Sesame Workshop and IBM Team Up to Test AI-Powered Teaching Method
Sesame Workshop, the non-profit organization behind the beloved “Sesame Street” children’s program, has joined forces with IBM to develop an innovative vocabulary learning app powered by AI. This app is designed to adapt to a child’s current reading level and vocabulary range, intelligently adjusting as their skills improve.
This collaboration is part of a three-year partnership between IBM and Sesame Workshop, announced last year, to develop a series of cognitive apps, games, and educational toys. The vocabulary learning app is the first outcome of this partnership.
The app has undergone a pilot trial with over 150 students in Gwinnett County Public Schools in Georgia, one of the top urban school districts in the US. The app utilizes Sesame Street characters, educational videos, and word games to enhance vocabulary development.
Teachers can monitor students’ progress in real-time through a secure dashboard, allowing them to tailor lessons and curriculum to individual needs. The app uses adaptive assessments to personalize learning experiences, focusing on specific words and areas requiring attention.
The pilot program, which involved collecting 18,000 assessments over two weeks, showed promising results. Students demonstrated an improvement in vocabulary, learning words typically considered above their grade level, such as “arachnid,” “amplify,” “camouflage,” and “applause.”
While the app is still in its early stages, the feedback from the Gwinnett pilot will inform the development of a new version, which will be introduced to more schools in an expanded pilot this fall.
This project exemplifies the growing trend of using adaptive learning techniques and personalized instruction to enhance education. Sesame Workshop, with its long history of utilizing media and technology to improve learning, sees this AI-powered app as a promising new channel for learning opportunities both in and out of the classroom.
