Is it A.I. or Just Great Programing?

Teaching With Technology and What I learned about A.I.

As a kindergarten teacher, I try to incorporate the use of technology as often as reasonably possible.  I feel that my students’ age group (4yrs–7yrs) will continue to inherit a world inundated with digital and technological forms of data and learning. As technology continues to evolve, the way we live and work transforms. Artificial Technology (A.T.) is becoming more useful and practical for educators. This can be seen in the amount of Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) driven technology being marketed to young learners. “Today’s students – K through college – represent the first generations to grow up with this new technology.  They have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age” (Prensky 2001). In this post I will explore some ways that I teach with technology and what I have learned about A.I.

Technology Supportive to My Teaching

I have found that using technology, in the classroom, enhances the learning engagement. For example, I found a way to quickly organize a lesson using generative A.I. to deliver a skill to my little learners. I provided familiarity by designing characters that represented the demographic of my student population.

I used words that they were familiar with instead of technical terms that were more suitable for older age groups. I wrote a prompt and recorded my voice (or use pre-recorded options) for the characters. The app took care of the rest. In the end, I was able to add a visually engaging component to a lesson that I will teach multiple times. My students enjoyed watching the presentation and found the content more relatable due to my “techy” creation. With this, I am assured that my students are receiving personalized and enriching educational experiences.

“Classrooms don’t need tech geeks who can teach; we need teaching geeks who can use tech.”

David Geurin

Teaching With Technology: The Good and the Bad

I am a supporter of using technology in the classroom. There are aspects of teaching with tech that are supportive and vital to the healthy development of the educational platform and the students therein. It is important for educators to familiarize themselves with developments in technology. This assists with staying current and providing lessons that enrich learning experiences by making them interactive and engaging. At its inception, the use of technology to assist with work was most notably seen as a means of enhancing productivity through the performance and completion of menial tasks. Supposedly, these menial tasks would lighten a heavy workload and allow the “human” worker to focus on more challenging projects. This allowed a greater degree of progress within a working environment. However, some may remember that there were political associations common to the developing usage of technology.

As technology continued to develop, associations (primarily political) were viewed as bad connections for the educational platform. Politically, these associations increased the power and authority of those directly connected with technology (Winner 1980). Some educators remain focused on this bad history of technology. This could add to challenges faced with using technology in the classroom.

What came first: Programing or A.I.?

At first glance, this subtitle may seem to be a bit convoluted. After all, programming is a complicated process. Artificial Intelligence (A.I.), by definition, is complicated too. So, what am I referring to when I adapt the “chicken and the egg” paradox to A.I. and programming? Simply this, in order to develop the language necessary for A.I. to come into being, it takes programmers and mathematicians. However, the programs and algorithms must manifest intellect, no longer manipulated by human intervention. 

“Technology will never replace great teachers, but technology in the hands of great teachers is transformational.”

George Couras

One Reddit contributor asserts that A.I. is not what the general public has been taught to believe. [Kichigai] cautions us to understand that the term is a broad marketing concept and there is no real intelligence. Educators are invaluable in that they instruct the humans who will invent the future. Artificial Intelligence will continue to be subservient to the teacher.

References

Couros & Geurin quotes from https://www.bamradionetwork.com/quoted/popular/293-education-technology

[Kichigai] (September 18, 2023). Technical [Is there an A.I. tool that processes video with changing lighting and outputs a video with the most consistent look across the video?]. Reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/editors/comments/16mbz93/comment/k17tazc/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon, 9(5)

Winner, L. (1980). Do artifacts have politics? Daedalus, 109(1), 121-136