What is the Role of Artificial Intelligence In Education?

It has long been debated how to integrate technology into education to improve it. The combination of education and technology is commonly referred to as “Edtech”. Currently one of the ongoing discussions in Edtech is how to integrate artificial intelligence into education in a good way.

The thing is that there are too many options and of course, not all of them are feasible. In this article, we will take a look at some ways in which AI is being used or can be used in Edtech. The methods we will check out are not only beneficial for students but also for teachers.

So, let’s not dilly-dally any longer and check them out.

How can AI be Utilized in Education?

1.     Can Work as a Teaching Assistant

Since 2020, online classes and remote working have become a bigger part of the world than they were before. Many schools started using apps and systems like Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, and Skype to teach students online in virtual classrooms.

The thing is that AI is quite easy to integrate into online classrooms. One particular example is Bing AI. In Skype, Bing AI can be called into the classroom by adding it as a participant. This means that both teachers and students can interact with it.

Bing AI is a powerful AI chatbot that can provide up-to-date facts about anything. That means that teachers can use it to simplify explanations, and students can use it to explain any part of the lecture that they didn’t understand. The good thing is that Bing AI provides sources for all its information. So, further research can be easily done.

This is just one example of using AI as an assistant. More sophisticated systems provide visual aids along with text that can aid in learning. Teachers can use AI systems to do menial tasks such as taking attendance.

2.     Can Help Teachers Grade Simple Tests

One way in which AI systems can help a teacher is by helping them with manual, time taking tasks. Chief among those tasks is grading and numbering assignments and tests. Now, let’s be clear here, AI is not yet advanced enough to grade essays and other written works. So, those cannot be graded using AI as that would be detrimental.

What AI can help with is simple tests and quizzes. Many schools and colleges have multiple choice questions (MCQs) in tests. They have simple answers that can be fed into an AI system and it can just automatically grade tests. That can save teachers a lot of time which they can invest in better tasks such as preparing lectures or lesson plans.

Apart from MCQs, simple question types like “Fill in the blanks” can also be checked and graded by AI systems. Such questions have really simple and discrete answers, so automated systems can easily check them because there is no complexity involved. In fact, such systems are used to grade standardized tests all over the world. There is no reason for teachers not to use them.

3.     Can Identify Gaps in a Student’s Knowledge, and Supplement Them

One of the major problems with current education systems in the world is that there is no emphasis on personalized learning and tutoring. Schools will teach an entire class of students in one way. That may work for some students, but plenty of others will be left behind.

Students who can’t keep up with the lessons have poor performance which is stressful for them. However, an AI system that can identify these gaps and address them can be very beneficial here.

A system that can take a quiz to understand the student’s knowledge gaps and provide personalized study materials to cover those gaps can be amazing. Quite a few online learning websites do this. They provide personalized courses for each student to enhance and ease their learning experience.

Some good examples are Chat2Course.com and To-teach AI. To-teach AI is actually for teachers and it helps them to develop personalized teaching materials, exercises, and quizzes that are best suited for their students. If such AI systems can become more mainstream, then education will be drastically improved.

4.     Can Help Students Understand And Utilize Information For Their Assignments

A great use of AI is helping students do their work more efficiently. AI tools can improve and streamline many tasks that prove to be difficult for students. One of the most important tasks in creating assignments is summarizing. Students have to research their assignment topic and then condense that information into a palatable piece. This is done via summarizing.

But herein lies the issue. Students find it difficult to accurately summarize information. They have issues deciding which part of the data is necessary or unnecessary. They end up including too much unnecessary information in their assignment, which may cost them some brownie points.

Here they can use an AI summarizer to condense their research properly. The summarizer uses NLP (Natural Language Processing) to understand the text and identify all of its salient points. Most AI summarizing tools can assign values to these points in accordance with their relevance.

Then they use the most highly valued statement to create a functional summary. This summary can be used by students in their assignments and homework. This also has the added advantage of teaching students how to summarize text on their own. By seeing what kind of points are considered important in a text, students can get a better idea of how to summarize themselves.

Conclusion

So, those are some ways in which AI can be used in the education sector to both enhance teaching and learning. There are many tools and technologies out there that teachers and students can use to help themselves and each other. The only impediment to the adoption of AI in Edtech is a general lack of motivation to bring in change. If the right authorities can muster their courage and resources, AI can vastly improve the education sector.

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