The current boom in technological changes affects every industry, including academia. And with the ongoing shift to online and hybrid learning, these technological advancements are moving at an unprecedented pace.
Nowadays, students can get instant help from essay writing services that write papers for money using chatbots. Moreover, with the help of the same chatbots as well as AI, teachers can handle administrative tasks and personalize the curricula to specific student needs.
In this article, we’ll explore upcoming technology-based education trends in 2022.
Automated Chatbots
The teacher-student dynamic relies heavily on constant communication when it comes to learning. However, teachers are never available 24/7 to respond to their students.
And that’s where chatbots come in. With an automated chat feature, students can get answers to their queries without waiting for the teacher.
Various institutions already use this technology, and we’ll see further implementation in the education sector moving forward.
Virtual Labs and Simulations
As most schools move online or switch to hybrid learning models, bringing the classroom into the home becomes a priority. Since students can no longer access lab resources, they need virtual laboratories to replicate that hands-on experience.
Platforms like Praxilabs can help students experience the world in a virtual environment. Students can also use other simulated ecosystems to immerse themselves in the learning process.
VR and AR
Speaking of virtual environments, VR headsets will become standard learning tools in 2022. Virtual reality offers students an extension of the real world, which is necessary for social improvement.
Another tool that educators will use more in 2022 is Augmented Reality (AR). This technology allows students to experience or enhance their auditory and visual perception of the real world.
With recent advancements in the Metaverse, companies like Oculus will continue working on VR and AR tools for learning.
Online Assessments
In the past, teachers had to spend hours preparing tests, assigning them to students, and grading them eventually. However, the future favors a stress-free approach to assessments.
With online assessment tools like Quizlet, teachers can create and grade their students’ quizzes. In addition, young learners can also get instant feedback from automatic grading systems.
Effectively, these online assessment portals will become ubiquitous in academia, thereby helping teachers grade students without much hassle.
AI-Powered Learning
Artificial intelligence is now part of the public lexicon because it makes life easier for people. In the education system, AI tools will continue to improve the quality of the materials, as well as the means of delivery.
Having mentioned the use of AI-powered chatbots, we’ll still need to touch on advanced AI algorithms for learning. This technology will help teachers analyze students’ learning and performance data to streamline the learning material.
Personalized Learning
AI tools can synthesize large swathes of data to improve the studying experience in the virtual classroom. From this data, the teacher — with the AI’s help — can personalize the student’s learning process.
Why personalize learning? Previously, educators used a universal teaching approach for every student, which meant that some students fell behind their peers. But with AI-synthesized data, teachers can adjust the learning material to meet the specific needs of individual students rather than following a cookie-cutter approach.
Soft Skills Training
The current labor market demands soft skills as a complementary standard to hard skills. In the coming year, schools will pay more attention to soft skills. Some standard soft skills for schools to prioritize include:
- Creativity
- Diversity
- Empathy
- Eco-friendliness
- Critical thinking
- Communication
- Collaboration
- Time management
- Decision making
- Feedback
- Openness to criticism
- Organization
- Adaptability
- Conflict resolution
- Stress management
- Leadership
- Dexterity
- Persuasiveness
Another aspect of soft skill training involves life-long learning — a concept that involves preparing students to acquire skills independently, even beyond their active school years.
Hybrid Learning
The unprecedented COVID pandemic continues to affect countries and schools globally. With no cure in sight, schools may have to adopt hybrid learning permanently to protect students from health hazards.
Although some schools are yet to provide the requisite infrastructure for hybrid learning, public sector decisions will force them to invest in this area in 2022.
Also, anytime learning will become standard practice in most schools as students continue to gain more control over their academics.
With videos, live streams, podcasts, and other digital media forms becoming part of the regular curriculum, students can now schedule their learning to their convenience.
Gamification
As technology becomes more personalized, teachers will need to gamify the learning process to create an even more immersive experience for their wards.
And since students now struggle to fend off distractions from all angles, gamification can help them focus on learning activities, thus improving their overall academic performance.
Although academia has been gradually shifting to gamification models over the past decade, we’ll see massive strides in this area in 2022. Companies and learning portals that successfully used gamification include Brainscape, Duolingo, and Virtonomics.
Conclusion
Technology and education have consistently grown alongside each other. So, as new technological advancements enter the public sector, the education system will adopt them to improve student performance and make life easy for teachers. With AI, AR, and VR technologies, students can gain a more immersive learning experience, as well as develop soft skills that are applicable beyond academia.