Education : machine learning for better learning

Among the really exciting application of machine learning, there is one that fascinates me : machine learning in the classroom.
Recently some very exciting applications have been described to use algorithms to enhance the quality of education and make children smarter. This field of research was cited among the top 10 technologies to follow in 2017.

There is hope : data can be used for Greater Good

I had been very pessimistic in 2015-16 about the trends in Big Data and in particular the promotion of commercial goals rather than the creation of value for the end-user (my hypothesis was that firms use Big Data technologies first to satisfy their financial goals rather than focusing on a better customer satisfaction and enhanced loyalty). Reading about new developments in the classroom sort of reassured me that there is hope. Data can be used for the Greater Good (this, incidentally, will be the topic of the 2017 Data Innovation Summit in Brussels).

Machine learning algorithms for better education

So far, the ideas I’ve read about regard mainly classroom work (I don’t pretend to have read everything; don’t shoot me if I missed something, mention it rather in the comments).
For instance algorithms can help teachers detect learning patterns among students and adapt teaching to different style of pupils. I think this is a great idea. It addresses the particularity of each children and will maximize his/her chances to succeed. Yet, correct me if I’m wrong, but exploiting technology may require extra teachers to follow kids. Algorithms will “only” address the detection of different learning patterns, identify children needing special attention or differentiated teaching methods, but the work still remain to be done.

Applications for individual computer-supervized teaching

One -in my opinion- even more exciting domain is the use of machine learning in educative mobile apps. So far I haven’t found examples of these but I certainly haven’t searched well enough.
Here’s the idea : the more a child uses an educative mobile app, the more this app can understand the strengths and weaknesses of the child compared to other children around the world using that same app.
I’d love to deepen this subject. So if you know examples that may correspond to the description above, please comment at the bottom of this page.

Image : shutterstock

By Pierre-Nicolas Schwab Pierre-Nicolas est Docteur en Marketing et dirige l'agence d'études de marché IntoTheMinds. Ses domaines de prédilection sont le BigData l'e-commerce, le commerce de proximité, l'HoReCa et la logistique. Il est également chercheur en marketing à l'Université Libre de Bruxelles et sert de coach et formateur à plusieurs organisations et institutions publiques. Il peut être contacté par email, Linkedin ou par téléphone (+32 486 42 79 42)