Couple of days back, I did a tweet storm on what I thought was wrong about the online learning industry, https://twitter.com/nutanc/status/1247727616594825217
I wrote about it based on my 8 years of experience as an associate professor in computer science and engineering teaching more than 1000 engineering students.
The main gist of the tweet storm was that online learning is not a social activity. There is no feedback for educators and there is no fun for students. And that is why only the most dedicated of students make it through an online course.
So, what’s the solution?
Fortnite.
Let me explain.
I play Fortnite on and off on my PS4. I am a 40 year old guy, so I don’t understand or “get” a lot of it. But I try to observe the social dynamics while playing Fortnite. And its amazing. Very few power players are in it for the actual game where they search for opponents and shoot them down. Most of the time its actually a bunch of friends coming together talking about their daily life and exploring the worlds. Other have already written about this phenomenon, https://qz.com/quartzy/1493147/fortnite-a-social-space-like-facebook-and-skateparks-once-were/ and https://char.gd/blog/2018/fortnite-is-the-new-hangout-spot.
And this is why I believe Fortnite to be the future of online education.
Universities or colleges are places where people who want to learn common things come together and go on a journey of learning, with some guidance from older people who have already embarked on that journey. Atleast that’s what education used to be. And in our current world, where everyone is hooked to a phone, Fortnite is that place where common friends can meet. In fact, its happening right now. Kids now chat and talk more on Fortnite kid of platforms than they do in real life.
Fortnite is already experimenting with online virtual social experiences. It did a Marshmellow concert, https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/21/18234980/fortnite-marshmello-concert-viewer-numbers and it had 10.7 million players showing up for the event. If like minded people can get together for an online concert, I am sure we can extend the platform for social learning experiences.
So, how can a Fortnite kind of platform look for online education. Lets dream.
First, the platform would allow an educator to create their own map. Imagine being able to create a civil war room, or the battle of Panipat room. And fill it with the right characters.
The educator could then invite her students to join the room. The students get to choose their avatars which will represent them in their classrooms. The teacher will initially act as a guide and walk you through the map. Showing all the important landmarks in the map and explaining them. The built in voice chat will allow easy communication with zero latency.
The students are then encouraged to explore the worlds on their own. This will be the main difference. When students get together and form their groups, that’s when they are more comfortable. They can discuss their everyday activities and discuss the maps. The teacher is just a voice chat away for any doubts.
Once the students get comfortable with the world, the teacher can set assignments or goals. The goals can be mini games which can be played solo or as a group. They can interact with the characters and learn and solve. Imagine being able to talk to Dr. B.R. Ambedkar to learn about the constitution or talk to George Washington about the declaration of independence. Because of the game dynamics, students will be encouraged to learn more. And this will encourage self learning. Since every session will be recorded, the teacher can do a walk through with the student later and discuss where they made mistakes and correct them.
I can image lessons of History lending themselves to this model. But with a little bit of effort, we can build worlds of science and math. We can make the students walk the number line and solve geometric puzzles. We can make them go inside the human body and shoot down a virus or bacteria.
I know its fun to think about this, but the thing is we are not far from making this a reality. Already platforms like Fortnite exist. The technology is there for a lot of people to come together and explore worlds. Technology is there to connect these people in real time so that they can chat and talk and share photos and videos.
Online education need not be boring videos where one person is giving a monologue. It can be a compendium of colorful worlds which can be explored together.
