The Education Flywheel: Navigating the Circular Ecosystem of Human Learning and AI Advancement
In our rapidly evolving world, education has become a complex flywheel, spinning faster with each revolution. As we educate the next generation of humans, we simultaneously advance AI, which in turn reshapes how we learn and teach. This circular ecosystem presents both unprecedented challenges and extraordinary opportunities. We find ourselves navigating a landscape where timeless wisdom competes with digital noise for attention. In this post, I explore the intricate balance between knowledge, people, and technology, examining how we can harness the power of AI to educate better while ensuring that the core of human learning remains intact. Each spin of this flywheel is shaping the future of human-AI collaboration and the very nature of knowledge itself.
This week I decided to print a few fables as reading material for my 6-year-old children. One of the fables that I had them read was Aesop's The Hare and the Tortoise. It teaches such a timeless lesson -Slow and steady wins the race!
I also recently came across apost by James Clearwith the same basic message: "Consistency before intensity."
It is very important that children are exposed to things like that early on. The next day after I had my kids read the fable, I asked them, "What's the moral of the story about the tortoise and the hare?" and they both screamed with excitement, "Slow and steady wins the race!"
Several things are worth noting here:
What was true in 6th century BCE still holds.
We need reminders. In today's day and age of information abundance, it becomes increasingly difficult to filter out and remember what's really important and what will stay relevant over time. The principles stay the same but can be adapted and expanded. Thank you, James!
Technology is sprinting ahead and we are so focused on it and how it affects and changes our lives. What news is real or fake? What did the latest AI model learn and can generate? How much and what data did it gobble to learn all this? The list goes on.
However, do we pay enough attention to the more important question?
What's next?
The next generation of humans. Our children.
What information are they exposed to? What are they learning? What are they retaining? I am not here to brag about my parenting skills. On the contrary, I find it extremely difficult fighting for the most precious resource that everyone is going after nowadays - attention.
My kids, like all the other ones I'm sure, are consuming an enormous amount of digital content. Most of it is completely useless for their long-term well-being but extremely efficient in keeping their attention. It has no substance - just zeros and ones, photons from the screen. It hijacks their attention and it is extremely difficult to switch to something of essence. Why? It's boring, I am told. That drives me crazy. It's the same as consuming "empty calories" but let's not get distracted by that monster of a topic that nutrition is.
I am not saying that there is no good educational content freely available. There is plenty of it. But it can't keep the kids' attention. I have seen some creative ways and systems for educational content in a fun format, and several AI tools started appearing recently. It's nothing on the grand scale of things and considering what's at stake.
If AI can figure out how to write software and how to model the folding of proteins, predict complex climate patterns, and accelerate drug discovery, I am certain it can develop personalized learning plans for children with engaging materials. Not only that, but AI can also continuously track a child's progress, adapting the plan and materials on the fly to optimize learning outcomes. I am already using it to generate math and language worksheets but I am only scratching the surface. The current state of technology has capabilities way beyond that and it's getting better every day.
We constantly make analogies with the not-so-distant past - how we used to have to go to the library and spend hours to do some basic research and how we have access to all the knowledge in the world in our pocket. How the mobile phone we obsessively check more than 150 times a day has more power than a computer that took up a room. There are many other examples of great things we've achieved but I'll stop here.
The point is - given our impressive history of problem-solving, we can surely find a way to guide our children's attention towards what truly matters. We've conquered complex challenges before; now it's time to make learning so captivating that it naturally draws our kids in. With enough determination, we can transform educational content into something that not only competes with, but wins the battle for attention with mindless entertainment. We just need to set our minds to it.