A rtificial intelligence has turned our traditions and methods of organizing the educational process upside down. Since now pre-school, general education and higher education systems have been based on common or group principles, and now AI is forcing a shift to individualized learning models.

Imagine if your preschool child has a constant friend-educator at home and in kindergarten, who perfectly understands the psychology of the child, communicates with him or her verbally, answers without getting tired of all the questions of the child, tells extremely interesting and informative stories or fairy tales, shows helpful and fun cartoons, clips or pictures in an acceptable mode, sings with him or teaches him to pronounce, organizes real games, gives advice to parents about the child’s needs. In a word, a super tutor who is affordable and accessible to everyone.

The school will also be transformed on the same principle. The student-artificial intelligence-teacher model will replace the student-classroom-teacher model.

With the invasion of AI, there is an urgent need to rethink preschool-school-university transitions in general, because along with the development of individualized education models, these transitions will be highly differentiated at the individual level. The preschooler, pupil and student should be able to be educated at a more advanced or slower pace according to their knowledge and abilities and not be dependent on the performance level of the group. That is, children of the same age can receive knowledge of significantly different levels and complexity.

This is, of course, a future challenge for which we must start taking steps today. However, there are already tools we are obliged to implement the day before. First of all, it is necessary to introduce educational programs that develop AI literacy into education, which will explain to each student the principles of AI, existing practical applications, their capabilities, limitations and ethical standards.

Specialists suggest that AI should be used in education to provide differentiated learning. Accordingly, the learner’s/student’s educational abilities and background knowledge are identified using AI tools and a new learning plan is customized to meet his/her needs. If there are 20 or more pupils/students in a class or group, individual adaption of the educational program cannot be carried out by one teacher. Whereas the AI system can individually observe how the student performs the assigned task, how much time he/she spends and whether he/she is progressing. If he is struggling, the system may offer help, if progress is positive, the system may give more challenging tasks so as not to slow progress. Chatbots with artificial intelligence systems can help learners through personalized, timely feedback or further explain material by providing simplified examples. Chatbots can answer questions about course content or structure. This will help students to be more motivated and fully engaged during their studies.

AI turns into a personal super-teacher who can also take on the function of a tutor, being accessible and available to everyone.

In schools and universities, the intelligent textbook will be the educational tool of the foreseeable future. This will provide an opportunity to present the material to the student in an interactive way, to check the level of mastery of the material, to formulate questions accordingly, based on which the material will be presented in the most accessible and simple ways or new material will be presented. The textbook will not be limited to the text or images printed in the book, but will also include animation, video, interactive images and pictures, and audio playback of the material. This technology will make the teaching of all subjects much easier, more effective, interesting and attractive. And all of these will be a program designed not for large groups, but will be tailored to each student’s abilities.

The AI will greatly improve the process and effectiveness of learning assessment. It is obvious that the existing assessment models-individual work, testing, question-and-answer are flawed and have a high level of subjectivity. AI will allow learning to be assessed based on patterns and trends recorded throughout the learning phase, with its results reflecting the level of progress of the pupil or student, rather than being assessed subjectively based on exams taken on the same day. 

According to experts, in addition to using the aforementioned artificial intelligence technologies, higher education needs to introduce educational programs that will develop technological literacy, data science and human literacy. Colleges and universities should invest more resources in educating students about the changes AI brings with it and how it is changing the job market. There is a viewpoint that higher education institutions should no longer move to such educational models, thanks to which the acquisition of a profession will be adapted not only for a person with secondary education but also for a person who needs education in any sphere of life. Moreover, this model should have no spatial and temporal constraints.

The opportunities and benefits that AI brings are undoubtedly enormous, but it also carries tangible risks. Chief among them are misinformation and loss of critical thinking. The earlier children start using open sources the more likely they are to fall victim to misinformation. If this threat can be more or less countered by certain restrictions or by strengthening the foundations of source studies, much more effort will be needed to counter the loss of critical thinking resulting from the widespread use of AI.

The problem is that pupils and students will have an omnipotent tool that can perform any exercise or assignment, solve a problem of any complexity, create on any topic and of any volume.

At a certain point, this can create a situation where the pupil/student ceases to be a bearer of critical thinking and destroys the creative skill, resulting in the latter becoming an individual who skillfully uses AI but does not have his/her “own” knowledge and skills. 

UNESCO experts believe that another problematic aspect of introducing AI into the education system is the process of training teachers and professors.  You certainly cannot count on a generational shift in this issue, as the development of AI technologies is extremely fast and ongoing. It is also impossible for example to have one or two specialists in each school or university to advise the entire institution on AI.

These problems are very topical not only in Armenia but also all over the world. International organizations and education authorities of advanced countries have paid special attention to their solution in recent years. In May 2023, UNESCO hosted a global meeting of ministries of education that highlighted a number of consultations related to the use of AI technologies in education.  Particularly, emphasis was placed on the development of national strategies, capacity-building of education systems, development of teachers’ skills, adjustment of copyright laws and implementation of curriculum, assessment and data protection systems. As a result of all this, the organization published a consultation document, that includes important advice towards the application of AI technologies.

However, by the time a school or university has had time to implement AI tools and train students to use them, they will likely have already mastered many of these tools on their own. Thus, there is also the responsibility of the older generation to gradually learn and apply AI technologies and transfer them to the younger generation in a safe and manageable manner.