It could be considered a severe understatement to declare that many people don’t have a brisk idea of what artificial intelligence, or more commonly referred to as AI, is. For the people who have no idea what it is, Artificial Intelligence is the the science that makes machines think and act just like any other human. Any device that is powered by AI can do things that are considered “smart” and can process many pieces of information and is considered to be “smarter than humans.”
“So there’s a website called Magic School AI. And I used it to help write social stories or help make an activity for like, a blooket, and it’s very easy to use as well as learn,” Special-education teacher Rebecca Bruce said.
Artificial Intelligence is a rapidly growing field of technology that is seemingly interesting a wide field of tech enthusiasts and, to be honest, every other person who is socially active. Artificial intelligence has been designed with the goal in mind to make it as humanly as possible. Creators of various AI companies want to make their AI be able to analyze, think, reason and act the same way a human does.
“I’ve played around with chat GPT, for fun, when it first came out and was available to users online. I’ve asked it questions before. And I have a couple of friends that work in like, tech industry. So I’ve been introduced to like computer models at IBM for their generative AI,” English teacher Benjamin Patrick said.
Ever since the word “Artificial intelligence” was heard from John McCarthy back in 1955, AI has been worked on to become more advance in various fields. AI is expected to play the role as a transformative force regarding many aspects of our lives, including education. The amalgamation of AI and education is going to completely alter the way we learn and maybe, just maybe, the way teaching is going to occur in the future. In this article we will explore the way AI would revolutionize education.
“I think maybe in the future, once AI is more like regulated, then it would definitely be better. I think right now it’s to0 early to really use it.” English teacher Sage Sutton said.
Artificial Intelligence can play a key factor for the learning environment. AI can provide students with a learning that is personalized. The data that it uses can be fed the information of an individual students weaknesses, strengths, and the learning methods that best suites them. This would help students acknowledge and revise the places that they lack the most. Not only that but students, with the help of AI can have easy access to education anytime and anywhere. Why is this needed? Well, it’s a tradition that every student is given homework in particular classes, logically hard ones that typically require more attention. While some students may easily finish the work with no assistance, many students might struggle and need attention from someone experienced, usually a teacher. However, many teachers might not be available at that time or the student might just have no way to contact the teacher to state the issue. This leads the student to just skip the homework and ask the teacher the next day. Slowly this one-time think might grow into a habit that will affect the student later in their lives. AI can solve that problem by being available for students assistance 24/7 which would help a ton of students worldwide. AI can not only benefit students but can equally do so for teachers. WIth the help of this new generative technology, many teachers can benefit from all the grading work that AI can do. The accuracy, and speed will help teachers a lot, especially those with a lot of grading work. A task usually taking 5 hours can now take less than 2 with the help of artificial intelligence. Another benefit that the teachers would have is that AI has the ability to provide accurate analysis of student performance and work. This would help teachers scrutinize student performance in a more efficient way and high precision.
“I think that in a classroom, human interaction with a teacher who specialized in that specific area is really important. I think teachers are better able to help students learn how to work collaboratively, think critically, and question.” Science teacher Melinda Schermerhorn said.
But everything good has something bad and that applies to AI as well. If AI keeps it’s scarily accurate and “good at everything” streak, there is a high chance that it may lead to the unemployment of many people. Many organizations, factories, schools would probably prefer a robot, that does work with efficiency and only a one time payment, over a human who needs to be payed (word) and like any other human, causes errors. Payment is also a big problem that people who want to use AI will face.Although AI will be an one time payment, that one-time payment may last somewhere from 15,000 dollars to 100,000 dollars. Low-level Complex AI costs around $15,000- $35,000 where as High-level complex AI costs $80,000- $100,000. An average teacher gets pain around $39k- $81k per year. But the biggest concern of bringing AI into education would be generative AI. Generative AI is a new thing that has been introduced which is capable of taking in any information, for example: images, text, video, and changing it into a whole new thing that is desired by humans. This kind of AI can lead many students to make AI solve their math problems, write their essays/stories for them and complete any assignment with no human effort involved.
“Often, when students use generative AI, it is because they are either trying to just flat out like escape the word, or they may not always know what to write or have an idea of how to complete the assignment,” Patrick said.
Artificial Intelligence is a thing that is going to completely revolutionize the way humans live in the future. Like any other thing in this world, it also has its good and bad sides and its left on us humans to decide whether we want to make it a boon or a bane.
“Technology is designed to benefit our world around us and to make our lives as human beings more easy. Unfortunately, because of things like student stress, capitalism, and all these other negative attributes in the world, we often use AI for negative reasons. But if we can come together around some like simple rules for how we use AI and society, I think it could actually be a really positive tool for all of us, students, adults, everyone,” Patrick said.
