Invest in a child's Improbable Thinking

The rapid march of AI will outdate existing education even faster. To be able to compete the young need an updated education that develops confidence and capability in thinking differently - in a manner thats harder for machines and ethically regulates them. The encouraging results of the XSEED students in its large scale national test on thinking skills offers hope and some useful lessons.

Like you, I do not know where the doings of ChatGPT and its successors are going to take us. One thing I do know is the huge implications for education of children. The wonders of GPT4 include terrific scores on exams like the SAT and the ever tougher LSAT, conjuring hundreds of recipes from a few pictures of ingredients, erecting entire websites from handwritten scrap of paper, one-click lawsuits, finding best-fit partners, and answering pretty much any job-interview question. Where does it leave us and our kids ?

Warnings about intelligent machines displacing humans are not new. In AN eerily prescient video from the 1980s, philosopher J Krishnamurthy warns about a coming future where computers will do almost everything better that humans - from poems to predictions - and apart from leading to massive job losses will starkly raise the question of what it means to be human.?This question is now looming large above us and we have to confront it - for ourselves, more importantly our children.

In a New York Times article last week, legend Noam Chomsky & colleagues give us a clue about ourselves. The crux of AI and machine learning, they say, is sifting through large amounts of data, identifying patterns, and making probable predictions. Cautioning us about the premature celebrations of ChatGPT, they point out the "deepest flaw" of AI is the absence of critical thinking capacity that can determine the improbable. This often makes the output "superficial and dubious". True intelligence they say is the demonstrated ability to express improbable and insightful things. Humans can do that with very thin slices of data and that sets them apart from brute force machines. Whether this assessment outlasts successive improvements or not (GPT4 is already at another level!), it does give some direction on human education: Improbable Thinking.

Improbable Thinking has been the focus of XSEED Education, our project to make education more useful to all children. Our attention has relentlessly been on developing fundamental ability to conceptually grasp things, think critically, creatively solve problems, and have the courage and capability to fearlessly express in one's own words. This is a foundation in 'improbable thinking'. In a recently published study a key finding was that?XSEED students showed a +21% performance advantage over non-XSEED students?in these type of thinking skills. The performance was in a computer-based Nationals Skills Test in English, Math, and Science that was taken by 61,000 students in 21 Indian states across in Grades 1-8. This is generally considered more difficult than traditional ones and requires conceptual thinking and problem-solving skills and rather than just recall facts and formulas i.e. the reality our children will face every day.

These children are better at thinking differently not because of gadgetry, 'name teachers', or extra personal attention. They are thinking differently because the everyday teaching & leaning experience is different - and superior. These results have come about because the entire emphasis of the XSEED system of teaching and learning requires children to think about a problem, come up with their own solution, and express it in their own words. The program works through schools, across social-economic strata, and entails fundamentally altering mindsets and skills of teachers and school administrators. Given these realities, it's a miracle that the program has scaled (reached 2 million children across several countries) the way it has. Why? Because while parents may not be able to articulate it, an increasing number have an intuitive sense that I need to not just do more for my child, I need to do different.

Potentially AI is the latest deluge mankind must counter and to survive the Noah’s Ark must be built and inhabited. It will be hard to erect and scary for all creatures to leave their old habits and habitats. But what is the choice? Waters are rising and we don’t have that much time. Staying on will mean perishing in the ravaging tide.?Evolution and history together conspire to selectively remember the ones who make the move soon enough. Thankfully this 'ark' of new education will have place for more than two of each kind. Jump on!

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