Artificial Intelligence (AI) is becoming such a part of our daily lives that soon it will be almost impossible to imagine life without it. Especially since the emergence of ChatGPT and other Large Language Models, endless new possibilities have arisen for the usage of AI in many areas, especially in educational settings. Currently, the effective use of AI in education, both in teaching and learning, remains largely undefined, as do its limitations. We are also missing clarity regarding the potential benefits of AI for instructional research and the ethical boundaries of its use in this field.

The opportunities and challenges associated with integrating AI into educational practices and research are explored in a newly published article from Hendrik Drachsler, Knut Neumann and Jochen Kuhn. In their paper they identify specific questions that instructional research needs to tackle to establish a scientific foundation for AI’s use in education.

Learning

They first explore the possibilities generative AI has for the learning process: how generative AI can be used in problem solving and in generating feedback for students. Open questions remain here as to whether possible wrong answers generated from AI can be identified as such and also how AI-generated feedback is perceived by students.

Teaching

Secondly the paper addresses the topic of teaching with generative AI and how AI can be used in planning, giving and reflecting on lessons. Here it is noted that research is needed to determine how qualitatively valuable lessons planned with the help of AI actually are and how well generative AI can be for teachers to give lessons. Although generative AI has the potential to gather information about students and present this to teachers in an easily understandable way, it is not yet fully clear how helpful or potentially misleading this information could be.

Future Questions for AI Use

Open questions are also addressed by this article on the use of generative AI in teaching and teaching research, such as when, how and for whom generative AI is beneficial for learning and how can it be used by students and teachers in a successful manor. They also address how the use of generative AI can be used to support the professional activities of teachers and how it can serve as an assistant to teachers to help enhance teaching and learning all together.

Reference to the article: Neumann, K., Kuhn, J., Drachsler, H. (2024). Generative Künstliche Intelligenz in Unterricht und Unterrichtsforschung – Chancen und Herausforderungen. Generative artificial intelligence in instruction and research on instruction—potentials and challenges. Unterrichtswissenschaft. doi: 10.1007/s42010-024-00212-6