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How Facial Analysis Software Could Help Struggling Students
moon_unit2 writes "Tech Review has a story on research showing that facial recognition software can accurately spot signs that programming students are struggling. NC State researchers tracked students learning java and used an open source facial-expression recognition engine to identify emotions such as frustration or confusion. The technique could be especially useful for Massive Open Online Courses — where many thousands of students are working remotely — but it could also help teachers identify students who need help in an ordinary classroom, experts say. That is, as long as those students don't object to being watched constantly by a camera."
beers given as treatment? or is crack more in vogue?
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
...to get everybody in the class to show up wearing one of these.
Unless it identified almost all of them it wasn't working ;-0
I would be more interested in the ones who don't show that emotion, since they are the ones so lost and confused that they have abandoned all hope and given up. If you are trying to learn Java, and you aren't frustrated and confused, you're doing it wrong.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
That is a compelling argument for subsidized post secondary education.
Nice try NSA...
Assignment 12-A is designed to require an average student approximately 20 minutes to solve.
Student #001A solves the problem in 3.5 minutes - Too easy for his skill level
Student #312Q solves the problem in 42.3 minutes - he is struggling and needs further assistance
Problem solved, and you didn't have to spend a dime placing spy-cams at every workstation. You're welcome.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Because some teachers want to have additional tools to proactively help struggling students that maybe tok shy or embarrased to ask for help. How terrible of an idea that is. Clearly the point of being a teacher is not helping their students, right?
When you graduate and get a job, your boss isn't going to be using those same tools to check in on you to see when you're struggling and need help. Asking for help when you need it is part of the educational process. Giving students a crutch because they are "too shy" to ask for help doesn't really help them in the long run. If they are too shy to ask their instructor for help (the person they are paying to teach them), then how will they ever be able to say to their boss "Hey, I don't think I know how to get starting on this project, can you point me in the right direction".
Besides, teachers already have tools to see when you're struggling and don't know the material - those tools are tests and homework.
I meant completely.
Actually it is the availability of credit that does that, not the subsidy. As a good example look at the cost of in state tuition, where the tax payer foots part of the bill vs out of state at the public university.
The problem with this type of innovation is that it's a shot in the dark.
We haven't the first clue for the most effective way to teach people. We study things in HS because the subjects are "classics", not because they are useful (Geometry versus Probability, for instance). The "walk around lecturing in front of passive students" model doesn't fit with the need to be rambunctious. The fixed, level-based scale of achievement: "all children should be at this level of achievement at this age, else they are disabled" doesn't take into account variations in maturity or birth date. (Be born a day earlier, get put into a class where you're competing with class mates a year older.)
For reference, check out redirect. The author carefully details a large number of education techniques and social services which have no scientific basis whatsoever. Predictably, when actually studied, many of these ideas do more damage than good; for instance, regarding teen pregnancy, government teaching initiatives tend to increase the teen pregnancy rate.
There's simply no evidence that a) this system works to the degree of accuracy needed, b) doesn't have a high false-positive rate due to unforseen factors such as drapes waving in the background, c) can be used to any good effect (double-blind studies anyone?) as a teaching aid.
Our track record for using technology to help education is not good.
It makes for a good story, though. "We don't know the best way to teach, but here's something that should work!"
Here's another thought problem for you. Recall the 2009 Star Trek movie which shows a young Spock standing in a pit while a computer presents audio and video lessons. (I don't think the pit model works, but a student in front of a screen seems natural enough.)
Assume that you have control over this content, and can do double-blind studies of minor changes. Each video is a computer program, so any small piece can be redone without retaping the entire lesson. The program allows student interaction.
What features would your ideal teaching machine have, what sorts of things would you teach, what sorts of experiments could you do to home in on the optimum teaching method?
While there certainly are some humanities students who get support - most of them do not receive full support from their institution. Typically, half time TA with no tuition coverage. This can also be the case for engineering PhDs at some institutions. Almost all science PhD students are typically guaranteed 2 years TA plus tuition even at the very smallest schools. In addition, non-STEM related PhDs take longer (about 1.5 years longer at the median). This leads to more student loan debt for non-STEM PhDs compared to STEM PhDs. Please see this study for a very nice comparison: The Price of a Science PhD
In addition, you make what I believe to be two assumptions by implication about Universities:
1. That professors are hired to teach.
2. That TAs will do a worse job teaching than professors.
Professors are NOT hired to teach - the exception is small private colleges without graduate programs. Professors are hired to bring research money into the University. The University takes in the region of 40-60% off the top of grants "for institutional research support." While this is not always the case (for some grants, the granting institution require the university to commit matching funds) it is more than the norm. Secondly, while professors are typically more knowledgeable in the subject and typically have more experience teaching (by virtue of spending the time as a TA during graduate school), that does not mean they are the better teachers. The best teachers I ever had were evenly split between professors and TAs. While not scientific, my colleagues experiences were similar.
If everything comes down to a cost benefit analysis, we lose everything that isn't profitable. Have you ever worked for a company that valued its "profit centers" at the expense of the rest of the workforce? It is a narrow and short-sighted viewpoint, divorced from reality. Not everything needs to be approached as a business.