With the support of 5G, the education industry is ushering in intelligent transformation

In 2020, my country's 5G network construction has been fully launched. 5G is a key link in the construction of new infrastructure. On the one hand, as a representative of the new generation of information technology, 5G is the carrier of a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation; on the other hand, as a general technology, 5G empowers all fields of the economy and society and helps the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries. According to the forecast of the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, from 2020 to 2025, 5G will drive related investment in some vertical industries by about 0.5 trillion yuan.

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Looking back at the history of mobile communication technology and the development of education in my country, in the 3G era, mobile networks entered the field of education and mobile learning came into being; the 4G network ushered in the era of mobile Internet, online education developed comprehensively, and the process of distance education accelerated. The 5G era will fundamentally change the current education model. Especially under the influence of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the postponement of the opening of primary and secondary schools, the closure of offline training, and the Ministry of Education’s "stop classes but not stop learning" policy have increased the acceptance of online education, and 5G+ smart education has been accelerated. As 5G network coverage gradually improves, 5G will play a greater role in innovating teaching methods, balancing educational resources, expanding learning channels, improving teaching quality, improving the assessment system, and realizing intelligent campus management, helping to build a new smart education ecosystem.

5G empowers the intelligent transformation of education

5G+ distance education: balanced educational resources. Affected by historical and objective factors, the imbalance of urban and rural educational resources is a realistic problem facing my country's education sector. As early as 2014, the Ministry of Education and five other departments jointly issued the "Implementation Plan for Building an Effective Mechanism for Expanding the Coverage of High-quality Educational Resources by Using Informatization", which clearly stated that "through the construction of an effective mechanism for expanding the coverage of educational resources by using informatization, we will achieve full coverage of broadband networks in schools of all levels and types, the co-construction and sharing of high-quality digital educational resources, and the comprehensive and in-depth integration of information technology and education and teaching, gradually narrowing the gap between regions, urban and rural areas, and schools, and promoting educational equity."

In the 3G/4G era, due to the limitations of Internet speed and bandwidth, it was difficult to achieve an "immersive" scene at a long distance. The theoretical transmission rate of 5G can reach 10Gbit/s (100 times that of 4G), and it has ultra-low end-to-end latency, making remote high-definition live interactive classrooms possible. In the future, it can completely break the limitations of geographical space and allow students across the country to share high-quality courses. In 2019, with the support of Guangdong Mobile, Guangzhou No. 6 Middle School and Liwan District Shamian Primary School used 5G+ dual-teacher classrooms to carry out synchronous teaching with Bijie National Middle School, Bijie No. 6 Primary School, and Bijie Jinsha County No. 3 Primary School in Guizhou, so that students far away in remote mountainous areas have the opportunity to receive courses from key schools in Guangzhou, helping to balance the development of educational resources.

5G+XR: Innovative teaching methods. AR/VR has been in the public eye for several years, but it is still in a relatively early stage. With the support of 5G, the VR industry has truly transformed from the incubation period to rapid development. The interweaving and integration of 5G+XR is very likely to completely change the way people perceive the world, and will also upgrade the existing online education model. AR/VR applications will give full play to the advantages of 5G super bandwidth. 5G ultra-low latency can effectively reduce the dizziness caused by virtual device imaging, making 5G+XR+ education possible. In July 2019, China Mobile supported teachers in Beijing and Shenzhen to give an open class "The Secret of the Rainbow" to 25 students through 5G+ holographic projection technology. Through holographic technology, famous teachers were sent to "students' eyes" 1:1, allowing students in Shenzhen to enjoy real, non-stuttering, and low-latency interactive teaching with students in Beijing. In addition, for teaching scenarios that are difficult to explain, 5G+XR can be used to create interactive teaching scenarios, mobilizing students' multiple senses such as vision, hearing, and kinesthetics to participate in course learning, making abstract concepts and theories more intuitive and vivid in front of students, thereby improving classroom efficiency.

5G+ Smart Campus: Intelligent Campus Management. In addition to the imbalance of educational resources, campus safety hazards are another major problem in the field of education. In recent years, the impact of student accidental injury risks on education has become increasingly serious, and the task of school safety management is arduous. In 2019, focusing on the safety of teachers and students in schools, the Ministry of Education and five other departments formulated the "Opinions on Improving the Safety Accident Handling Mechanism to Maintain the Education and Teaching Order of Schools", aiming to maintain the teaching order of schools. In order to further improve the level of school safety prevention, on September 6, 2019, the General Office of the Ministry of Education issued the "Notice on Further Strengthening the Construction of Campus Safety Prevention Facilities in Compulsory Education Schools", which made clear arrangements for the construction of school safety prevention facilities. In view of the diversity and complexity of current campus safety accidents, 5G+ Smart Campus will use high-definition cameras, sensors and other IoT terminals, combined with ICT technologies such as face recognition, artificial intelligence, big data, and cloud computing, to achieve digital, intelligent, and efficient campus management.

The development of 5G+ smart education needs to go through four stages

According to the "5G+Smart Education White Paper" released by China Mobile, the development of 5G+Smart Education will go through the following stages.

5G initial application stage: Currently in the stage of 5G proposal and initial application, there is a lack of standards for various network applications and integration under 5G. It is necessary to explore ways to integrate 5G networks and traditional networks, and at the same time explore standards for 5G education applications.

5G standard development maturity stage: Within 1 to 2 years, 5G will become a mature technology, relying on its high speed and low latency characteristics to promote the development of basic services in the education field, such as improving the efficiency of high-definition video transmission; relying on its large bandwidth characteristics to support more massive data transmission, initial exploration of interactive applications in interactive classrooms will become possible.

Maturity of 5G education network: After various 5G terminals mature, a complete education service network based on different teaching, research, education management and other scenarios will be established to meet the business needs in the education field. The network has powerful situational awareness, data processing and analysis capabilities, and can provide adaptive services for different users.

5G supports the transformation of education models: This transformation is the ultimate goal of 5G+ education development, which is based on the improvement of the 5G education network environment. When the above network is built, the basic model of education and teaching will also face changes, promoting a large-scale improvement in teaching efficiency.

Two major factors restrict the development of 5G+ smart education

At the beginning of 2020, the opening of primary, secondary and high schools across the country was postponed, and 265 million students turned to online courses, and online education applications showed explosive growth. The 45th "Statistical Report on the Development of China's Internet" released by the China Internet Information Center shows that as of March 2020, the scale of online education users in my country reached 423 million, an increase of 110.2% from the end of 2018, accounting for 46.8% of the total netizens. However, we still need to be soberly aware that the slow progress of 5G network construction and high fees still greatly restrict the development of 5G+ smart education.

Insufficient 5G network coverage is the key bottleneck restricting the development of 5G+ smart education. Due to the high cost, high energy consumption and high density of 5G base stations, operators' 5G network construction is mainly concentrated in cities and hot spots based on comprehensive considerations of economic benefits and efficiency, and the coverage speed lags far behind 3G/4G networks. Due to limited educational resources and weak teaching staff, rural schools need remote live classrooms, multimedia teaching products and services under high-quality and stable network transmission. 5G network coverage is a necessary guarantee for Internet teaching in the new era, and it is also an inevitable requirement for narrowing the gap in urban and rural education.

Insufficient funds for educational informatization is a key factor restricting the popularization of 5G+ smart education. The 2018 "National Special Supervision Report on Education Informatization" pointed out: "In some places, the application level of information technology in education and teaching is still not high, and educational informatization has not yet had a substantial impact on education and teaching. Some teachers, especially rural teachers, have a low level of information technology application, and there has been no fundamental change in teaching models, teaching methods and teaching organization forms." Through surveys of education authorities in Jiangxi, Guangxi and other provinces, it is known that, constrained by factors such as high 5G network charges and large funding requirements, the current application of 5G in the field of education is mainly concentrated in key schools in the province. Education funds in rural and even remote areas need to be used to improve the basic teaching environment of schools, such as improving infrastructure such as desks, chairs, and classrooms, and the progress of educational informatization is slow. In the 5G era, the demand for investment in educational informatization has increased accordingly. It is recommended to increase the proportion of educational informatization funds in education funds, especially in rural and remote areas to coordinate the development of urban and rural education, and continuously improve the level of educational informatization.