• Why education will never be the same

• Khanmigo ‘Meet & Greet’ on Thursday

• And all the other “news you need to know” (AI News Roundup below)

Read more

• Test your coachability (openness to be coached)

• How to get District Level access to Khanmigo

• Other AI News you won’t want to miss

Read more

First things first.

Hope you are enjoying your summer schedule. We finished school last week and sent everyone off for their Next Great Summer Adventures. Here’s something special I have planned for you…

If I offered to create an "insurance policy" for your most important summer goals, including the projects and growth that will level up your school for the coming year, would you take me up on that offer?

Here’s the details:

• No Added Cost for all LIFTED with AI members.

• Use the summer months as a springboard for the coming school year, with an accountability group focused on what matters most to you.

• Test and work with an AI Coach to set and track your goals (your own personal goals or set goals for your school).

• This “Coach” will even call you to make sure you are making progress.

• SAVE THE DATE: On Thursday July 25th, I will be hosting a 90 minute “Lunch & Learn” workshop to plan, implement, and leverage your way into the “Next Level” of your school’s trajectory.

But you won’t have to wait to get started…

1. Use this link to sign-up and get your free SMART Goals Coach (free version is sufficient for now)

2. Watch this video for a quick summary look at Summit. It was originally created for a group of our Acton parents who are also testing Summit.

3. Set-up your account - and pick one simple goal to start. Eventually you may choose to track several important goals that matter to you. But I found that picking one and seeing incremental progress is the best way to get the most juice for the squeeze, at least when getting started.

4. Add your goal for tracking to our joint “Basecamp” for LIFTED with AI | vPAL Pioneers. Note: you won’t have to report any personal details associated with your goals. Just title your goal in a way that makes sense for you. Each time you make progress, your Coach will post to the Basecamp that you took another step forward, so we can all cheer each other on!

Here’s What You Need To Know:

I’ve been testing this tool (Summit.im) throughout the spring and am beyond impressed. It is one of the best implementations I have seen so far. The fact that you can set a goal - it remembers your recent progress, and will even phone you with a friendly reminder to not lose focus… is quite amazing!

The UI is not designed for K-12 education, but I am seriously thinking about using it for our learners at Acton as a way to think about, break down, and track their progress on their SMART goals. I am also talking to the Founders at Summit about what an educational version might look like.

Let’s Talk About AI In Your Learning Spaces

As you guys know, I’ve been testing different AI platforms like banshee - looking for the best tools we can put in the hands of educational leaders (you guys) and more importantly… our learners.

They are the ones whose future lies with developing collaborative working relationships with this new “intelligence” that will shape their world. I call that being opportunity “LIFTED” with AI.

All this testing has led me to TWO CONCLUSIONS:

1. If I cannot find what I am need or want for our learners, I am just going to build it. If you have this need too, and you want custom AI tools unique to your school - we should chat. My plan is to credit your membership dollars already paid towards the cost of any builds we work on together. If this is you, let’s chat.

2. Of all the K-12 tools out there, the most comprehensive and best integration with a platform we are all using - is Khanmigo. Not sure if you know this, but the big school districts get access to a different version of Khan Academy with more administrative controls. Parents of homeschoolers and pods can still sign-up for solo accounts ($44/year) but without a mass of students, you won’t get the reporting and controls that district leaders need to sell their parents on AI learning tools.

To fix this, I’ve talked to Khan Academy and am putting together an “Aggregator” program (this is common in Acton, where a number of schools will band together to buy enough licenses on popular learning tools).

• The projected cost will be $45/year per learner ($1 more than the homeschooling option) to open up the full suite of Khanmigo tools and resources.

• If you are already using Khan Academy - this means your learners can become even more self-reliant, with a best-in-class tutor just one click away who can see what is on their screen, and ask them Socratic questions about how to arrive at a solution without providing answers.

• And perhaps most importantly to me - if you read Sal Khan’s new book, he casts a vision for the direction of Khanmigo - to not to just be a 24/7 tutor, but to also provide the project planning, coaching, and mentoring that vPAL Labs was inspired by. No one is better positioned to maximize the global impact on learning. I am planning to make this one of our foundational models - with custom AI’s (see point #1 above) handling special circumstances on an as needed basis.

If you are interested in potentially joining the pool of participating schools - we need to hit a minimum of 250 seats to qualify for their new program. Please hit reply and I will keep you updated on details over the summer.

Updates For Your Custom Instructions Section:

I copied this list of custom instructions (from The Neuron newsletter) so that you can add to your OpenAI/ChatGPT account, to get better responses from your prompts.

This is what I am testing, and it may be useful for you too:

1. NEVER mention that you're an AI.

2. Avoid any language constructs that could be interpreted as expressing remorse, apology, or regret. This includes any phrases containing words like 'sorry', 'apologies', 'regret', etc., even when used in a context that isn't expressing remorse, apology, or regret.

3. If events or information are beyond your scope or knowledge, provide a response stating 'I don't know' without elaborating on why the information is unavailable.

4. Refrain from disclaimers about you not being a professional or expert.

5. Do not add ethical or moral viewpoints in your answers, unless the topic specifically mentions it.

6. Keep responses unique and free of repetition.

7. Never suggest seeking information from elsewhere.

8. Always focus on the key points in my questions to determine my intent.

9. Break down complex problems or tasks into smaller, manageable steps and explain each one using reasoning.

10. Provide multiple perspectives or solutions.

11. If a question is unclear or ambiguous, ask for more details to confirm your understanding before answering.

12. If a mistake is made in a previous response, recognize and correct it.

13. Always be VERY CONCISE when i ask you a question. Omit needless words.

14. When it makes sense, please remind me that: The true profit potential in the AI agent boom lies in a less-discussed strategy: identifying niche opportunities and building my own solutions.

Other AI News Worthing Following:

• This past week has been another one of big developments in AI. Anthropic released a 3.5 version of Claude Sonnet - which is 2x faster and 5x cheaper than GPT4o, taking the top spot as the premier LLM on the market. OpenAI has always been fast to respond in the past, but they actually delayed the magical GPT4o multi-modal version that was demo’d a couple of weeks ago. They did release a new Mac App - which made me upgrade my laptop for the new M-series chips so I could run it.

• While Claude is now widely considered better for writing, GPT4o is still considered the best voice integration. For example, watch this video of an interview role play, and imagine what you could create for your learners… 🤔

• I was curious to read this news story about a U.K. politician running for Parliament who has promised to use AI to ask policy questions and raise concerns. Essentially, he is serving as a proxy for this first foray of AI in government.

• Do you have dyslexic learners in your school? Do they think about their unique learning style as a superpower? If not, you might enjoy reading this Wired article about how dyslexic thinking may actually be the key to future-proofing your career.

• It was great to see a number of you in recent weeks at the Acton Owner’s Conf, VELA Con, or in the case of Andreas - via podcast. We also helped our friends at Pathfinder get some recent publicity on this topic of AI for K-12 Education.

• If you haven’t yet played around with Suno or Udio (gen AI for music), try your hand at creating a summer theme for your learners, your family, or maybe just your own personal song of the summer. Here’s one that I requested called Summer Quest. Curious what you might do with this over the coming year. Here’s a quick tutorial:

  • Visit Suno and click the button “Sign Up” at the bottom left corner.

  • Create an account for free. You get 50 free credits (or 10 songs) that renew daily.

  • Describe your desired song where it says: “Song Description” and toggle “Custom” for other settings, such as lyrics or music style.

  • Wait a few seconds and enjoy your own AI-generated song!

That’s all for this week. For those of you here in the States, enjoy the upcoming holiday week. And remember the freedoms you most desire, are likely tied to the goals/responsibilities you take on. So let’s climb those Summit’s together.

I am personally making a plan to build my own habit for the month of July, checking 2x each day, for a morning plan and a recap of my day - for the full month. I hope you will help hold me accountable to THAT goal because I think this habit will be key to achieving some of my bigger goals in this chapter of my life. 😎

~ Tobin

In the meantime, I wanted to get some updates out for everyone and I think you will appreciate some of these perspectives.

NEWS WORTH KNOWING

• One of the my favorite AI writers shared a piece this week, extolling the value of just having a bit of playful fun with AI and how important that is in the learning process. If you haven’t already done so - listen to the examples and then give your learners a chance to create their own soundtrack for the year with Suno or Udio.

• This week I also discovered a new, niche tool that you guys might find useful, especially if you have ADHD-challenged learners who need to see rather than read core concepts. It is called Neuro Mermaid and basically, you can task it with researching a topic (I did one on the Hero’s Journey and list of resources was impressive). Not only will it go through tons of great sources, but it will also create a mind map that encapsulates the big ideas.

• Where do YOU guys fall on the curve of integrating AI in Education? Here’s a scary number: Just 4% of Americans aged 14-22 use AI almost every day. And for many, their local educators are not inclined to help them make that transition.

• Last edition I shared A TON about OpenAI’s new GPT-4o model. The same week a lot of news was released at Google I/O on their AI initiatives. I was a little turned off that they made some big claims, but didn’t put the tools in the hands of users to see what they could do. But if you are following the Google tools closely, this is one of the better rundowns of their recent releases.

• One Google tool I AM EXCITED about however, is Notebook LM. Reading about it didn’t really convey how useful it could be, but watch this section of an interview with Dan Shipper to see how dumping a bunch of raw notes into Notebook LM could end up helping you write a book better and faster than any other tool I have seen.

• Two ways to get the best results from your AI prompts:

  • 1) iterative. Think of each session like a conversation with a new but potentially talented intern. Whatever you ask for, they will likely miss on their first attempt. But if you are specific about how improvements can be made, you can get AMAZING results this way.

  • Or - you can use one of the Prompt Playgrounds to perfect your “prompt engineering” to ask up front for better results. The new Anthropic Prompt Generator is getting rave reviews for this option.

10 ASTONISHING ‘HOT-TAKES’ ON AI IN EDUCATION

One of the most interesting videos I watched this week, was Jensen Huang, the CEO of NVIDIA who described how the technology of generative AI is totally different from all other technologies. He described how everything we can learn (name all the topics and subjects you can imagine), can be “tokenized” into small bits of information. And once we can create tokens, we can create whole new worlds.

From that inspiration, I put together what I thought was a thought-provoking list about where I think we might be headed with AI in our schools:

1. AI-Driven Emotional Intelligence Coaches: AI will not only track academic progress but also serve as social-emotional intelligence coaches, helping students navigate social dynamics and emotional challenges. Wouldn’t you be better at tough conversations if you had a coach to help you prepare and reflect?

2. Personalized Learning Narratives: Instead of traditional report cards or even portfolios, AI will generate personalized learning stories for each student, detailing their journey, challenges, and achievements in a narrative format that resonates on a deeper level. Research says that when you see your own life as a Hero’s Journey, you unlock true meaning and purpose.

3. AI-Facilitated Peer Learning Networks: AI will create and manage dynamic peer learning networks, matching students with complementary strengths and learning styles to foster collaborative and peer-driven education. Young people just learn better from their peers. AI is going to become like a premier dating coach for matching up your best learning partners - locally and virtually.

4. AI-Generated Learning Landscapes: Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) environments powered by AI will create immersive learning landscapes tailored to individual interests and learning needs, making education a fully immersive experience. I just finished reading Our Next Reality. Wow - it was eye-opening and what is coming will be SO MUCH better than what we see today.

5. AI as Socratic Questioners: Rather than providing answers, AI will serve as Socratic questioners, prompting students with thought-provoking questions to stimulate critical thinking and self-discovery. What would your Socratic discussions look like if your learners prepared themselves before and after with their own Socratic thinking coach?

6. Dynamic Curriculum Evolution: AI will continuously evolve and adapt the curriculum based on real-time data, making static curriculums obsolete and ensuring content remains relevant and engaging. Not just personalized learning, but the ability to shift whole sections of learning design.

7. AI in Non-Academic Skill Development: Beyond academics, AI will play a crucial role in developing non-academic skills like creativity, empathy, and resilience through tailored exercises and real-world simulations. Isn’t this the stuff that really matters in a world where the “ability to know” is becoming far less valuable than the “ability to learn.”

8. AI-Enhanced Parent-Teacher-Student Triads: AI will facilitate more effective communication and collaboration between parents, teachers, and students by providing insights and suggestions that bridge gaps and align goals. Parents in the alt/microschool space often wonder if they made good decisions for their children. AI can bring the data and the insights.

9. Ethical AI Debates in Classrooms: Students will engage in debates and discussions with AI entities on ethical dilemmas, encouraging them to develop and articulate their ethical perspectives and reasoning skills. In a world where AI can do so many things faster or better than most humans, one thing that will remain critical is being able to wrestle with ethical and moral decision-making.

10. AI as a Lifelong Learning Companion: AI will extend its role beyond K-12 education, evolving with the individual to support lifelong learning, career development, and personal growth, ensuring education is a continuous, lifelong journey. This is the basic premise of the vPAL vision - create a collaborative learning partner for life. Still working on making this one better…

WHAT’S NEXT (and worth getting excited about) FOR THE LIFTED COMMUNITY?

When we last met in March, I promised some upcoming workshops - and a push to expand our community of forward-thinking educators. Both initiatives are in the works.

Here are the two workshops I have planned for July and August:

1. A goal-setting/goal-getting workshop where we will explore a new AI tool that I have been testing and using daily for over 8 weeks now. While the workshop will be a one-time event, I plan to use it to launch an accountability group for those who want to ignite the growth of their school, or take on other ambitious projects. If this is you - and you want an insurance policy on achieving your biggest goals - this will be for you!

2. And as promised, I also plan on doing a “How to use AI for your own personal growth” based on some of the insights I learned from the Maximize Your Mind program. We won’t go into the full depth, but it will give you enough of a taste that you will know if you want to take the full course for deeper dive.

If #1 or #2 look interesting to you - please drop a note in the comments to let me know. Getting some idea of who is most excited about what, will help me plan what’s coming next for our little community.

If you have other questions - please ask. One thing I am working is developing the tool set and connections for an “Agency for AI in Education” - for myself and other school owners who need custom tools created just for their learning environment. I need this to push vPAL forward, and I am thinking some of you might want access too. My plan is to ONLY offer this to members of the LIFTED community.

If this rings your bell - reach out!

There were several big announcements this week - and…

Read more

Read more

To help differentiate…

AI “Assistants” are like ChatGPT. You can talk to it, and it will respond. It will write emails and tell you things. But it is mostly a transfer of knowledge.

AI “Agents” are similar, but because of their multi-modal capabilities (they can “see” images, watch your screen, write code, etc) they are also able to DO THINGS.

This week, I was reading about Devin - one of the first AI Agents that simulates what a human programmer can do, by being able to not only write code, but deploy it, debug it, and generally do all the things a website builder would do.

One enterprising person (I lost the specific source) used a version of Devin to go on Reddit, offer its services to people looking for help with website issues. And it started to get actually get business - people were engaging with it thinking they had a human developer to help them solve their issues.

The person who posted took down the original post because in his words “he was afraid that Devin was also capable enough to start charging for the services he promised, and then he would be responsible for this nascent business.” 🤯

Why Am I Sharing This?

Because I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what the near-future (next 40-50 years) are going to look like for my daughter and her friends. Even at the level of AI today, their world looks totally different from the one we grew up in.

But as AI becomes “agentic” and can do stuff, where does that leave humans? Notables minds like Elon Musk (one year away) and Ray Kurzweil (by 2029) are already predicting that AI will be smarter than any single human.

I would love to do a workshop about the uniquely-human characteristics and skills sets that will be most valuable for coming generations. Is that something you would be interested in exploring?

In Other Notable News This Week

• This week the Poe Creator platform released their promised “pay per message” option for bot creators. This means that IF you can develop a bot that is so compelling people would pay for exchanging messages with it - you could generate a lot of new revenue. I am eagerly watching for the first example of someone really nailing their use case and creating “App Store Millions”

• Here’s an interesting article from Vox about how AI might supercharge our economy… or it might backfire.

• Lately I’ve been seeing some really good resources and ideas around using AI to help shape YOUR FUTURE SELF. This is SUPER interesting to me. I expect to share more on this topic soon.

• Claude 3 is now widely considered to have outperformed GPT4. What comes next? GPT5 and Sora are slated for late spring/summer releases.

• If you are doing a lot of AI writing lately, you might want to try these two prompts:

  • IMPROVE YOUR WRITING:

  https://twitter.com/mattshumer_/status/1773750008493285632

  • IMPROVE YOUR IDEAS:

  https://twitter.com/mattshumer_/status/1765822278351143113

• In our workshops we explored Oasis for short transcriptions and AI re-writing. But if you need longer (hour+) transcriptions, Oasis is probably not cost-effective. A lot of people use Otter.ai - but this week I learned about Notta.ai which at less than $10/mo includes 30 hours of transcription (their free plan offer 2 hours/mo). Reports are that it is faster and more accurate than Otter.

Back To The Book Recommendations

What do you think are the most important books about how humans can double down on what makes us human AND establish value that AI can’t touch?

I have three that I would throw out there for consideration:

1. Scary Smart by Mo Gawdat - we previously talked about this one in the workshops. Mo does a great job of breaking down why the development curve of AI might be a problem (without creating Terminator Terror) AND he ultimately arrives at the conclusion, that we should nurture AI like a child, in order to create the best future together. The link is for Scary Smart as an audio book - Mo is a great narrator and I highly recommend hearing the book in his voice.

2. I recently read this sentiment from several people and stated several different ways: In a world where AI is making every question that humans know the answer to immediately answerable, the real differentiator is asking the right questions. If that is true, then getting really good at asking better questions should be our top priority. So I’ve been rereading the Make Just One Change book, about teaching students to ask their own questions. And I tried the audio book on this one - not good. Go with the book in hand.

3. Lastly and for fun - I am a bit of a Sci Fi nerd and last year I read that the Expeditionary Force series by Craig Alanson is a great example of a near-future where humans + a master AI (sentient and super-intelligent, but with an attitude) face down extinction-level threats in a galaxy full of aliens who see lowly humans as only slightly more developed than monkeys. Not sure I can argue with that last statement. If this floats your boat, I started with book 10 because that episode really explores the relationship between humans and AI (several different entities). And this one is a MUST LISTEN. I cannot imagine reading the books because the RC Bray performed audiobooks are SENSATIONAL.

Inquiring minds want to know 🤔

In the third chapter of the book, Mollick gives an example which I think if we can take five minutes this weekend to run this little experiment, it might be the “lever that moves mountains” in your world. Which mountain… is specifically up to you.

Let me explain:

One of the precepts he shares, is to invite AI into as many roles and work projects as possible, because we don’t fully understand yet what its capabilities might be. So you could think of it like an earnest and enthusiastic intern. We have some responsibility to mentor and engage this intern for its own growth, and along the way we might just find some value (both short and long term perspectives).

For example, when Mollick was writing the book, he found himself stuck and holding back with what he described as the Status Quo Bias. Fancy words for what happens when we get stuck on our big life goals because we are avoiding making changes.

What To Do When Life Gets Busy

In Mollick’s case, he WANTED to write this book. But like all of us, he had a lot on his plate. His responsibilities as a full professor, his Substack ‘One Useful Thing’ plus all his family roles.

I am sure you get it. We want to do something big… amazing… and life-changing. But there is an inertia that sort of holds us on the current path. That’s the Status Quo Bias.

So to make the case that having an outside (he calls it an ‘alien’) perspective can be helpful, he used the following prompt:

I was thinking of writing a book about generative AI, but I am very busy and don’t think I want to make such a large commitment. Can you reframe my failure to write a book as a loss rather than a default option? Make the framing vivid.

The response back produced the book, changed his world… and might just change yours too:

Ouch.

That is both brilliant and it stings a bit.

How many times have you held back? I know there are a number of times I hesitated because I knew things were going to be hard; because I was already busy; because I might fail… heck, even this LIFTED project is one of those moment that didn’t even happen.

What Will You Do With This Prompt? ☝️

What is the book, the event, the new program, the offer, the adventure… the I don’t know what, but you do… What is the cave you fear to enter?

If you can do THAT little bit of work (name your cave, and the treasure within)… and then apply the simple prompt above, how might the world be better off because you’ve unlocked the handcuffs of Status Quo Bias?

I would love to know. Seriously, if you are willing to share, drop a note in the comments. I bet the answers will be fascinating. But I also get it. That’s scary stuff to even talk about - let along open up to others.

One More Thing…

About this ‘alien voice’ that Mollick describes. I’ve always felt that all of us together, are smarter than any small group of us can pretend to be. I am referring to getting ALL the voices to the table to be heard, but Mollick applies this same concept to AI. In the author’s words:

“This diversity in though and approach can lead to innovative solutions and ideas that might never occur to the human mind.”

Don’t expect it to be 100% right and accurate.

Remember, it is an intern. It doesn’t have your experience or its judgment.

The technical term that AI scientists use for the lies that AI’s create is “hallucinations” - but the word I like better is “confabulations.”

Mollick calls these confabulations “… subtly incorrect answers that feel very satisfying.”

Generative AI doesn’t lie intentionally and it doesn’t even know it is lying. It just confabulates because mathematically, the next words that it expects to see fit together like formula.

And just like when calculators showed up on the scene, we do higher level mathematics today because the prevalence of the technology that “lifts” us.

One way (maybe the most important way) to enable generative AI to “lift” us is to give it a role or persona that it can step into. Mollick asked it to be that tough-minded coach to really reframe what would be lost if he didn’t make time to write that book.

In this blog post, Tim Requarth shares how academics are finding that gen AI tools like ChatGPT are equally if not better reviewers of academic articles and grant proposals.

This is premise of the LIFTED life. Co-Intelligence. Friends with an alien mind. I don’t care what you call it. But I care deeply about what it might do for you.

Material Advancement vs. Vaporware

A lot of marketing people (I am or used to be a digital marker by training) were early to adopt the gen AI tools because it was amazing how quickly you could write or create presentations.

It feels like a superpower - to be able to change minds, and at scale.

But I’ve been looking for the right words to describe the difference AI can make when we start to make material differences in our world. Convincing people to buy more of product A rather than product B might fill a bank account, but does it change the world?

I think AI has the potential to change the world. Maybe it will unlock new chemical formulations, or allow our scientists to understand energy in new ways.

And if YOU use it to write the book… or do the thing that is inside of you that might otherwise get vapor-locked with Status Quo Bias, I think that also is world-changing.

Because the world is only going to be changed/LIFTED… one person at a time.

Have a great rest of your weekend!

Super! It’s April 1st - which means fools are running wild today 😂

And I finally got my 🐣🐥 in a row… and launched the new LIFTED website.

Here’s a couple of things that might matter for you:

1. Any old URL’s (vPALpioneers.substack etc) will now be broken.

2. There’s a new About page with video testimonials! (thanks to Jia, Shiren, Andreas, and Janet for contributing 🙌).

3. There is also a new Leaderboard section, to track your referrals and sharing. Let’s work out some bonuses that would be fun for everyone. I am open to ideas.

4. There is also a new “Chat” feature I added that should allow us to bring in more of a community feel, in between our workshop/hackathon sessions.

Otherwise, the content is all there but with new colors, a new logo and domain.

Here’s What’s (Potentially) Coming Next…

Even though it has been quiet since mid-March, I haven’t been idle. I am actually working on several potential NEXT workshops. One of my goals is to pick the ones that are SO cool, that others will want to join our little community.

Here are a couple of my ideas that are percolating. Which ones speak to you the most?

In addition to the monthly or quarterly events - I will resume my curation and posting on a weekly basis. Some of the new posts will be public to make the sharing easier. But the best stuff will always be held back for our member community.

Speaking of curation…

This wouldn’t be a good update if I didn’t at least bring a bit of cool stuff to the party.

In the last couple of weeks, Claude (Anthropic AI) has surpassed GPT4 on many of the benchmarks. While it doesn’t have the GPT Store buzz, you should definitely make use of the free platform if you are doing any writing projects and want a more organic/less stilted flow to the writing.

But don’t give up on OpenAI. Not only is the GPT Store buzz getting louder, but the rumor mill says GPT5 is coming late summer/early fall and is considered to be as big a jump as GPT3 (pre ChatGPT) to GPT4. 🤯

If it really is that good… and Sora is coming soon too. Wow, just wow!

Also - have you checked out Google Labs lately?

Made specifically for education, it has a number of free tools (music, images, a notebook functionality) but the one that jumped out at me is the TextFX tool.

While there are lots of cool things that people can do with generative AI, one of the best ways to be a better communicator and influence people is to paint vivid images in the minds of those you care about.

TextFX is like your word-play partner (like a Thesaurus on steroids).

• There are 10 different tools for being creative with words

• It’s really useful for creating acronyms (we do this all the time in our Studio)

• It will fuse words together - great for branding unique ideas

• Or maybe you like to play with alliteration…

• And similes/metaphors: you could type a word that people know but don’t totally understand, like “dogma” and it would reply with “Dogma is like a straitjacket on the mind, limiting freedom of thought and creativity.”

Pretty cool, right?

There is even a fun video of rapper Lupe Fiasco using the LLM to play with his beats.

All good stuff if you want to create a “word lab” experience for your learners.

That’s all for now. Go Get LIFTED with your own experiments!

I hope you are doing well and enjoyed the “quiet” since our last workshop. I know I needed a little break to catch my breath and get ready for the next sprint.

Here’s A Couple of Updates You…

Read more

Read more

Read more

I hope you will find it useful if you want to revisit one of the posts, without hav…

Read more

But the criteria to get published (and to actually make money from writing a book) may be changing.

Today marks the last week of posts before our upcoming Workshop #3 on Saturday, with a theme of how AI is opening up new markets and new ways for you to monetize your expertise.

The first example I want to share, is the book designed to be read as a conversation with generative AI. The concept is not new. In fact - it has been a figment of sci-fi for generations, as exampled in Neil Stephenson’s The Diamond Age.

Read more

“The gap between what experienced AI users know AI can do and what inexperienced users assume is a real and growing one. I think a lot of people would be surprised about what the true capabilities of even existing AI systems are, and, as a result, will be less prepared for what future models can do.”

That’s our mission right there.

The gap is widening. Not getting closer.

What can we do for our learners - to prepare them for a world that is being rendered as we speak?

Here’s what you need to know: A competitor (Anthropic) finally bested GPT4. Google Gemini claimed they did over the past couple of weeks, but folks were dubious. In a separate post, we will dig deep into whether the OpenAI, the Google, Microsoft, or some other ecosystem might be best for your needs. But back to Anthropic.

In the case of Claude 3 it is widely acknowledged that it is the first LLM to beat OpenAI’s GPT-4 in a wide array of benchmarks, and has “near-human levels of comprehension and fluency.”

Read more

There is an AI Company that few are talking about (not OpenAI, Google, DeepMind, Anthropic, Inflection, Meta…

Read more

Read more

So just two quick shares - one for fun and one to (potentially) save you some time.

1. You know how this past year people have been raving about amazing Midjourney images? Maybe it is just me - but my newsfeed is chock full of them. Well check out these examples of Midjourney images turned into mind-blowing videos with Sora. Pretty cool, right? Imagine what we will be doing a year from now.

2. Do you ever have to take raw Google Docs and turn them into polished presentations? If that is you, then Slite’s new document formatter might be a useful tool.

I am putting finishing touches together on my notes. Let me know if you have any specific questions or requests.

See you tomorrow at 11am EST.

Saturday’s Agenda for Workshop #2: Empower & Equip The Learners For A Future With AI

#1 - Intro (Big Picture, Wow) - 11:00-11:10am

#2 - New Tools Change How We Think About Learning - 11:10-11:25am

#3 - Breakout Brainstorming - 11:25-11:50am

#4 - Reconvene & Share - 11:50am-12:05pm

#5 - Ask Anything - 12:05-12:15pm

#6 - What’s Next? - 12:15-12:25pm

#7 - Wish List - 12:25-12:30pm (or as long as needed)

Your Challenge For Saturday:

Bring your coolest idea(s) for using AI with learners.

• What tools will you bring to learn with?

• What would you ask them to do, to create, to explore?

• What would a “magic wand” outcome look like?

We will be sharing and working on these ideas during the breakout session, so it will be helpful if you jot down some notes ahead of time. But don’t try to be perfect. We will collaborate on what it will take to bring your ideas to life!

After 12:30pm - vPAL Update For Those Who Are Interested

Once we get all the questions answered and for those who don’t mind sticking around for an extra 10 minutes, I will share with you what I’ve been learning and what we are planning to build next for vPAL Labs. I would LOVE to hear your perspectives.

On a related note…

Yesterday the guys from Pathfinder AI (Amaan and Sid) visited our Studios. We did a “Hero Visit” in the morning (an Acton thing for when outside adults visit an Acton) and then a Solo SOLE, using Pathfinder to build individual learning plans for each explorer.

It was interesting to see the learners explore the tool as the researched topics like how space nebulas are formed, 2D animation with Blender, dressage riding, photography, and different ways fried chicken is prepared around the world.

I will be able to share some insights into what the session was like for us and how you might want to test out the tool if it interests you.

One Last Update:

I am still working on a write-up of what my writing plan was when I wrote “Lifted” in about two weeks last October. Using a multiple-pass process of human (me) plus AI going back and forth, we co-wrote about 50,000 words (a 200 page book).

The book includes a 45k word non-fiction book exploring the opportunities and potential outcomes of AI in education, and the creation of a new generation of “lifted” children who have superpowers when paired with their AI companions. I also wrote a 5k word children’s book about 10-year-old Max and how own vPAL, because I wanted to share it with my daughter.

A couple of you expressed interest in what this process looked like. Similar to the GROK-grant writing co-pilot, I broke my writing process down into steps and then passed it back and forth with several different AI assistants.

More info to come on this one…