At the ALDinHE Conference the affordances of Google’s Teachable Machine were explored in a workshop co-run by Dr Mike Hobbs (Anglia Ruskin University) and Professor Debbie Holley (Bournemouth University)
In their future careers students will increasingly encounter machine-learning systems, so it is appropriate to develop a deeper understanding to demystify this technology as the new ‘Deep Learning’ approach as outlined in the MIT technology Review https://www.technologyreview.com/s/513696/deep-learning.
Our workshop offered an entry level taster, ( https://teachablemachine.withgoogle.com/) where participants used webcams to capture three actions such as waving, facial expression or hand signals. The machine is trained to recognise these and then plays an associated video, sound or speech clip.
Feedback included suggestions on co-creating collaborative resources with students; using the machine as a means of capturing reflective input and output and as an effective way of embedding soft skills.
the teachable machine workshop – attended by CEL Technology Enhanced Theme leader Dr Ann Luce (far right)