lifelong learning

The freelance economy: Top trends to watch in 2017 — from blog.linkedin.com

Excerpt:

Freelancers now account for nearly 35% of the U.S. workforce and the trend is only picking up speed with more professionals opting to create their own jobs in lieu of more traditional full-time employment.

As we head into the new year, we want to shed a bit more light on this burgeoning sector of the workforce. What kind of location, industry and demographic trends are surfacing among the freelance professionals of 2016? You might not know, for example, that a whopping 40% of our freelancers are concentrated in just four states: California, Texas, Florida and New York. Or that more senior men are most likely to take the leap into freelancing.

The time is ripe to be a freelancer in America so we’re revealing insider insights like these to help you learn more about this trending profession. Check out the report below – gleaned from a survey of more than 9,500 of our ProFinder professionals – to see what we discovered.

From DSC:
Besides the workforce moving towards the increased use of freelancers, the pace of change has moved from being more linear in nature to more of an exponential trajectory.

Some important questions, therefore, to ask are:

Are our students ready to enter this type of workplace?
Can they pivot quickly?
Do they know how to learn and are they ready to be lifelong learners? (Do they like learning enough to continue to pursue it? Peoples’ overall quality of life would be much higher if they enjoyed learning, rather than be forced to do so in order to keep the bread and butter on their tables.)
Are they able to communicate in a variety of ways?
How are their customer service skills coming along?
How are their problem-solving skills coming along?
Do they know how to maintain their businesses’ books and do their taxes?
Are they digitally literate and do they have an appreciation for the pluses and minuses of technology?

I sure hope so…but I have my serious doubts. That said, many institutions/organizations representing K-12 and higher education are not doing a great job of innovating either. Though there certainly exists some strong pockets of innovation in some of our institutions out there — and the ability to pivot — taken as a whole, our institutions and organizations haven’t been as responsive, nimble, and innovative as our students need them to be.

After all, we are trying to prepare students for their futures (with the externality effect being that we, too, will also be better prepared for that future).

From DSC:
After seeing the sharp interface out at Adobe (see image below), I’ve often thought that there should exist a similar interface and a similar database for educators, trainers, and learners to use — but the database would address a far greater breadth of topics to teach and/or learn about. You could even select beginner, intermediate, or advanced levels (grade levels might work here as well).

Perhaps this is where artificial intelligence will come in…not sure.

Some brief reflections from DSC:

#Blockchain will likely be used by colleges, universities, bootcamps, MOOCs, and others to feed web-based learner profiles, which will then be queried by people and/or organizations who are looking for freelancers and/or employees to fill their project and/or job-related needs.

As of the end of 2016, Microsoft — with their purchase of LinkedIn — is strongly positioned as being a major player in this new landscape. But it might turn out to be an open-sourced solution/database.

Data mining, algorithm development, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) will likely have roles to play here as well. The systems will likely be able to tell us where we need to grow our skillsets, and provide us with modules/courses to take. This is where the Learning from the Living [Class] Room vision becomes highly relevant, on a global scale. We will be forced to continually improve our skillsets as long as we are in the workforce. Lifelong learning is now a must. AI-based recommendation engines should be helpful here — as they will be able to analyze the needs, trends, developments, etc. and present us with some possible choices (based on our learner profiles, interests, and passions).

Google, Facebook, & Microsoft are remaking themselves around AI [Metz]; Intelligence everywhere! Gartner’s Top 10 Strategic Tech Trends for ’17; plus 11 other items involving AI, machine/deep learning

On 11/22/2016, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Asia, Australia, career development, change, changing business models, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, emerging technologies, Facebook / Meta Platforms, Google, health, higher education, human-computer interaction (HCI), IBM, ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, legislatures / government / legal, lifelong learning, Microsoft, Natural Language Processing (NLP), tools, United States, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Google, Facebook, and Microsoft are remaking themselves around AI — from wired.com by Cade Metz

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Alongside a former Stanford researcher—Jia Li, who more recently ran research for the social networking service Snapchat—the China-born Fei-Fei will lead a team inside Google’s cloud computing operation, building online services that any coder or company can use to build their own AI. This new Cloud Machine Learning Group is the latest example of AI not only re-shaping the technology that Google uses, but also changing how the company organizes and operates its business.

Google is not alone in this rapid re-orientation. Amazon is building a similar group cloud computing group for AI. Facebook and Twitter have created internal groups akin to Google Brain, the team responsible for infusing the search giant’s own tech with AI. And in recent weeks, Microsoft reorganized much of its operation around its existing machine learning work, creating a new AI and research group under executive vice president Harry Shum, who began his career as a computer vision researcher.

But Etzioni says this is also part of very real shift inside these companies, with AI poised to play an increasingly large role in our future. “This isn’t just window dressing,” he says.

Intelligence everywhere! Gartner’s Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2017 — from which-50.com

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

AI and Advanced Machine Learning
Artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced machine learning (ML) are composed of many technologies and techniques (e.g., deep learning, neural networks, natural-language processing [NLP]). The more advanced techniques move beyond traditional rule-based algorithms to create systems that understand, learn, predict, adapt and potentially operate autonomously. This is what makes smart machines appear “intelligent.”

“Applied AI and advanced machine learning give rise to a spectrum of intelligent implementations, including physical devices (robots, autonomous vehicles, consumer electronics) as well as apps and services (virtual personal assistants [VPAs], smart advisors), ” said David Cearley, vice president and Gartner Fellow. “These implementations will be delivered as a new class of obviously intelligent apps and things as well as provide embedded intelligence for a wide range of mesh devices and existing software and service solutions.”

Google’s new website lets you play with its experimental AI projects — from mashable.com by Karissa Bell

Excerpt:

Google is letting users peek into some of its most experimental artificial intelligence projects.

The company unveiled a new website Tuesday called A.I. Experiments that showcases Google’s artificial intelligence research through web apps that anyone can test out. The projects include a game that guesses what you’re drawing, a camera app that recognizes objects you put in front of it and a music app that plays “duets” with you.

Google unveils a slew of new and improved machine learning APIs — from digitaltrends.com by Kyle Wiggers

Excerpt:

On Tuesday, Google Cloud chief Diane Greene announced the formation of a new team, the Google Cloud Machine Learning group, that will manage the Mountain View, California-based company’s cloud intelligence efforts going forward.

Found in translation: More accurate, fluent sentences in Google Translate — from blog.google by Barak Turovsky

Excerpt:

In 10 years, Google Translate has gone from supporting just a few languages to 103, connecting strangers, reaching across language barriers and even helping people find love. At the start, we pioneered large-scale statistical machine translation, which uses statistical models to translate text. Today, we’re introducing the next step in making Google Translate even better: Neural Machine Translation.

Neural Machine Translation has been generating exciting research results for a few years and in September, our researchers announced Google’s version of this technique. At a high level, the Neural system translates whole sentences at a time, rather than just piece by piece. It uses this broader context to help it figure out the most relevant translation, which it then rearranges and adjusts to be more like a human speaking with proper grammar. Since it’s easier to understand each sentence, translated paragraphs and articles are a lot smoother and easier to read. And this is all possible because of end-to-end learning system built on Neural Machine Translation, which basically means that the system learns over time to create better, more natural translations.

‘Augmented Intelligence’ for Higher Ed — from insidehighered.com by Carl Straumsheim
IBM picks Blackboard and Pearson to bring the technology behind the Watson computer to colleges and universities.

Excerpts:

[IBM] is partnering with a small number of hardware and software providers to bring the same technology that won a special edition of the game show back in 2011 to K-12 institutions, colleges and continuing education providers. The partnerships and the products that might emerge from them are still in the planning stage, but the company is investing in the idea that cognitive computing — natural language processing, informational retrieval and other functions similar to the ones performed by the human brain — can help students succeed in and outside the classroom.

Chalapathy Neti, vice president of education innovation at IBM Watson, said education is undergoing the same “digital transformation” seen in the finance and health care sectors, in which more and more content is being delivered digitally.
…
IBM is steering clear of referring to its technology as “artificial intelligence,” however, as some may interpret it as replacing what humans already do.

“This is about augmenting human intelligence,” Neti said. “We never want to see these data-based systems as primary decision makers, but we want to provide them as decision assistance for a human decision maker that is an expert in conducting that process.”

What a Visit to an AI-Enabled Hospital Might Look Like — from hbr.org by R “Ray” Wang

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

The combination of machine learning, deep learning, natural language processing, and cognitive computing will soon change the ways that we interact with our environments. AI-driven smart services will sense what we’re doing, know what our preferences are from our past behavior, and subtly guide us through our daily lives in ways that will feel truly seamless.

Perhaps the best way to explore how such systems might work is by looking at an example: a visit to a hospital.
…
The AI loop includes seven steps:

Perception describes what’s happening now.
Notification tells you what you asked to know.
Suggestion recommends action.
Automation repeats what you always want.
Prediction informs you of what to expect.
Prevention helps you avoid bad outcomes.
Situational awareness tells you what you need to know right now.

Japanese artificial intelligence gives up on University of Tokyo admissions exam — from digitaltrends.com by Brad Jones

Excerpt:

Since 2011, Japan’s National Institute of Informatics has been working on an AI, with the end goal of having it pass the entrance exam for the University of Tokyo, according to a report from Engadget. This endeavor, dubbed the Todai Robot Project in reference to a local nickname for the school, has been abandoned.

It turns out that the AI simply cannot meet the exact requirements of the University of Tokyo. The team does not expect to reach their goal of passing the test by March 2022, so the project is being brought to an end.

“We are building not just Azure to have rich compute capability, but we are, in fact, building the world’s first AI supercomputer,” he said.

— from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella spruiks power of machine learning,
smart bots and mixed reality at Sydney developers conference

Why it’s so hard to create unbiased artificial intelligence — from techcrunch.com by Ben Dickson

Excerpt:

As artificial intelligence and machine learning mature and manifest their potential to take on complicated tasks, we’ve become somewhat expectant that robots can succeed where humans have failed — namely, in putting aside personal biases when making decisions. But as recent cases have shown, like all disruptive technologies, machine learning introduces its own set of unexpected challenges and sometimes yields results that are wrong, unsavory, offensive and not aligned with the moral and ethical standards of human society.

While some of these stories might sound amusing, they do lead us to ponder the implications of a future where robots and artificial intelligence take on more critical responsibilities and will have to be held responsible for the possibly wrong decisions they make.

The Non-Technical Guide to Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence — from medium.com by Sam DeBrule

Excerpt:

This list is a primer for non-technical people who want to understand what machine learning makes possible.

To develop a deep understanding of the space, reading won’t be enough. You need to: have an understanding of the entire landscape, spot and use ML-enabled products in your daily life (Spotify recommendations), discuss artificial intelligence more regularly, and make friends with people who know more than you do about AI and ML.

News: For starters, I’ve included a link to a weekly artificial intelligence email that Avi Eisenberger and I curate (machinelearnings.co). Start here if you want to develop a better understanding of the space, but don’t have the time to actively hunt for machine learning and artificial intelligence news.

Startups: It’s nice to see what startups are doing, and not only hear about the money they are raising. I’ve included links to the websites and apps of 307+ machine intelligence companies and tools.

People: Here’s a good place to jump into the conversation. I’ve provided links to Twitter accounts (and LinkedIn profiles and personal websites in their absence) of the founders, investors, writers, operators and researchers who work in and around the machine learning space.

Events: If you enjoy getting out from behind your computer, and want to meet awesome people who are interested in artificial intelligence in real life, there is one place that’s best to do that, more on my favorite place below.

How one clothing company blends AI and human expertise — from hbr.org by H. James Wilson, Paul Daugherty, & Prashant Shukla

Excerpt:

When we think about artificial intelligence, we often imagine robots performing tasks on the warehouse or factory floor that were once exclusively the work of people. This conjures up the specter of lost jobs and upheaval for many workers. Yet, it can also seem a bit remote — something that will happen in “the future.” But the future is a lot closer than many realize. It also looks more promising than many have predicted.

Stitch Fix provides a glimpse of how some businesses are already making use of AI-based machine learning to partner with employees for more-effective solutions. A five-year-old online clothing retailer, its success in this area reveals how AI and people can work together, with each side focused on its unique strengths.

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

As the White House report rightly observes, the implications of an AI-suffused world are enormous — especially for the people who work at jobs that soon will be outsourced to artificially-intelligent machines. Although the report predicts that AI ultimately will expand the U.S. economy, it also notes that “Because AI has the potential to eliminate or drive down wages of some jobs … AI-driven automation will increase the wage gap between less-educated and more-educated workers, potentially increasing economic inequality.”

Accordingly, the ability of people to access higher education continuously throughout their working lives will become increasingly important as the AI revolution takes hold. To be sure, college has always helped safeguard people from economic dislocations caused by technological change. But this time is different. First, the quality of AI is improving rapidly. On a widely-used image recognition test, for instance, the best AI result went from a 26 percent error rate in 2011 to a 3.5 percent error rate in 2015 — even better than the 5 percent human error rate.

Moreover, as the administration’s report documents, AI has already found new applications in so-called “knowledge economy” fields, such as medical diagnosis, education and scientific research. Consequently, as artificially intelligent systems come to be used in more white-collar, professional domains, even people who are highly educated by today’s standards may find their livelihoods continuously at risk by an ever-expanding cybernetic workforce.

As a result, it’s time to stop thinking of higher education as an experience that people take part in once during their young lives — or even several times as they advance up the professional ladder — and begin thinking of it as a platform for lifelong learning.

Colleges and universities need to be doing more to move beyond the array of two-year, four-year, and graduate degrees that most offer, and toward a more customizable system that enables learners to access the learning they need when they need it. This will be critical as more people seek to return to higher education repeatedly during their careers, compelled by the imperative to stay ahead of relentless technological change.

From DSC:
That last bolded paragraph is why I think the vision of easily accessible learning — using the devices that will likely be found in one’s apartment or home — will be enormously powerful and widespread in a few years. Given the exponential pace of change that we are experiencing — and will likely continue to experience for some time — people will need to reinvent themselves quickly.

Higher education needs to rethink our offerings…or someone else will.

“Blockchain-based credentials may catapult credentialing movement” [Stansbury] & “Why the blockchain will revolutionize academic credentialing” [Jagers]

On 11/10/2016, in accreditation, Blockchain, emerging technologies, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, ideas, innovation, lifelong learning, microlearning, student-related, by Daniel Christian

Blockchain-based credentials may catapult credentialing movement — from ecampusnews.com by Meris Stansbury
Carnegie Mellon, MIT Media Lab, and Learning Machine host groundbreaking conversation about open standards for blockchain credentialing in higher education and beyond.

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Leaders from Learning Machine, MIT Media Lab, and Carnegie Mellon University engaged in a groundbreaking conversation with a packed house of EdTech vendors and education leaders at the annual EDUCAUSE conference. Together, they introduced Blockcerts, the open standard for issuing secure, verifiable digital credentials.

Hosted by Learning Machine CEO, Chris Jagers, the panel brought together research from the MIT Media Lab (Principal Engineer Kim Duffy), real-world perspective from the Registrar of Carnegie Mellon University (John Papinchak), implementation details from Learning Machine leadership (COO Dan Hughes), and the societal implications of distributed technologies (Learning Machine Anthropologist Natalie Smolenski). The panelists described a future in which learners are able to act as their own lifelong registrars with blockchain credentialing.

Why the Blockchain will Revolutionize Academic Credentialing — from medium.com by
This is a transcript of the presentation given during Educause at the Anaheim Convention Center on October 28, 2016.

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Before we dive into details that technology, let’s cover some background. Even though schools moved from sheepskin to digital records a while ago, schools are still acting as the sole record keepers for student information. If a student wants to access or share their official records, they have to engage in a slow, complicated, and often expensive process. And so, for the most part, those records aren’t used much after graduation, nor built upon.

Additionally, education is changing. Online learning and competency-based programs are rising in popularity. And this is magnified by a rapidly growing number of accredited education providers that expand far beyond traditional schools. This is causing a proliferation of educational claims that are hard to manage and it raises many new questions, both in terms of policy and technology. And what I hope to explain today is how a new technical infrastructure has emerged that enables students to be part of the solution by acting as their own lifelong registrar.

Some reflections/resources on today’s announcements from Apple

On 10/27/2016, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, active learning, adult learning, analytics, Apple, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Augmented Reality (AR), Blockchain, Bring your own device (BYOD), business side of he, career development, change, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, collaboration, colleges, communications, communities of practice, community colleges, convergence, corporate universities / corporate training, cost of getting a degree, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, digital learning, distance education, education technology, elearning, emerging technologies, formal learning, future of higher education, game-changing environment, global / globalization, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, informal learning, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, internet, K-12 related, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, learning preferences, lifelong learning, microlearning, mirroring and/or multiple devices, mobile learning, MOOCs -- Massive Open Online Courses, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, new business models, online learning, online tutoring, personalized/customized learning, platforms, professional development, reinvent, staying relevant, streams of content, student-related, surviving, tablets, technologies for your home, television, training / L&D, TVs, ubiquitous learning, universities, user experience (UX), vendors, videoconferencing, virtual field trips, virtual K-12 schools, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, virtual tutoring, vision/possibilities, web-based collaboration, webinars, youth, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
How long before recommendation engines like this can be filtered/focused down to just display apps, channels, etc. that are educational and/or training related (i.e., a recommendation engine to suggest personalized/customized playlists for learning)?

That is, in the future, will we have personalized/customized playlists for learning on our Apple TVs — as well as on our mobile devices — with the assessment results of our taking the module(s) or course(s) being sent in to:

A credentials database on LinkedIn (via blockchain)
and/or
A credentials database at the college(s) or university(ies) that we’re signed up with for lifelong learning (via blockchain)
and/or
To update our cloud-based learning profiles — which can then feed a variety of HR-related systems used to find talent? (via blockchain)

Will participants in MOOCs, virtual K-12 schools, homeschoolers, and more take advantage of learning from home?

Will solid ROI’s from having thousands of participants paying a smaller amount (to take your course virtually) enable higher production values?

Will bots and/or human tutors be instantly accessible from our couches?

Will we be able to meet virtually via our TVs and share our computing devices?

The Living [Class] Room -- by Daniel Christian -- July 2012 -- a second device used in conjunction with a Smart/Connected TV

Other items on today’s announcements:

All the big announcements from Apple’s Mac event — from amp.imore.com by Joseph Keller

MacBook Pro
Final Cut Pro X
Apple TV > new “TV” app
Touch Bar

Apple is finally unifying the TV streaming experience with new app — from techradar.com by Nick Pino

How to migrate your old Mac’s data to your new Mac — from amp.imore.com by Lory Gil

MacBook Pro FAQ: Everything you need to know about Apple’s new laptops — from amp.imore.com by Serenity Caldwell

Accessibility FAQ: Everything you need to know about Apple’s new accessibility portal — from imore.com by Daniel Bader

Apple’s New MacBook Pro Has a ‘Touch Bar’ on the Keyboard — from wired.com by Brian Barrett

Apple’s New TV App Won’t Have Netflix or Amazon Video — from wired.com by Brian Barrett

Apple 5th Gen TV To Come With Major Software Updates; Release Date Likely In 2017 — from mobilenapps.com

Excellent reflection/idea from Nikos Andriotis: “Meta-machine learning – i.e., a self-learning LMS”

On 10/24/2016, in 21st century, accreditation, adult learning, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, assessment, Augmented Reality (AR), blended learning, Blockchain, bots, career development, change, changing business models, CMS/LMS, colleges, community colleges, competency-based learning/education, content development, aggregation, repositories, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, digital learning, disruption, education technology, emerging technologies, experimentation, face-to-face, future, future of higher education, game-changing environment, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), IBM, ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, K-12 related, learner profiles, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, learning hubs & pods & microschooling, lifelong learning, metacognition / metacognitive skills, microlearning, Microsoft, more voice more choice more control, online learning, pace of change, pedagogy, personalized/customized learning, platforms, professional development, reinvent, RSS, staying relevant, streams of content, student-related, surviving, training / L&D, universities, user experience (UX), workplace, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
The other day I had posted some ideas in regards to how artificial intelligence, machine learning, and augmented reality are coming together to offer some wonderful new possibilities for learning (see: “From DSC: Amazing possibilities coming together w/ augmented reality used in conjunction w/ machine learning! For example, consider these ideas.”) Here is one of the graphics from that posting:

These affordances are just now starting to be uncovered as machines are increasingly able to ascertain patterns, things, objects…even people (which calls for a separate posting at some point).

But mainly, for today, I wanted to highlight an excellent comment/reply from Nikos Andriotis @ Talent LMS who gave me permission to highlight his solid reflections and ideas:

https://www.talentlms.com/blog/author/nikos-andriotis

From DSC:
Excellent reflection/idea Nikos — that would represent some serious personalized, customized learning!

Nikos’ innovative reflections also made me think about his ideas in light of their interaction or impact with web-based learner profiles, credentialing, badging, and lifelong learning. What’s especially noteworthy here is that the innovations (that impact learning) continue to occur mainly in the online and blended learning spaces.

How might the ramifications of these innovations impact institutions who are pretty much doing face-to-face only (in terms of their course delivery mechanisms and pedagogies)?

Given:

That Microsoft purchased LinkedIn and can amass a database of skills and open jobs (playing a cloud-based matchmaker)
Everyday microlearning is key to staying relevant (RSS feeds and tapping into “streams of content” are important here, and so is the use of Twitter)
65% of today’s students will be doing jobs that don’t even exist yet (per Microsoft & The Future Laboratory in 2016)

The exponential pace of technological change
The increasing level of experimentation with blockchain (credentialing)
…and more

…what do the futures look like for those colleges and universities that operate only in the face-to-face space and who are not innovating enough?

Cognitive computing comes to education; personalized education may never be the same again!

On 10/19/2016, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adult learning, analytics, Apple, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, assistive technologies, Blockchain, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, education, education technology, IBM, innovation, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, learning preferences, lifelong learning, microlearning, more voice more choice more control, online learning, participation, passions, personalized/customized learning, platforms, productivity / tips and tricks, professional development, student-related, training / L&D, by Daniel Christian

Coppell ISD becomes first district to use IBM, Apple format — from bizjournals.com by Shawn Shinneman

Excerpt:

Teachers at Coppell Independent School District have become the first to use a new IBM and Apple technology platform built to aid personalized learning.

IBM Watson Element for Educators pairs IBM analytics and data tools such as cognitive computing with Apple design. It integrates student grades, interests, participation, and trends to help educators determine how a student learns best, the company says.
…
It also recommends learning content personalized to each student. The platform might suggest a reading assignment on astronomy for a young student who has shown an interest in space.

From DSC:
Technologies involved with systems like IBM’s Watson will likely bring some serious impact to the worlds of education and training & development. Such systems — and the affordances that they should be able to offer us — should not be underestimated. The potential for powerful, customized, personalized learning could easily become a reality in K-20 as well as in the corporate training space. This is an area to keep an eye on for sure, especially with the growing influence of cognitive computing and artificial intelligence.

These kinds of technology should prove helpful in suggesting modules and courses (i.e., digital learning playlists), but I think the more powerful systems will be able to drill down far more minutely than that. I think these types of systems will be able to assist with all kinds of math problems and equations as well as analyze writing examples, correct language mispronunciations, and more (perhaps this is already here…apologies if so). In other words, the systems will “learn” where students can go wrong doing a certain kind of math equation…and then suggest steps to correct things when the system spots a mistake (or provide hints at how to correct mistakes).

This road takes us down to places where we have:

Web-based learner profiles — including learner’s preferences, passions, interests, skills
Microlearning/badging/credentialing — likely using blockchain
Learning agents/bots to “contact” for assistance
Guidance for lifelong learning
More choice, more control

Also see:

First IBM Watson Education App for iPad Delivers Personalized Learning for K-12 Teachers and Students — from prnewswire.com
Educators at Coppell Independent School District in Texas first to use new iPad app to tailor learning experiences to student’s interests and aptitudes
Excerpts:
With increasing demands on educators, teachers need tools that will enable them to better identify the individual needs of all students while designing learning experiences that engage and hold the students’ interest as they master the content. This is especially critical given that approximately one third of American students require remedial education when they enter college today, and current college attainment rates are not keeping pace with the country’s projected workforce needs1. A view of academic and day-to-day updates in real time can help teachers provide personalized support when students need it.
…
IBM Watson Element provides teachers with a holistic view of each student through a fun, easy-to-use and intuitive mobile experience that is a natural extension of their work. Teachers can get to know their students beyond their academic performance, including information about personal interests and important milestones students choose to share. For example, teachers can input notes when a student’s highly anticipated soccer match is scheduled, when another has just been named president for the school’s World Affairs club, and when another has recently excelled following a science project that sparked a renewed interest in chemistry.The unique “spotlight” feature in Watson Element provides advanced analytics that enables deeper levels of communication between teachers about their students’ accomplishments and progress. For example, if a student is excelling academically, teachers can spotlight that student, praising their accomplishments across the school district. Or, if a student received a top award in the district art show, a teacher can spotlight the student so their other teachers know about it.

From DSC:
Consider the affordances that we will soon be experiencing when we combine machine learning — whereby computers “learn” about a variety of things — with new forms of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) — such as Augment Reality (AR)!

The educational benefits — as well as the business/profit-related benefits will certainly be significant!

For example, let’s create a new mobile app called “Horticultural App (ML)” * — where ML stands for machine learning. This app would be made available on iOS and Android-based devices. (Though this is strictly hypothetical, I hope and pray that some entrepreneurial individuals and/or organizations out there will take this idea and run with it!)

Some use cases for such an app:

Students, environmentalists, and lifelong learners will be able to take some serious educationally-related nature walks once they launch the Horticultural App (ML) on their smartphones and tablets!

They simply hold up their device, and the app — in conjunction with the device’s camera — will essentially take a picture of whatever the student is focusing in on. Via machine learning, the app will “recognize” the plant, tree, type of grass, flower, etc. — and will then present information about that plant, tree, type of grass, flower, etc.

Above image via shutterstock.com

horticulturalapp-danielchristian

In the production version of this app, a textual layer could overlay the actual image of the tree/plant/flower/grass/etc. in the background — and this is where augmented reality comes into play. Also, perhaps there would be an opacity setting that would be user controlled — allowing the learner to fade in or fade out the information about the flower, tree, plant, etc.

horticulturalapp2-danielchristian

Or let’s look at the potential uses of this type of app from some different angles.

Let’s say you live in Michigan and you want to be sure an area of the park that you are in doesn’t have any Eastern Poison Ivy in it — so you launch the app and review any suspicious looking plants. As it turns out, the app identifies some Eastern Poison Ivy for you (and it could do this regardless of which season we’re talking about, as the app would be able to ascertain the current date and the current GPS coordinates of the person’s location as well, taking that criteria into account).

easternpoisonivy

Or consider another use of such an app:

A homeowner who wants to get rid of a certain kind of weed. The homeowner goes out into her yard and “scans” the weed, and up pops some products at the local Lowe’s or Home Depot that gets rid of that kind of weed.
Assuming you allowed the app to do so, it could launch a relevant chatbot that could be used to answer any questions about the application of the weed-killing product that you might have.

Or consider another use of such an app:

A homeowner has a diseased tree, and they want to know what to do about it. The machine learning portion of the app could identify what the disease was and bring up information on how to eradicate it.
Again, if permitted to do so, a relevant chatbot could be launched to address any questions that you might have about the available treatment options for that particular tree/disease.

Or consider other/similar apps along these lines:

Skin ML (for detecting any issues re: acme, skin cancers, etc.)
Minerals and Stones ML (for identifying which mineral or stone you’re looking at)
Fish ML
Etc.

fish-ml-gettyimages

Image from gettyimages.com

So there will be many new possibilities that will be coming soon to education, businesses, homeowners, and many others to be sure! The combination of machine learning with AR will open many new doors.

* From Wikipedia:

Horticulture involves nine areas of study, which can be grouped into two broad sections: ornamentals and edibles:

Arboriculture is the study of, and the selection, plant, care, and removal of, individual trees, shrubs, vines, and other perennial woody plants.
Turf management includes all aspects of the production and maintenance of turf grass for sports, leisure use or amenity use.
Floriculture includes the production and marketing of floral crops.
Landscape horticulture includes the production, marketing and maintenance of landscape plants.
Olericulture includes the production and marketing of vegetables.
Pomology includes the production and marketing of pome fruits.
Viticulture includes the production and marketing of grapes.
Oenology includes all aspects of wine and winemaking.
Postharvest physiology involves maintaining the quality of and preventing the spoilage of plants and animals.

Women of Foresight: Changes in Education for Future Student Success — from leadingthought.us.com by Dr. Liz Alexander

Excerpt:

Education. A topic that remains hotly debated all over the world. Especially now, as we struggle to find our footing as our futures hurtle towards us, faster and more profoundly different than ever before.

What changes do existing schools and colleges need to make to better prepare students for the trends we already see? Together with those “weak signals” that suggest other, possible futures? In “trying to adapt education for what the American economy is evolving into,” is mandating “coding classes” part of the answer? Are we doing enough to take into account contrarian perspectives like this one? Who gets to decide what the purpose of education should be, in any case?

These are just some of the questions everyone–from policy makers to parents, academics to students themselves–need to think about.

Intrigued as to what the global futurist and foresight communities might have in mind, I posed them the following question:

If there was one thing I could change in education to better prepare students for the future of work, it would be…

The twenty women that responded to my call are either professional futurists or apply foresight in their roles as leaders in global firms and consultancies, think tanks and foundations. They’re from countries as geographically disperse as Australia, Egypt, Germany, India, New Zealand, Norway, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, and United States.

(If you’re wondering why I only asked women, it was a deliberate move to broaden commentary on “our futures,” so people don’t think it’s the sole purview of older, white men. Also, because I believe women’s natural inclinations toward relationships and collaboration, communities and mutual support, are the future!)

One example/answer:

“…to put more emphasis on HOW students will contribute, rather than WHAT their expertise will be, by helping them answer these three questions:

How do I most want to contribute to something larger than myself, aka my ‘mission in life’?
In what work environment will I be able to make the meaningful contributions I’m capable of?
How do I interact with others? What might derail my ambitions, dreams, and wishes? What can I do about it?”

Announcing “LinkedIn Learning” — a new, data-driven platform for developing skills

On 09/23/2016, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, adult learning, analytics, career development, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, competency-based learning/education, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, data related items, digital learning, education technology, elearning, higher education, innovation, learner profiles, learning, learning ecosystem, lifelong learning, Microsoft, more voice more choice more control, multimedia, online learning, online media, organizational change, pace of change, passions, personalized/customized learning, platforms, reinvent, RSS, staying relevant, workplace, by Daniel Christian

LinkedIn announced several things yesterday (9/22/16). Below are some links to these announcements:

Introducing LinkedIn Learning, a Better Way to Develop Skills and Talent — from learning.linkedin.com

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Today, we are thrilled to announce the launch of LinkedIn Learning, an online learning platform enabling individuals and organizations to achieve their objectives and aspirations. Our goal is to help people discover and develop the skills they need through a personalized, data-driven learning experience.

LinkedIn Learning combines the industry-leading content from Lynda.com with LinkedIn’s professional data and network. With more than 450 million member profiles and billions of engagements, we have a unique view of how jobs, industries, organizations and skills evolve over time. From this, we can identify the skills you need and deliver expert-led courses to help you obtain those skills. We’re taking the guesswork out of learning.

The pressure on individuals and organizations to adapt to change has never been greater. The skills that got you to where you are today are not the skills to prepare you for tomorrow. In fact, the shelf-life of skills is less than five years, and many of today’s fastest growing job categories didn’t even exist five years ago.

To tackle these challenges, LinkedIn Learning is built on three core pillars:
…
Data-driven personalization: We get the right course in front of you at the right time. Using the intelligence that comes with our network, LinkedIn Learning creates personalized recommendations, so learners can efficiently discover which courses are most relevant to their goals or job function. Organizations can use LinkedIn insights to customize multi-course Learning Paths to meet their specific needs. We also provide robust analytics and reporting to help you measure learning effectiveness.

LinkedIn’s first big move since the $26.2 billion Microsoft acquisition is basically a ‘school’ for getting a better job — from finance.yahoo.com

Excerpt:

Today, LinkedIn has launched LinkedIn Learning — its first major product launch since the news last June that Microsoft would be snapping up the social network for $26.2 billion in a deal that has yet to close.

LinkedIn Learning takes the online skills training classes the company got in its 2015 acquisition of Lynda.com for $1.5 billion.

The idea, says LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, is to help its 433 million-plus members get the skills they need to stay relevant in a world that’s increasingly reliant on digital skills.

LinkedIn’s New Learning Platform to Recommend Lynda Courses for Professionals — from edsurge.com by Marguerite McNeal

Excerpt:

Companies will also be able to create their own “learning paths”—bundles of courses around a particular topic—to train employees. A chief learning officer, for instance, might compile a package of courses in product management and ask 10 employees to complete the assignments over the course of a few months.
…
LinkedIn is also targeting higher-education institutions with the new offering. It is marketing the solution as a professional development tool that can help faculty learn how to use classroom tools such as Moodle, Adobe Captivate and learning management systems.

“Increasingly predictions of tech displacing workers are coming to fruition,” he added. “The idea that you can study a skill once and have a job for the rest of your life—those days are over.”

LinkedIn Learning for higher education

Accelerating LinkedIn’s Vision Through Innovation — from slideshare.net

LinkedIn adding new training features, news feeds and ‘bots’ — from finance.yahoo.com

Excerpt:

LinkedIn is also adding more personalized features to its news feed, where members can see articles and announcements posted by their professional contacts. A new “Interest Feed” will offer a collection of articles, posts and opinion pieces on major news events or current issues.

If you doubt that we are on an exponential pace of change, you need to check these articles out! [Christian]

On 09/22/2016, in 21st century, Amazon, Apple, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Asia, Australia, business, Canada, career development, change, changing business models, cloud-based computing / apps / other cloud-related, colleges, community colleges, computer science, convergence, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, dangers of the status quo, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, disruption, emerging technologies, engineering, entrepreneurship, ethics, Europe, experimentation, faith, future, game-changing environment, generational differences, global / globalization, Google, health, hearts -- matters of the heart, heutagogy, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), IBM, ideas, India, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interaction design, internet, K-12 related, leadership, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, legislatures / government / legal, lifelong learning, machine-to-machine communications, marketplaces, Microsoft, mobile technologies, Near Field Communication (NFC), new business models, organizational change, pace of change, platforms, political science, professional development, psychology, reinvent, relationships, religion, research, robotics, society, sociology, staying relevant, strategy, student-related, surviving, the downsides of how people use tech, training / L&D, trends, UK, United States, universities, web-based collaboration, workplace, youth, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
The articles listed in this PDF document demonstrate the exponential pace of technological change that many nations across the globe are currently experiencing and will likely be experiencing for the foreseeable future. As we are no longer on a linear trajectory, we need to consider what this new trajectory means for how we:

Educate and prepare our youth in K-12
Educate and prepare our young men and women studying within higher education
Restructure/re-envision our corporate training/L&D departments
Equip our freelancers and others to find work
Help people in the workforce remain relevant/marketable/properly skilled
Encourage and better enable lifelong learning
Attempt to keep up w/ this pace of change — legally, ethically, morally, and psychologically

PDF file here

One thought that comes to mind…when we’re moving this fast, we need to be looking upwards and outwards into the horizons — constantly pulse-checking the landscapes. We can’t be looking down or be so buried in our current positions/tasks that we aren’t noticing the changes that are happening around us.

Cultures of Perpetual Learning [Richardson]

On 09/10/2016, in 21st century, adjunct faculty, career development, education, education reform, faculty/staff, higher education, ideas, lifelong learning, reinvent, staying relevant, surviving, teachers, training / L&D, vendors, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Cultures of Perpetual Learning — by Will Richardson

Excerpts (additional emphasis by DSC):

Over the years, we’ve heard a lot of predictions about what the future of work holds for all of us, not just our kids. It’s interesting now to see some of those predictions actually playing out.

Case in point is this post in the Harvard Business Review that summarizes the Herculean change initiative now underway at AT&T. It’s a fascinating read on it’s own, but it’s even more interesting when you start to align some of the findings to the work of schools. Or maybe more daunting.

The biggest takeaway for me? Professional learning is now the responsibility of the learner. I’ve harped on that for a while now, but AT&T pushes that idea in spades.

All of this works within a “culture of perpetual learning.” AT&T employees know that their roles will change, on average, every four years. In other words, if you’re not constantly learning, you’re toast.

From DSC:
Several graphics come to mind (see below).

DanielChristian-No-longer-running-sprints--but-marathons

From the HBR article:

Rapidly Shifting Technical Demands
For the past three years, AT&T’s CEO, Randall Stephenson, has been making large strategic bets on a diverse range of wireless technologies—most recently the $63 billion acquisition of satellite television company DirecTV. Asked about the decision to venture into new businesses, John Stankey, the head of AT&T’s Entertainment Group, says, “We have no choice.” Customers are demanding constant connectivity; from 2007 to 2015, for example, data traffic on AT&T’s wireless network grew by more than 150,000%. The company forecasts that by 2020, 75% of its network will be controlled by software-defined architecture. That percentage was virtually zero in 2000. This means, says Stankey, that most of AT&T’s global employees “signed up for a deal that is entirely different from the environment in which their business operates today.”

ExponentialNotLinearSparksNHoney-Spring2013

The pace has changed significantly and quickly

The first truly awesome chatbot is a talking T. Rex [Brownlee] #edtech #chatbots #AI #HCI

On 08/26/2016, in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, 3D, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, attention, Augmented Reality (AR), bots, computer science, digital audio, digital learning, digital video, education, education technology, educational games / serious games, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, innovation, intelligent systems, intelligent tutoring, interactivity, K-12 related, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, lifelong learning, love of learning, multimedia, platforms, play, user experience (UX), Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, youth, by Daniel Christian

The first truly awesome chatbot is a talking T. Rex — from fastcodesign.com by John Brownlee
National Geographic uses a virtual Tyrannosaur to teach kids about dinosaurs—and succeeds where other chatbots fail.

Excerpt:

As some have declared chatbots to be the “next webpage,” brands have scrambled to develop their own talkative bots, letting you do everything from order a pizza to rewrite your resume. The truth is, though, that a lot of these chatbots are actually quite stupid, and tend to have a hard time understanding natural human language. Sooner or later, users get frustrated bashing their heads up against the wall of a dim-witted bot’s AI.

So how do you design around a chatbot’s walnut-sized brain? If you’re National Geographic Kids UK, you set your chatbot to the task of pretending to be a Tyrannosaurus rex, a Cretaceous-era apex predator that really had a walnut-sized brain (at least comparatively speaking).

She’s called Tina the T. rex, and by making it fun to learn about dinosaurs, she suggests that education — rather than advertising or shopping — might be the real calling of chatbots.

Also relevant/see:

Honeybot would teach kids using “3D augmented reality” — from newatlas.com by Aaron Heinrich

Ed Tech & AI: How Education Chatbots [could] Revolutionize Personalized Learning [Walker]

On 08/22/2016, in 21st century, adult learning, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, colleges, community colleges, corporate / business world, corporate universities / corporate training, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, education, education technology, emerging technologies, higher education, homeschooling/homeschoolers, human-computer interaction (HCI), hybrid learning, ideas, learner profiles, learning, learning agents, learning ecosystem, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, lifelong learning, love of learning, microlearning, more voice more choice more control, motivation, online tutoring, personalized/customized learning, platforms, professional development, student-related, teachers, teaching & learning, technologies for your home, training / L&D, TVs, ubiquitous learning, universities, virtual tutoring, workplace, youth, by Daniel Christian

Education Technology And Artificial Intelligence: How Education Chatbots [could] Revolutionize Personalized Learning — from parentherald.com by Kristine Walker

From DSC:
I inserted a [could] in the title, as I don’t think we’re there yet. That said, I don’t see chatbots, personal assistants, and the use of AI going away any time soon. This should be on our radars from here on out. Chatbots could easily be assigned some heavy lifting duties within K-20 education as well as in the corporate world; but even then, we’ll still need excellent teachers, professors, and trainers/subject matter experts out there. I don’t see anyone being replaced at this point.

Excerpt:

As the equity gap in American education continues, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has been urging educators, investors and tech companies to be more open in investing time and money in artificial intelligence-driven education technology programs. The reason? Gates believed that these AI-based EdTech platforms could personalize and revolutionize school learning experience while eliminating the equity gap.

Also see:

Are ‘Motivation Bots’ Part of the Future of Education? — from educationworld.com

The Motivation, Revision and Announcement bots each perform respective functions that are intended to help students master exams.

The Motivation bot, for instance, “keeps students motivated with reminders, social support, and other means,” while the Revision bot “helps students to best understand ways to improve their work” and the Announcement bot “tells students how much studying they need to do based on the amount of time available.”

Somewhat related:

Deep Learning Is Still A No-Show In Gartner 2016 Hype Cycle For Emerging Technologies — from .forbes.com by Gil Press

Excerpt:

Machine learning is best defined as the transition from feeding the computer with programs containing specific instructions in the forms of step-by-step rules or algorithms to feeding the computer with algorithms that can “learn” from data and can make inferences “on their own.” The computer is “trained” by data which is labeled or classified based on previous outcomes, and its software algorithms “learn” how to predict the classification of new data that is not labeled or classified. For example, after a period of training in which the computer is presented with spam and non-spam email messages, a good machine learning program will successfully identify, (i.e., predict,) which email message is spam and which is not without human intervention. In addition to spam filtering, machine learning has been applied successfully to problems such as hand-writing recognition, machine translation, fraud detection, and product recommendations.

Learning Ecosystems

Cultures of Perpetual Learning [Richardson]

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