3 . Professor Ashok Goel of Georgia Tech developed an artificially intelligent teaching assistant to help handle the enormous number of student questions in the online class, Knowledge-Based Artificial Intelligence. This online course is a core requirement of Georgia Tech’s online Master of Science in Computer Science program. Professor Goel already had eight teaching assistants, but that wasn’t enough to deal with the overwhelming number of daily questions from students.

Many students drop out of online courses because of the lack of teaching support. When students feel isolated or confused and reach out with questions that go unanswered, their motivation to continue begins to fade. Professor Goel decided to do something to remedy (改进) his situation and his solution was to create a virtual assistant named Jill Watson, which is based on the IBM Watson platform.

Goel and his team developed several versions of Jill Watson before releasing her to the online forums. At first, the virtual assistant wasn’t too great. But Goel and his team sourced the online discussion forum to find all the 40,000 questions that had ever been asked since the class was launched. Then they began to feed Jill with the questions and answers. After some adjustments and sufficient time, Jill was able to answer the students’ questions correctly 97% of the time. The virtual assistant became so advanced and realistic that the students didn’t know she was a computer. The students, who were studying artificial intelligence, were interacting with the virtual assistant and couldn’t tell it apart from a real human being. Goel didn’t inform them about Jill’s true identity until April 26. The students were actually very positive about the experience.

The goal of Professor Goel’s virtual assistant next year is to take over answering 40% of all the questions posed by students on the online forum. The name Jill Watson will, of course, change to something else next semester. Professor Goel has a much rosier outlook on the future of artificial intelligence than, say, Elon Musk, Stephen Hawking, Bill Gates or Steve Wozniak.

5 . Online Free Courses

English Grammar and Style

We’ll present materials that cover grammatical principles, word usage, writing style, sentence and paragraph structure, and punctuation. We’ll challenge you with quizzes and writing activities that will give you strategies to enhance the quality of your writing, and invite you to participate in discussions and assess the work of your peers (同龄人).

Length: 8 weeks.

Instructor: Roslyn Petelin from the University of Queensland.

Academic Writing Made Easy

From structuring and organizing an academic text to avoiding common mistakes that can negatively affect your credibility, this course offers a guide for those who want to improve their writing. Each week is comprised of video lessons, followed by exercises and tasks of assessing your peers’ work. The course requires upper-intermediate to advanced English.

Length: 6 weeks.

Instructor: Heidi Minning from the Technical University of Munich.

Preparing to Network in English

Networking in the business world is key to career success. But what is networking? And how do you do it in English? This course helps you understand the basics of networking and why it’s important. You’ll identify the key qualities you should focus on developing. Most importantly, you’ll grow and expand your business network and professional connections.

Length: 6 weeks.

Instructor: Joel Ozretich from the University of Washington.

Using Emails for Networking in English

In this course, you’ll learn important strategies for writing effective emails. You’ learn how to write messages for different audiences and understand when to be formal or direct. You’ll also learn how choice of words can change the way people view your message.

Length: 4 weeks.

Instructor: Daphne Mackey from the University of Washington.

6 . JENNIFER SALLS — A high school math teacher in Sparks, Nevada

It is possible to construct good online courses that would support mathematics learning with middle and high school students. However, these courses would not look like most current online courses.

When we imagine an online course, we think of a solitary (孤立的)process in which a student is holed up with his or her computer, watching PowerPoints, paging through screens of text and solving a whole bunch of problems. While learning may be occurring, I suspect that it's short-term with little real understanding of mathematics. There are some students who learn well under these circumstances, but this is not true for the majority of students.

A good online course would take advantage of the many interactive resources. For example, if students were learning to solve equations, they would be directed to solve a carefully arranged set of problems using an interactive program. They would reflect on the interaction and share their observations with others taking the course.

Eventually, the lesson would move students toward solving equations, using their experiences with the interactive program as the jumping-off point. Students could experience real-world problems through video and simulations and use a variety of computer-based tools to solve these problems. Notice that a course like this is not solitary, but highly interactive, and it builds both problem-solving skills and conceptual knowledge.

BRIGID BARRON — A psychologist at Stanford University's School of Education

Whether or not any computing tool used in the classroom will interfere with or energize learning depends on how the teacher organizes its use.

When online courses are well designed, they offer learners and teachers wonderful opportunities. Hybrid models that combine classroom interaction with tools like blogs, podcasts, social networks and discussion forums can engage students in ways that traditional environments do not. When students are given challenging material, asked to carry out research and to create ways to share what they are learning with students from all over the world, engagement goes up.

There are other benefits. Assessment of student learning can be partly automated and designed to provide continuous feedback. When students need assistance, they can be directed to activities that will help them learn. Perhaps most importantly, online courses can help bridge gaps in course offerings within a school district. Many economically challenged schools don't have the resources to provide specialized or advanced courses, but those courses could be offered online.

Many students are already using technology in their own time to learn and create, for their own purposes or for school assignments (作业).If they know where to look, they can access online communities that foster their imagination and offer informal mentorship.

Instead of wondering whether teenagers are too easily distracted by computers, we should be figuring out how we can use digital media to sustain teenagers' interest and their desire to learn.