Everyday technolgy is evolving with new and innovative ways to make life easier…or is it? Some people argue that AI is the new normal and a major breakthrough in technology. Others argue that it takes away from the originality, creativity, and critical thinking skills of individuals.
Pros of AI
Task Automation: Time is a luxury that we can never have enough of. AI creates shortcuts that allow us to gain more time in our day. From lesson planning to grading papers to handling administrative task, AI can do it with ease.
Personalized Learning: Through AI, many programs have been created to determine student’s weaknesses and strengths to create a personalized plan for each student. These programs have allowed teachers the opportunity to determine the needs of their students quickly and differentiate to close learning gaps more efficently.
Accessiblity: AI makes learning more equitable for students with disabilities and EL learners. Tools such as text-to-speech and translator make education more
Cons of AI
Lacks personality: AI lacks the personality and voice that only a human can possess.
Biases: AI is based on algorithms that are based on the input of the creator and users.
Hindering learning: AI can be depended on too heavily leading to a lack of creativity and critical thinking skills. Students can rely on AI to complete their work for them instead of actually learning the skill themselves.
***Check out this blog by Instrucko on more advantages and disadvantages of AI in Education.***
AI in the Classroom
One AI tool that I explored this week is QuestionWell. QuestionWell allows you to take a text and create questions for the reading. I choose a reading comprehension sheet on “Force”. After copying the text into the provided box, I was able to do select the language that I wanted the questions in (Great feature for teachers like me who have EL learners!). I was also provided with the following:
- Essential Questions
- Learning Outcomes
- A list of questions
- Can export into many commonly used programs such as Kahoot and Google Classroom
Below are some examples of the results.
Successes
- Time saved!
- Great for quick checks of student understanding
- Translations:)
Challenges
- Some features are paid only features such as creating fill-in-the-blank questions, short answer questions, and extended response questions.
- Questions were different with translated language. Unable to create the same version twice with exact replica translation.
Overall, I felt like it was a great program and I would use it again. I would like to look more into creating the exact replica of questions in multiple languages if this option exists. However, I was please with the results and was able to gain insight on my students basic understanding of force.
Try QuestionWell here.
Biases in AI and How to Rectify Them
Wondering how you can add AI to your classroom? Check out 30 AI tools for the classroom.
One thing to remember is that AI bias exist. AI programs are products of their creators. AI can present inaccurate information and harm groups that are already marginalized. These bias can then influence people skewing their view and decision-making skills (Leffer, 2023).
While these biases will never be completely erased, there are ways to reduce biases with your learners.
- Educate your students how to navigate AI effectively. Explain that AI is a tool not a replacement for learning. Just as humans, AI is not perfect and has errors and misconceptions exists.
- Do your research! Familarize yourself with program before presenting to your students. Look for potential biases and misconceptions that your students may be exposed to.
- Empower your students! Encourage your students to use AI as tools and determine ways that they would improve the product created by AI and/or discover potential misconceptions and inaccurate information themselves.
Learn more about bias here!
AI and TCE Thresolds
Education is not neutral/Teaching is political: AI is continously evolving and impacting the educational system. Education is forever changing and AI is one of the most controversial topics in education. There must be a balance of AI within the classroom. Teachers must educate their students on how to use it effectively.
Teachers and students engage in critical-consciousness: AI impacts the learner and teacher viewpoints and both the learners and teacher must conscious of the effects that it may have on them. AI contains biases that must be acknowledged and must be approached with this knowledge and caution. AI can be a powerful and beneficial tool that can engage both teachers and students in examining their beliefs and current practices.
Sources:
Leffer, L. (2023). Humans absorb bias from AI—And keep it after they stop using the algorithm. Retrieved from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/humans-absorb-bias-from-ai-and-keep-it-after-they-stop-using-the-algorithm/
Hello,
The AI tool you used seems much less time-consuming, which is always great! One thing I dislike about some of the websites is how much they charge for special features. It is very helpful that the worksheets could be created in another language. Were you nervous about the accuracy of the translation for your EL students? When practicing using AI this week, I noticed some biases. AI can be useful. Learning how to navigate through AI and teaching the students how to navigate AI successfully is key to being productive in usage.
I also wrote how personalized instruction is a benefit of AI! It is difficult to teach the unique needs of each student everyday, and I like that AI can help with this. I hadn’t considered the time saved, and I agree that this is one of the biggest pros with AI. The biases and the hindrance of learning are the cons, but I agree that if we equip our students with critical thinking skills that we can try to eliminate perpetuating the biases and promote creativity. I haven’t heard of question well, but this looks like a great resource! I can see how a challenge is the limitation of a variety of questions, but I like how it includes questions and outcomes. It is also so convenient to easily gamify this with kahoot.
Education is truly the key in exposing our students to AI. I agree that we must equip our student with critical thinking skills. I love the gamify options and will try those soon.
I love how you shared the pros and cons of using QuestionWell! It sounds like it would be a great resource for the future, especially if you need something quickly since it saved you time. I would like to try this AI tool out in the future.
I also really like your points on how you can reduce biases with your learners. I think with AI being a newer tool for us, it is important for us as educators to be educated about AI before we share it with our students in order for them to use it best!
Time saved is always a plus in our profession! As I educate myself on AI, I hope to find more resources for my students to use and enhance their learning experience as a tool not a crutch.
Great post! I really like how you included Questionwell. This is something that I wasn’t familiar with and after visiting the link I think this would be a great tool to use in class, especially for ELL learners. I have the largest population of ELL students I have ever had in my career this year and I am always looking for better resources to make learning more meaningful for all of my students. This is a great tool.
I am also a big advocate for using AI to help educators in the classroom. We know that we live in a time of low teacher happiness rates and low teacher retention, tools like that can help us spend more time on other parts of our job while still providing meaningful learning experiences for our students.
I also thought you had a great summary of how AI Bias exists!
Thank you for your comment! I look forward to exploring the other features of QuestionWell more. I too have the largest ELL community of my teaching career and finding resources to best educate them is always a plus. I haven’t used AI much but would like to use it more for myself and explore more ways to use with my students.