Role of Teachers in Artificial Intelligence integrated multidisciplinary pedagogies
“Nothing is constant in the world but change” - A Greek Philosopher
The Industrial Revolution changed many practices and approaches in the world with the advent of steam power in the 1760s. In the 1880s with the introduction of electricity mass production, life of people and the economy of the world changed. The 1970s saw the innovation of digital computing automation. As a result, we are residing today in the age of Cyber physical systems. Another dimension of the digital world namely Artificial Intelligence is expected to bring the fourth Industrial Revolution. So change is inevitable. We must be ready to accept changes whole-heartedly as these are meant for progress. Progress is life. Until we die, we have a purpose in being living and certainly that purpose can be served through progress. So it is always wise to change and / or remain ready to change. Those who are unwilling to change generally fall into the trap of frustration, depression, chaos, being critical of everything etc.
In today’s digital world artificial intelligence (AI) is prevalent in many areas. Many new skills and new jobs are arising. With the inclusion of AI, the following fusion skills are becoming dominant.
Judgment integration
Bot based empowerment
Reciprocal Apprenticing
Digital readiness will provide us with new jobs, new opportunities and new 21st century skills. Today artificial intelligence is all around us. On account of AI new challenges as AI ethics, AI biases etc. have taken shape.
If we go by word, artificial means man-made. Intelligence on the other hand, refers to some important characteristics of human personality as:-
(i) Logical Reasoning (ii) Learning (ability) (iii) Understanding ability
(iv) Problem Solving (v) Decision making (vi) Critical Thinking
This is very common that we learn through experiences. We are able to understand if we hear or communicate through textual form and are able to make sense out of what we hear or receive in text form using empathy. LSRW (Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing) is the classical set of skills that enables us in understanding and comprehending.
In this context, it is to be noted that AI refers to a program that can sense, reason, act and adapt.
It is the ability of machines to learn from experiences, without explicit programming, in order to perform cognitive functions associated with the human mind (much more capabilities than basic cyber physical systems, programming & coding, data science, internet etc.
We know that basic cognitive services are vision, speech, language, knowledge and search. A lot of research is going on how AI can see, smell, hear, taste and touch and how AI can process and respond fairly.
Today AI is impacting our lives through its interventions via Swiggy (where we are automatically recommended food of our choice) FlipKart (recommendations based on our browsing and previous purchases), Google Maps, OLA, Aarogya Setu, Youtube, Lenskart.com, Facebook, Siri, Google Assistant, amazon_alexa, Hey Cortana etc.
Since we are knowingly / unknowingly using AI in daily life, CBSE envisaged to begin imparting education of AI as a skill subject. There is every reason to believe that 65% of students entering the primary section in 2016 will have occupations in those areas which are non-existing today and will be based on AI.
Further, CBSE has become the first board in the world to conceptualize integration of AI into main curricular subjects. A large number of teachers have already been trained. These teachers have developed AI integrated lesson plans in their respective subjects.
An excerpt from an AI integrated Lesson plan in Mathematics is presented as follows:-
Thus it has become a conducive time and situation to talk about AI integrated pedagogies.
CBSE is adopting two approaches for this.
(i) AI as a tool to learn Mathematics, English, Science or Social Science.
(ii) Language or Mathematics and other disciplines as a tool to learn artificial intelligence.
For today’s discussion we are more concerned with the approach mentioned above at S.N.(i).
CBSE has developed manuals for AI integrated pedagogies in Hindi, English, Mathematics, Science and Social Science. These manuals are available on CBSE website and DIKSHA portal. The links of these manuals are as follows:-
Artificial Intelligence Integration: An Introduction: https://diksha.gov.in/play/content/do_31316353189435801614714
Hindi: https://diksha.gov.in/play/content/do_31315368664241766411214
English: https://diksha.gov.in/play/content/do_31315368449082163211046
Mathematics: https://diksha.gov.in/play/content/do_31315368975182233611003
Science: https://diksha.gov.in/play/content/do_31315370081052262411053
Soc. Sc.: https://diksha.gov.in/play/content/do_31315443508751564811254
CBSE has planned in collaboration with INTEL to train minimum one teacher and maximum two teachers per subject per school. After training, these teachers will be technology leaders of the school. They will train / guide other teachers. After training teacher will be guided by the CBSE-INTEL team to develop AI integrated lesson plans and to implement them.
There are many AI tools available that can easily be incorporated to lesson plans. This has already been done by many teachers. For instance,
(i) AI Game: Rock, Paper & Scissors available at http://bit.ly/iai4yrps can be used by Teachers of mathematics in teaching probability etc.
(ii) AI Game: Semantris (=> Launch experiment => Play arcade) available at http://bit.ly/iai4ysem can be used by by Teachers of english during Vocabulary class.
(iii) Teachable machine (an AI tool_search through google) can be used in Science lessons. https://teachablemachine.withgoogle.com/
The school heads have to play a major and important role in developing an AI ready school. The AI journey consists of
Mindset + Skill Sets + Toolsets
This further requires orientation of different stakeholders. Parents’ group, Teachers’ group, Governing body group etc. Should be talked to and get them interested and involved in planning for and deploying technology.
Role of a School Leader in developing an AI Ready School
· Recognize the potential of Artificial Intelligence in Education.
· Lead the way towards effective implementation of AI to enhance student learning.
· Encourage and motivate teachers to get trained and integrate AI in regular classroom.
Teaching to enhance student learning.
· Help teachers implement AI integrated learning.
· Ensure effective and judicious use of AI integration in the curriculum.
· Ensure optimum use of available resources to promote the use of AI tools.
· Closely monitor effective AI integration.
What is Technology Leadership?
A teacher trained by CBSE-INTEL in AI integrated multi-disciplinary pedagogies will be the technology leader of the school. His role can be enlisted as follows:-
· Developing, articulating, and implementing a vision of how technology can produce positive change.
· Finding ways to innovatively apply available technologies to enhance teaching and learning.
· Innovative application of technology that often redefines the way a task is done.
· Finding creative ways of dealing with technology funding.
· Providing teachers and students with the best possible access to electronic resources
· Maximizing the benefits derived from applying technology to educational functions and processes.
Integration of AI across Education
It is universally acknowledged that AI would be the source and the cause of improving the teaching – learning methodology in the classroom.
By leveraging the best attributes of AI machines and teachers, the education system will be driven towards the best outcome for students.
AI is being widely recognized to be the power that will fuel the future global digital economy; and has gained geo-strategic importance .
The Future workplace is defined by Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools and frameworks, Communication technologies, and self-development. Today’s generation needs to constantly build on their skills in order to have a successful career.
The students of today will need to work in a future where AI is no longer a notion but is the reality. It's important that our educational institutions expose students to updated technologies and their usage.
Thus we teachers must be geared up to stand up to the challenge of implementing AI integrated multi-disciplinary pedagogies in order to develop 21st century skills in light of NEP 2020.
