By 2050, education will look radically different than it does now, according to psychologist and social scientist Howard Gardner — the originator of the theory of multiple intelligences — and Anthea Roberts, a visiting professor at Harvard Law School and founder and CEO of the AI tool Dragonfly Thinking.

    Gardner, speaking during a forum Wednesday at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, called AI as fundamental a change to education as the world had seen in 1,000 years — and even said it may render obsolete many of the forms of mind he is famous for describing. “The need to have everybody in the class doing the same thing, being assessed in the same way, will seem totally old-fashioned,” he said.

    The forum, titled “Thinking in an AI-Augmented World,” took place in Longfellow Hall and was hosted by Martin West, academic dean and Henry Lee Shattuck Professor of Education. “AI is already shaping the future of education in ways that everyone in the sector, from policymakers and leaders to teachers, parents, and students, needs to understand,” West said.

    Gardner and Roberts offered distinct perspectives of an AIaugmented education system.

    In Gardner’s view, by about 2050, every child would need a few years of schooling in the Three R’s: “Reading, ’riting, ’rithmetic, and a little bit of coding,” he said. After that, teachers who functioned more as coaches would expose students to activities that would challenge their thinking, expose them to ideas, and guide them toward professions that excite them. “I don’t think going to school for 10 or 15 years as we’ve done it makes sense,” said Gardner, the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Research Professor of Cognition and Education.

    Roberts offered another vision. Where previously knowledge production was “the actor on the stage, the athlete on the field, the writer of the book,” the next generation must be trained to orchestrate a team of AIs. “You become the director of the actor, you become the coach of the athlete, and you become the editor of the writer,” she said. “It requires actually having very strong faculties in terms of how you’re engaging.”

    Gardner said artificial intelligence has him rethinking some of his previous ideas on essential cognitive abilities. Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences, first published in the 1983 book “Frames of Mind,” outlined distinct types of intellectual competency: logical-mathematical, linguistic, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, and intrapersonal.

Source: https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2025/09/how-ai-could-radically-changeschools-by-2050/