Technology has intervened in every sector including education. With the innovation taking place in the technological sphere, the state of affairs of the world higher education system is at the brink of facing several affirmative changes.

It is predicted that technology is going to be a standout performer in the education sector with facilities like content distribution, delivery, and student assessment.

These are known as EdTech Trends and the emerging trends in the educational technology are bound to help the higher education by making it more dynamic, to the point and applicable. Scope of education technology is to increase as the announcement of the recent union budget points to the allotment of INR 99,300 crore for the education sector and INR 3000 crore for the skill development for the duration of 2020-2021.

Higher education institutions are going to implement cloud-based technologies for managing students’ relationship with the management (CRM), learning management systems (LMS) in addition to assessment management. This is where the importance of educational technology hides, which is going to take over disguised manual labor and make the education process trouble-free for students.

Intervention of EdTech in the higher education sector at the students learning level and the administrative level denote the objectives of educational technology. The nature and types of educational technology which are likely to overshadow manual learning process are listed below –

• Video-Based Learning –

​In a recent study by Cisco suggested that by 2020 internet traffic for education will rise up due to consumption of video-based learning. With more than 2.3 billion people are glued to the screen of their learning devices for education and entertainment. Students are now preferring to spend time watching interesting learning videos instead of reading long boring paragraphs.

As a matter of fact, this has proven to be beneficial. The retention rate of learning is more in the students studying from video-based learning modes. New land technologies like smart Televisions and Android-powered televisions are increasing video consumption and creating uninterrupted craze for learning.

Production of videos and their distribution have become cost-efficient and the interruption of video creation and video editing tools are making workflow of higher education content makers easier. Classroom-based videos, Educational Topic-Based Videos and Technology-Based Videos with screenshots and images along with perfectly stated description is what simplifying learning not only at the higher education level but at the grassroots level also.

If you miss live session, you get the option to download and watch later. Don’t worry about the doubt clearing sessions, you will get that at the FAQs. This process has ensured learning via videos to be repetitive. Some of the education content providers distribute written contents along with the videos for hassle-free learning.

• Blockchain Technology –

​It serves as a framework for the evergrowing cryptocurrency market, collaborates and secures data exchange opportunities for the organizations also. The security measure adopted by blockchain technology is unique and is difficult to hack. Furthermore, blockchain is stepping towards the higher education sector for student data sharing at various universities for exchange programme, course exchange modules, data exchange for a scholarship with authority, student academic data sharing for placement purposes.

• Online Assessment –

​Assessment of students’ examination performance is one of the most important points of the higher education system. Shifting from regular pen-paper examination mode, online exams are there to help the institutes in automation and simplification of the examination patterns including the entire evaluation process. Online invigilation is also in routes with these. Adding to the benefits, online assessment is helping in accelerating the total time taken for the evaluation process. Impartial evaluation is what makes the process more sought after. Software implementing the machine learning and artificial intelligence algorithms for checking the theory answers is almost cent percent efficient.

• Learn At Your Own Pace –

​Some of the universities have started online courses and students are needed to enroll in a bunch of courses for every semester. One benefit of this process is it has allowed students to study at their own pace. Regular teaching is not involved in this process and students can grip over the conceptual learning through online and personalized learning processes. Students with access to online learning modes are able to download the recorded lectures and partake in live chat sessions sitting at any location.

• Artificial Intelligence in Education –

​Artificial intelligence is predicted to take space of a lot of headlines this year. Supposed implementation like facial recognition for attendance and security measures will be a serious contribution of AI in higher education. AI can also help in invigilation process during classroom examination. Moreover, students’ performance can also be measured using data analytics algorithms.

• Students’ Data Analysis –

​With the help of machine learning or analytics, data analysis for higher education might become easier. Breaking free from biased evaluation will help the higher education sector to become more transparent. Students will get rightful analysis of their performance.

• Virtual Reality –

​Along with AI, virtual reality is gaining stature of being an efficient technology that costs minimum. Virtual reality in science is helping in practical learning. Gamification learning modules using virtual reality is another concept on the way of becoming famous in the higher education arena. Students will get more interest in learning with merge of education and entertainment. VR will result in better education content. Again by learning via VR will help students in knowledge retention.

• Internet of Things –

​Already IoT has maximized the performance of sectors like automation and control. And now IoT is on the verge of intervening in the education sector. Machine Learning itself uses this technology for face detection and monitoring students’ vehicles. IoT will be able to trace down the total time taken by a student to complete a particular assignment and according to the result it would provide useful viewpoints.

• Chatbots –

​It is an interesting innovation by the technology industry that has the ability to chat with real humans in live chat sessions. Chatbots resolve queries via website or mobile application in the blink of an eye. Chatbot integration can happen in FAQs, articles and blogs of the education sector on a 24*7 basis.

• Podcasting –

​It is going to be the transmitter of the current and coming generations. Podcasting industry is taking channels on plenty of devices of Apple and Google. There are many educational channels which are live on the podcast. It is the newest of ways for acquiring knowledge and is best suited for visually impaired students.