Why this math professor is putting actors in classrooms
Po-Shen Loh is a man on a mission. A professor of mathematics at Carnegie Mellon university, in Pennsylvania, he believes that reimagining the way we teach can help future-proof youngsters in a world where AI poses a growing threat to job security.
Last month, at the Human Capability Initiative conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, he delivered a talk titled “What if Broadway Actors and Math Olympians could Transform Teaching?”
“Today, most standard homework can be done using ChatGPT,” he told the audience. “We need think about what we’re teaching our students if all the things they are learning can be done by AI.”
His solution — partnering thespians with math prodigies — might seem an unlikely formula for shaking up education, but Loh believes today’s students need to learn collaborative problem solving, creativity and communication — and key to this is engaging them with math.
Loh’s way of doing that is by creating Zoom classes that feel more like social media than traditional learning. And he has a secret weapon. “We’re the first people in the history of education to put a professional actor in every single classroom,” he told the audience.
Rethinking “the Zoom experience”
Loh, who spent a decade coaching the US Team for the International Mathematical Olympiad, has crafted a virtual education platform for nine to 13-year-olds. Called live.poshenloh.com, the platform employs exceptionally talented US high school students to teach mathematics via livestream.
Loh came up with the idea during the pandemic, when livestream learning became commonplace, but not necessarily engaging for students.
“Most people had the experience that a Zoom math class was very effective at putting children to sleep,” he told CNN. “I started to think about why these classes struggled to keep people engaged when social medias such as TikTok and Twitch were so successful. That’s when the idea to rethink the entire Zoom experience came to me.”
The students chosen to teach classes are partnered with professional actors, comedians and theater-majors who watch the lessons and provide real-time feedback to make sure their delivery is energetic and entertaining. Part of the screen shows geometry diagrams or equations, as well as live chat from the students, who share their answers and ideas about the questions being discussed.
Loh says the response to the classes has been overwhelmingly positive. He recalls one particularly enthusiastic middle-schooler saying, “Every time I leave that class it’s like I’ve had a spiritual awakening in the domain of algebra!”
The classes are open to anyone and cost $20 per hour, although there is also a scholarship program. Around 2,000 students have been taught through the platform over the past two years, by 100 high schoolers.
Now, Loh hopes to inspire a generation of young learners to interact with one another, help others and build relationships with their peers. He only wishes that the idea had come to him sooner. “I could’ve saved a lot of years” Loh said. “I didn’t realize that mathematics and the performing arts could harmonize together in such a wonderful way.”
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