Tomorrow’s biggest lesson: motivation

With the workplace of today evolving at a whirlwind pace, we’re confronted with the constant challenge of adapting to keep up. But in an era of rapid technological advancement, how do we prepare the workers of tomorrow for the future they will face?

Technology plays an increasingly dominant role in how we work, but it also offers huge potential in how we learn, and in the classroom of the future personal motivation and soft skills will be critical to educational achievement, as well as a primary goal of the education system.

The collaborative classroom of the future

New research by Epson into the impact of key technologies on the education sector gathered the opinions of 17 leading thinkers on the topic, as well as testing their hypotheses with over 7,000 European business leaders and employees.

Based on their collected perspective, the classroom of 2025 will benefit from applications of new technologies such as interactive projectors, augmented reality, and 3D printers. For example, our study shows 53 percent of respondents believe that AR will be widely used for practical experimentation in the future, offering increased safety and lower costs, as well as reducing the need for specialised experimental spaces.

This shift is expected to change the relationship between teachers and students, with teachers taking on the role of educational guides or life coaches, while students are more responsible for their own learning.

Sixty-two percent of the Europeans surveyed believe that this system, supported by collaborative learning technology, will level the playing field for students by enabling each student to learn in their own way.

The structure of lessons is also predicted to change as a result of technology, with 67 percent of respondents believing classrooms will alter to become workshops for collaboration.

Motivated for meta learning

Students will increasingly have a more proactive role to play in achieving their own learning outcomes. According to 57 percent of respondents, meta-learning, in which students are far more responsible for their own educational processes, will become the new norm. In support of this, 55 percent of respondents believe it will have a positive impact on the education sector as a whole.

The positive news is that only 33 percent of respondents believe that the motivation of students will be a threat to education quality over the next 10 years.

The reality is that for this cultural shift to happen, educational bodies must implement certain checks and balances. It is imperative that emphasis is placed on training students to become ‘self-starters’ and accountable for their own learning progress, for example, by ensuring soft skill training is an integral part to the learning process.

Enabling the workers of tomorrow means stressing the importance of motivation today, and providing the appropriate educational tools to empower them to adapt in an ever-changing world.

Want to know more?

The full report has all the insights, you can download it here: