Brave New Words: How AI Will Revolutionize Education (and Why That’s a Good Thing)
By Salman Khan
Vikings
ISBN: 978-0593656952
272 pages.

Digital platforms powered by artificial intelligence (AI) can provide access to quality education through personalized and interactive tutoring at a fraction of the cost of achieving this through the traditional school model with a 30:1 student-teacher ratio.

This is the main message of the book Brave New Words: How AI will revolutionize education (and why that’s a good thing) by Salman Khan. Revolutionizing education is also the main goal that drives Salman Khan. It’s understandable why he is excited about the possibilities that AI opens up in education.

Salman Khan – of Khan Academy fame – is of course no newcomer to education and/or online teaching and learning. Khan Academy is one of the largest platforms of its kind in the world and has played a key role in providing millions of people with access to high-quality educational content, and Khan Academy’s videos have been viewed billions of times.

Quality education requires not only good content delivered to students in an interesting way, but also constant and interactive feedback for students. Students also need to be encouraged and inspired, and they also need a lot of coaching. Traditionally, this was and is provided by teachers in the classroom.

Salman Khan of Khan Academy is writing a book about the potential of artificial intelligence to bring high-quality, personalized education to more children at a lower cost than traditional interventions

Before the introduction of AI, Khan Academy was able to ensure the quality of content and the way it was taught (pedagogical issues), but Salman believes that Khan Academy was unable to provide many of the coaching elements. The interaction between the student and the material provider could not be very active, lively or responsive to the needs of the individual.

Students received timely feedback and parents and teachers were informed about their learning progress. However, the internet did not allow students to have an engaging and personalized learning experience.

Khan believes AI offers a way to address this problem. AI trained with the right educational materials can provide immediate and effective feedback. Students could have meaningful conversations with AI-trained participants that are tailored to the individual’s needs. It would be like having a good teacher and coach by your side.

This is the potential that Salman Khan sees in AI for education. He admits that we may not be there yet. AI tools are still being developed and trained. But for him, the potential is definitely there.

Khan also talks about Khan Academy’s AI-powered program Khanmigo as a step in this direction. According to Khan, Khanmigo acts as a knowledgeable, interactive and supportive coach for students on an individual level.

It is already capable of providing students with fairly sophisticated interactions/conversations. Mr. Khan gives numerous examples from various disciplines in his book. But more importantly, Mr. Khan believes that the potential to further develop Khanmigo as AI tools become more sophisticated will make it even more impressive.

He mentions that they are involved in a number of studies examining the impact of Khanmigo on student learning and other outcomes. The results of these studies will be very important.

Quality education requires not only good content delivered to students in an interesting way, but also constant and interactive feedback for students. Students also need to be encouraged and inspired, and they also need a lot of coaching. Traditionally, this was and is provided by teachers in the classroom.

These opportunities could be extremely important for countries like Pakistan, which are struggling to provide a quality education to all children. In Pakistan, about 26 million children between the ages of 5 and 16 are out of school. Most of those children who do go to school receive a poor education. If we had the opportunity to provide our millions of young people with access to quality education at a reasonable cost, it could be a game changer for Pakistan. But is it possible? And is it practically achievable?

Our internet infrastructure is poor. It needs to be significantly improved if “live” interaction with an AI tutor is to be meaningful. Offline, this is not possible. This means we need bandwidth and internet stability.

For children who are already in school, this measure may be more feasible. Many schools have internet connections. Some also have computers and devices. If individual devices are needed, that will be a problem. Many low-fee schools and public schools will have difficulty organizing a device for each student, so some devices will have to be shared. Or someone will have to subsidize the device and perhaps even subscription fees.

For out-of-school children, the problems are even more serious. Many out-of-school children do not attend school because their families are poor. Many out-of-school children also work as child laborers. Will they be able to afford devices and subscriptions? Will they be motivated to persevere? The state will definitely have to subsidize partially or fully.

Salman Khan points out that AI-powered learning could still be cheaper than having a knowledgeable, motivated and capable teacher in the classroom. That could well be true. Even those who can afford to pay a certain amount of tuition in Pakistan receive an inferior education. So the cost comparison could be correct.

Interestingly, Khan stresses several times that AI cannot replace teachers. If a teacher is competent and knows how to teach and motivate, AI is certainly a poor alternative. But if the teacher is not as good and the AI ​​alternative is better, will Salman Khan’s argument still hold up? That seems unlikely.

So AI will at least change the role of the teacher in the classroom, and in some cases – although this is more likely in places where “real” teachers are not as well trained and/or motivated – it will even replace teachers. If Khan is right in his assessment of the potential of AI-powered education programs, he is wrong in his assessment of the impact on teachers and teaching. Regardless, it could take years for those impacts to materialize: education is not a field where things change quickly.

This is an important book. It shows the potential of AI to transform and potentially improve education. Khan gives numerous examples from different subjects and at different levels. The message is simple: AI-powered education programs can deliver personalized coaching for high-quality interventions and are likely to be more cost-effective than classroom teaching.

It definitely has the potential to change the status quo. It could open up new avenues for countries that struggle to provide educational opportunities for all.

The reviewer is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Development and Economic Alternatives and Associate Professor of Economics at Lums

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, August 11, 2024