By: Kristen DiCerboKhan Academy Chief Learning Officer, Ph.D.
Educational technology should always remember that “education” comes first and “technology” comes second. Whenever there’s any new technology, start with understanding the learning problems that we need to solve and then determine whether technology can help solve them.
It is difficult to scale up the tutoring and teaching practices in large classes. Intelligent tutoring apps have tried to solve the problem for decades, but they were limited by available technology. We believe generative AI (the kind of AI which produces high quality images and text) can fill in the gaps and scale up the best student learning practices.
Active engagement
We know that students need to be actively engaged in the material they’re learning. This doesn’t mean mindlessly doing something, but instead active cognitive engagement. The ICAP framework, developed by Mickichi and Ruth Wylie, shows the impact of cognitive involvement on learning. It shows moving from passive or inactive to active to constructive.
