal desks and chairs in rows for the modern student; this is student-centered style with a variety of seating arrangements:

Stools, stability balls, bean bags, couches, rockers, plastic bins, you name it (from https://www.boredteachers.com/classroom-ideas/16-awesome-flexible-seating-classrooms-thatll-blow-your-teacher-mind)

Brain research points to a different set of biorhythms for teens; we have known this forever but keep channeling our teens into an adult timeframe for their schooling.

Note that the future is now for several of these changes and some will move off or be modified for next year’s list as we continue to make headway in our understanding of how the human brain works relative to learning and continue to develop technology that helps us learn more efficiently and effectively.