On the first day, nearly 4,000 students and parents from more than 1,600 families arrived at ECNU. They had an immersive experience of intelligent education, including reform in teaching methods and knowledge dissemination.
“ECNU gives full play to its discipline advantages and integrated innovation. Intelligence Education Week focuses on displaying the university’s latest achievements in basic education and intelligent education and their application.” Sun Zhenrong, Vice President of ECNU, pointed out that intelligent education is currently developing from integration of specific technologies into a more comprehensive and in-depth fusion of various technologies. ECNU will actively promote the in-depth integration of artificial intelligence and education, accelerate educational reform and innovation, give full play to the advantages of artificial intelligence, and ultimately realize the transformation of educational patterns and models.
The latest research achievements have been merged into sports activities in the playground. Two authoritative courses, “KDL Preschool Sports and Games” and “KDL Sports and Health” independently developed by ECNUers for children and adolescents are offered. Through the data uploaded by the sports bracelets that children wear, teachers can observe the heart rate curve and monitor exercise intensity and density in real time. In this way, children's exercise level and physical fitness can be evaluated scientifically and effectively.
According to Professor Wang Xiaozan from the School of Physical Education, “Human-Computer Interaction can not only stimulate students’ interest in extracurricular sports activities but also help meet the demands that artificial intelligence should reshape physical education and health education.”
At the School of Design, children excitedly experienced the game “Music Painting”, which combines the common artistic elements of music and painting and promotes children's capability of aesthetic creation through technical means and artistic exploration activities.
Chen Jinming, an Associate Professor of the School of Design, said: “Music painting education helps children form an aesthetic psychological structure and learn how to grasp the world through multi-sensory experience education.”
In the human-computer collaboration intelligent aesthetic education activity, 8 intelligent robots drew Shanghai comics, Chinese meticulous paintings and works of the famous Western artist Picasso on the scroll. The young audience were absorbed in the robots’ painting and filled the painting scroll with different colors on their own.
The needs for the research and development and application of intelligent education are also reflected in the scientific innovation activities and achievements of university students. Students’ start-up projects displayed in the Intelligence Education Week centered on STEAM education, programming thinking education, which are in combination with VR, programming games, scientific experiments, etc. and achieved remarkable results. The mature applications and products displayed at multiple booths all resulted from the long-term incubation and support of the university's innovation and entrepreneurship platform.
The team of Associate Professor Zhang Changxin from the Faculty of Education provided children with sensory function assessment. By conducting EEG tests on children and using neuroscience methods, the team gave descriptions and explanations for children's sensory functions, and offered suggestions about personalized education.
In addition, the Maternal and Child Health Hospital affiliated with ECNU cooperated with the Faculty of Education to innovate the combination mode of medicine and education. They realized the development of the infant’s ultra-early brain potential through early intervention of the professional system to improve the early development of infants’ exercise, language, cognition, social adaptation and behavior.
Mei Bing, Chair of ECNU’s University Council, said that education is the top priority of people's livelihood, and the integration of intelligence and education is an important means to achieve high-quality and balanced development of education. As a Double First-class university, ECNU will give full play to its discipline advantages and its role as an education center, promote interdisciplinary integration, and take intelligent education as the first strategy for the university’s future development. ECNU is working with people from all walks of life to explore ways to implement high-quality intelligent education in the future.
Mei Bing, Chair of ECNU’s University Council, at Intelligent Education Open Week
Author: Yuan Yiwei
Photo by Wu Xiaolan, Li Zhendong, Wu Chuxiang
Copy editor: Philip Nash
Edior: Yuan Yiwei
