(TNND) — An education expert is calling on schools to teach students “soft skills” that machines can’t replicate, so kids can compete in tomorrow’s workforce reshaped by generative artificial intelligence.
Jennifer Steele, a former K-12 teacher who is now an education professor at American University, said that people skills are likely to become even more in demand by companies as AI replaces some of the creative and analytical work people are currently doing in isolation.
Steele said soft skills should be a vital part of education, even for kids who are years away from joining the workforce
“There’s an economic as well as psychological reason for teachers to be emphasizing these skills,” she said.
It’s not that soft skills aren’t taught in schools now.
But with many schools issuing Chromebooks to students, Steele said an overreliance on screen-based learning could imperil core skill development that can help kids succeed as adults.
“When I first started thinking about the implications of AI for the workforce, I was defining soft skills in terms of the ability to collaborate with others and work in groups,” she said. “But I think it is more than that, because it’s also the ability to monitor your own emotional states and monitor your own learning. So, it’s metacognitive skills, intrapersonal skills and interpersonal skills.”
AI might be able to do a task, but it can’t do so with the bedside manner of another human being.
LinkedIn career experts previously identified soft skills, such as communication and relating to other people, as important in today’s competitive jobs market.
Steele said schools can weave soft skills development into traditional subjects, such as math and reading.
AI is threatening to reduce job opportunities in even cognitively demanding but isolated work, Steele said.
And she believes people – customers and potentially businesses – will be willing to pay a premium for a human interface as AI takes on more tasks.
Socio-emotional learning is particularly important in young children, she said.
The focus should shift more toward complex problem-solving for high schoolers.
And Steele said schools should ensure students learn foundational math and reading skills, even if they can rely on technology to get the right answer.
Teaching soft skills is a tougher challenge for schools than teaching hard skills, she said.
Soft skills are fixed personality traits to some extent.
But that doesn’t mean schools shouldn’t try and help kids learn soft skills, she said.
“We also often think of math or reading as innate. And when we think of these things as innate, we abdicate our responsibility as educators,” Steele said. “Because, of course, it’s true, some kids are quicker with humor. Some kids are more social. Some kids are quicker with math and computer programming. But the point is not to say, ‘Oh well, you’re a programmer. We’re going to teach you to be a programmer. You’re funny. We’re going to teach you to be a comedian.’ It’s to teach kids that everything that doesn’t come naturally to you is something that you can learn, and there are advantages to learning it. Because that will help you in many domains, especially in this new economy where kids, when they become adults, are going to have to be really flexible and adaptive.”