A recent study published by The Hechinger Report found that the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in classrooms can have a negative impact on student learning. The study, which involved 193 teachers and over 2,800 middle and high school students in a private school chain in Turkey, discovered that students whose teachers had access to an AI teaching assistant felt less motivated to learn and scored lower on standardized exams.

The Study’s Findings

The researchers, led by Alp Sungu, an assistant professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, found that the damage was especially pronounced among students whose teachers were already weaker instructors. These students not only felt less motivated but also scored lower on standardized final exams. Sungu suspects that teachers may be using AI as a crutch, relying on it to generate material instead of doing the actual work themselves.

The study also found that students whose teachers had access to the AI tool rated their classes as less enjoyable, less interesting, and less important than students in the control group. The decline in intrinsic motivation was modest, but larger among students of those teachers who had already been heavier AI users before the experiment began.

Implications for Education

The study’s findings have significant implications for the use of AI in education. While AI can be a useful tool for teachers, it is not a replacement for human judgment and creativity. Sungu cautions that it would be a mistake to conclude that AI is terrible and will ruin education, but rather that access to AI technology alone does not improve teaching.

The challenge is to help teachers use AI in ways that preserve human judgment and creativity. This will require teacher training programs, guardrails, and better interfaces. As Sungu notes, when teachers use AI as a tool, they must still immerse themselves in the output, revising and adapting it to their classrooms.

Original reporting: KTVZ (Central Oregon) — read the source article.