Like many people, I am wondering what changes AI will bring. More specifically, I wonder what human skills will be most valuable in a future where computers do an increasing number of our routine tasks.
I recently observed a school assembly where a pupil presented by reading out content from their phone. The pupil did not appear to have prepared or practised delivering their presentation to an audience, and therefore it came across as ‘robotic reading out’.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t very engaging to listen to, and it occurred to me that a computer could have literally done the same thing!
If only this pupil had had more opportunities to learn and practise oracy skills for presentational talk. They could have created a human connection with their audience, built rapport and engaged others in thinking about the assembly topic. These are skills that are much harder for computers to replicate – and therefore well worth developing.
As a society, let’s put our energy into learning the skills that humans do best.
