by Andres Krohn

1. Conversational Interfaces as ‘Frictionless
Adoption Paths’ to Institution-Wide
Technology-Enhanced Teaching
Anders Krohn, Co-founder and CEO, Aula
@anders_krohn
anders@aula.education

2. “…a more technology-enhanced
approach to teaching…”
University of Oxford
Digital Education Strategy, 2016
A Fundamental Trend in Education

3. • Community is not reflected in digital spaces.
• Active and research-driven technology-enhanced learning
happens in pockets of innovation, not institution-wide.
• Educational technology does not reflect the desired
‘graduate attributes’. For example, with respect to
collaboration, creativity, knowledge sharing, etc.
The Digital Student Experience Challenges Facing
Universities

4. Learning Management Systems
“…successful in enabling the
administration... Less so in enabling
learning...”
EDUCAUSE and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,
April 2015
@anders_krohn or http://bit.ly/whatwearereading

5. The Learning Management System is the Elephant
in the Room
• 2014 ECAR Survey of more than 90,000 students and
faculty shows a clear trend:
‘user satisfaction is highest for basic LMS features
and lowest for features designed to foster
collaboration and engagement.’
• The move towards ‘Parallel LMS’
…but ‘having staff friends is just ‘weird’’ (‘A Next-
Generation Digital Learning Environment for UCL’)

6. What went Wrong?

7. What went Wrong?
• Q1: Find examples of consumer
software which is usable, but
powerful (i.e. upper right).
What are the core components?
• Q2: In light of this and
previous slides what
inspiration can learning
infrastructure draw from
consumer products?

8. From Digitisation of Administration to
Technology-Enhanced Teaching

9. ‘Conversational’ Means Powerful and Intuitive -
Technologically and Pedagogically

13. Implications - Thoughts on ‘Cognitive Load’ and
affordances

14. Aula - A ‘Conversational’ Alternative to
Learning Management Systems.

15. “I’m having a GREAT time with
Aula. Really enjoying the
streamlined simplicity of it.”
“The simplicity of Aula is wonderful.
The interface is clean, and every
function is easy to maneuver.”
“I absolutely love it. I love its
clean simplicity.”
“It’s great to have a space where
students feel empowered to share
stuff.”
Pegram Harrison
Fellow in Entrepreneurship
Saïd Business School
University of Oxford
Student Survey
MIT
Steve Ramsay
Center for Digital Research in the
Humanities University of Nebraska-
Lincoln
Janine Debaise
Instructor in Writing and Literature at
SUNY-ESF
Proved the point with 200+ pilot classes

16. Anders Krohn
Co-founder & CEO
+44 (0) 7512 240611
anders@aula.education