By now, we’ve all endured a great deal of hype surrounding AI in Education. This fast-evolving space is cluttered with “AI evangelists” touting the next big tip, trick, or game-changing app. With so much noise, it’s becoming hard to distinguish between true innovations and those designed only to garner likes or clicks. Take it from someone who feels responsible for staying current on the topic: it’s confusing, overwhelming, and even anxiety-inducing.
On the surface, there is great potential for AI to transform education. The promise of students getting instant feedback, personalized instruction, private tutors, and real-time, data-driven insights seems more feasible than ever. It’s fun to imagine a world where students are truly at the center of their own learning and teachers can be more of what they should be: experience architects, officially converted from “sage on the stage” to “guide on the side.”
In reality, though, most current AI tools mainly serve to streamline administrative tasks. While using generative AI for lesson planning, project ideas, rubrics, letters of recommendation, and writing emails are all nice time savers, they do little to transform teaching and learning. Add in the biases, data privacy issues, deep fakes, and academic integrity concerns, and the gap between where we are now and where we’d like to be gets wider and wider.
I don’t mean to be pessimistic. I’m sure there are many early adopters who would credit AI with helping them create innovative and meaningful learning experiences for students. On top of that, I’d be stupid to dismiss the value of all AI productivity hacks completely. It’s nice to get things done more quickly, unload some busy work, and have 24/7 access to a brainstorming buddy. But to claim that AI is revolutionizing education, by and large, is putting the cart way in front of the horse. We are only beginning to understand the potential of generative AI. It’s as if man created fire and in the very next moment, tried to build a rocket ship.
For these reasons, I believe we have a long way to go before we see successful implementation in K-12 classrooms that induces real, meaningful change. Many AI tools are currently not even recommended to students under the age of thirteen. Even if they were, there are many complex layers to successful implementation, such as community buy-in, training, data security, and equity, among others. These things take time. If we rush into it and flop, we risk a lot more than simply adding another new initiative to the already overflowing graveyard of educational reforms. The potential dangers of AI misuse are far more severe. For these reasons, we would be wise to pump the breaks, temper our expectations, and proceed carefully.
The Hard Part
Here lies the challenge: somehow, concurrently, we’ve got to respect that AI is rapidly changing the world around us. And as much as we try to lock down our firewalls, networks, and student devices to police generative AI usage in school, we would be naive to think that students won’t use AI the moment they walk out the door.
This juxtaposition between what we can control and what we can’t raises urgent questions. Should we embrace AI usage for students? If not, is there a double standard between how teachers and administrators use AI versus what we expect from students? Where do we go from here?
I believe there are three actionable steps we should all take right now to help us balance innovation with academic integrity so we can strategically usher in a new era of K-12 education:
- Promote AI literacy for all. Change is certain but we are still very much in the information-gathering phase of this monumental shift. The more we learn together now, the easier it will be for us to adapt together later on.
- Clarify your stance and unify your message. Update your policies and/or AUP with language that includes AI and Generative AI usage to protect yourself legally and encourage responsible use. For those comfortable endorsing AI, position it as a brainstorming partner or research assistant and emphasize humans in the loop. Whatever stance you take, ensure everyone in your school community is on the same page.
- Put assessments under the microscope. Here’s the hard question: “If an assignment can be completed swiftly with generative AI, is it really worth doing at all?” There may be some debate now, but eventually, it will be a clear “No.” One day, AI tools will be as common as calculators in K-12 classrooms and students will be able to accomplish so much more. When that time comes, we’ll want to be ready to embrace a new standard of student achievement.
This paradigm shift will be the most drastic change for teachers – who are, by most standards, already overworked and tired of constant change – to embrace. In the meantime, the strategies below can help teachers uphold academic integrity as our understanding of generative AI continues to grow.
- Flip the Classroom: students get introduced to new concepts at home with videos, readings, or other forms of media, while “AI-friendly work” can be completed under the teacher’s supervision
- Emphasize Process over Product: move away from high-stakes, isolated assessments and instead use check-points, process rubrics, and ongoing constructive feedback, among other strategies, to ensure students aren’t skipping over the learning
- Use Multimodal Assignments: students can demonstrate their mastery of the learning goals in more than one way, such as writing, delivering a presentation, creating a poster or visual aid, building a model, etc., proving they’ve internalized the content
- Incorporate Authentic, High-Order Thinking Tasks: the more we ask students to solve complex, real-world problems in their local community, the more we can trust that their work is their own
In conclusion, I’m hopeful that we will one day experience a meaningful integration of AI technology into our classrooms that transforms teaching and learning; but we have a long journey ahead. For now, rather than evangelizing tools we know nothing about, let’s focus on the present and put our energy into much-needed pedagogical change. While the evolution of education at the hands of AI is certain, it requires a thoughtful and tactical approach. It’s our responsibility to ensure that a strong foundation is in place today so skyscrapers of innovation can be built tomorrow.
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