Chapter 5, part 2 - The Effects of AI on Student Motivation Through Instruction, Learning, and Assessment

Chapter 5, Part 2 — Conclusion

The Effects of AI on Student Motivation Through Instruction, Learning, and Assessment

Because motivation has such a potent effect on student performance and educational outcomes, I evaluated the potential effects of how AI could specifically impact student motivation as it relates to the three aspects of education described in previous chapters: instruction, learning and assessment.

The Potential Effects of AI on Motivation — Instruction

The U.S. Department of Education rejects the idea that AI will replace teachers, assuring them that they won’t be replaced (U.S. Department of Education, 2023). While I agree that AI may not completely replace teachers, I also believe that given the likely permanent presence of AI in almost every facet of education, we will soon need to redefine the role of a teacher in order to achieve the best outcomes in a new era. Teachers will need to acknowledge the existence of AI and use it to teach, assess, and encourage students to use it in the right ways to help them learn.

In fact, if teachers stubbornly maintain the same role they do now, and don’t adapt to AI, I believe there is the potential that they might actually demotivate students. If teachers do not revise their homework and lesson plans to reflect the new capabilities introduced by AI, students may become disengaged, resorting to AI to complete their homework anyway. With this in mind, educators may already need to re-evaluate their assignments and ask themselves, “Can AI complete this homework?” If the answer is yes, it may indicate that the assignment is not effectively challenging the student if he or she is given access to AI (Breazeal et al., 2023).

Further, from a student's perspective, the question may be: if ChatGPT can answer a question in a second, why not let it just do the work? The obvious answer is that the student would not actually learn anything because they would not have to engage with the material. But the answer may be more nuanced: ChatGPT could have a new role in education that changes how students learn over time. For example, I remember one of my teachers explaining why we had to learn to do math without a calculator: "You won’t always have a calculator in your pocket!" But now most of us have a phone with a calculator in our pockets. Imagine if teachers hadn't adapted their policies around calculators and required students to perform all calculations by hand. Students would likely not engage with the homework since the calculator can do it for them, leading to disinterest and a lack of motivation to learn.

On the other hand, I believe we may begin to see negative societal effects if everything we learn comes from AI-assisted learning through a computer and students develop an over-reliance on computers for their knowledge and information. While computers provide access to tons of information, I worry about a world where they are trusted more than human experts, including teachers. Further, this overreliance on AI for instruction could lead to teachers becoming gradually phased out of education, or a risk that they could become demotivated, feeling redundant as they perceive that robots can handle all instructional responsibilities.

Further, if AI essentially takes over as the “primary instructor,” I believe it will miss the irreplaceable and spontaneous teachable moments that deeply engage students and inspire them to explore further. These moments, which can spark a student’s curiosity and lead to in-depth study and questioning, are uniquely facilitated by human teachers. Regardless of the evolving role of teachers in the future, they must remain cognizant of this crucial aspect of a human teacher’s contribution to education and define the future role of teachers accordingly.

By incorporating AI into the classroom in the right ways, it would free teachers up to fine-tune their instruction by engaging with students and getting a better understanding of the broader life context of each student. This idea is highlighted by researcher Nomisha Kurian’s study, which found that AI’s responses to serious and traumatic student issues were inadequate, emphasizing the indispensable role of human educators in this field (Kurian, 2023). While AI can streamline some of the teaching processes, it should not diminish the unique human element that teachers bring to education. Other research, such as the work by Vincent Aleven et al. (2017), emphasizes AI as a complement rather than a replacement for traditional teaching methods, advocating for an approach that uses a combination of technology and human teachers to enhance educational outcomes. In my opinion, this is the best way forward and fosters a sustainable path for teaching and AI to coexist in a way that is beneficial for everybody.

When I think back on the teachers who made the biggest impact on my life, the ones who made the biggest impact on my life were the teachers I would want to stay after class with to ask questions and talk about the subjects that piqued my interest but didn't necessarily fit into a curriculum. This is why I believe AI will be beneficial to education, but only if it reimagines the role of the teacher to include more of a role that focuses on developing the interests and motivating the student than being a “deliverer of information.”

The Potential Effects of AI on Motivation to Learn

Everybody’s learning style is unique; however, AI’s ability to adapt to a learner’s particular skill set and their own ways of learning could motivate students to learn more because they would be learning in a way that best works for them.

In my mind, the biggest unknown and potential negative side to AI in regard to learning is the risk of an overreliance on AI that could demotivate students to solve any problems, especially if AI begins to have the capacity to solve everything. One of the clearest examples of technology demotivating people to learn—with potential negative consequences for cognitive development—is with GPS systems. Having grown up with digital maps my whole life, it is clear that my navigational skills are lacking compared to my parents. I can recount countless stories of either my mom or dad going somewhere and having to use a giant paper map to figure out where they were and where they were going. Instead, I just punch in an address on my phone, follow the blue line, and barely pay attention to whether I’m even headed in the right direction. I figure I’ll always have GPS, so why bother learning the routes?

However, according to research by the National Institutes of Health, the use of convenient GPS technology has other much more insidious side effects. The researchers discovered that use of GPS negatively impacts the brain because it does not exercise important brain structures, notably the hippocampus, that are dedicated to the complex tasks of spatial awareness and mental mapping (Dahmani et al., 2022).

So, this minor aspect of my daily routine illustrates a broader issue—it could become much more problematic if we allow AI to overtake our critical thinking. Not only could it demotivate us to think for ourselves, it could actually have other unknown side effects that diminish our brain power. The U.S. Department of Education has expressed concern that students using tools like ChatGPT instead of seeking out their own answers could become habit-forming and negatively impact the development of critical thinking and problem-solving skills (U.S. Department of Education, 2023). Through reliance on AI to do everything for them, students could risk becoming overly dependent on AI, returning to it repeatedly because of its convenience and speed, rather than using it as a tool to guide them to their own conclusions (Breazeal et al., 2023).

There’s also a risk that the human element of learning might get lost. If asked whether they would prefer to be taught by a robot or a human, many students, including myself, would choose a human. The efficiency of an automated system that tailors all learning exactly to each student’s needs might not outweigh the benefits or motivational power of positive human interaction. Moreover, learning in a classroom setting with other students and a teacher contributes to the enjoyment of learning, a dynamic that could be diminished with an overemphasis on automated systems.

However, schools like the model Alpha School described in Chapter 4 have done well in creating environments that combine technology and human interaction as a core part of the learning experience. Here, in this particular case, students help each other with problems, ensuring that human interaction remains integral to learning. I believe this balance between technology and humans is crucial as we navigate the integration of AI into educational contexts.

The Potential Effects of AI and Motivation Through New Forms of Assessment

The idea of keeping kids in their zone of proximal development is crucial to motivating students to learn. When students are within this zone, the learning is not too hard so that it frustrates the student, and also not too easy, whereby the student becomes disinterested (Murray et al., 2018). Instead, when students are in this zone, learning has the potential to become engaging, almost game-like, where challenges are suitably difficult to keep the answer just within reach but not too easily attainable.

Mark Rober, in his TED Talk on learning, refers to a concept he coined the “Super Mario effect,” where learning becomes like a game and students aren’t punished for the wrong answer (Rober, 2018). In the TED Talk, Rober shows how much more successful students are when they are not punished for incorrect answers. With an AI-driven tutoring system that is tailored to each student, learners have as many attempts as they need to figure out answers to questions without the negative downsides of getting answers wrong. This is because the learning is just between the student and the system, and students don’t run the risk of looking silly in front of their class.

I believe that with the right AI assessment tools that accurately determine each student's learning level, AI can help ensure that each student remains within their optimal zone of proximal development. This tailored approach could make learning more enjoyable and game-like, thereby motivating more students to engage with the material that is just right for them.

Further, AI can help to free up time for teachers to provide more encouragement for students as well as identify external issues that may be inhibiting their learning. I also believe that the transformative ability of AI to assess and give instant feedback could play a positive role in most students’ academic journeys. This is because the feedback given is fresh, and if the student is actually interested in the subject, they won’t have to wait too long and lose interest before the human feedback is given. Instead, AI-driven feedback can strike while the iron is hot, allowing students to continue to build and expand their knowledge while they are still motivated and interested in the subject.

References

Aleven, V., McLaughlin, E. A., Glenn, R., & Koedinger, K. R. (2017). Instruction based on adaptive learning technologies. In R. E. Mayer & P. A. Alexander (Eds.), Handbook of research on learning and instruction (2nd ed., pp. 522–560). Routledge.

Breazeal, C., Long, P., Chandra, K., Parrish, A., & Long, D. (2023). GenAI + Education Welcome and Fireside Chat [Video]. MIT RAISE. https://raise.mit.edu/

Dahmani, L., Proulx, M.-J., & Bohbot, V. D. (2022). Habitual use of GPS negatively impacts spatial memory during self-guided navigation. Scientific Reports, 12(1), 2784. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-05950-w

Kurian, N. (2023). AI’s empathy gap: ChatGPT, trauma, and the role of human teachers. The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2023/02/21/ais-empathy-gap-chatgpt-trauma-and-the-role-of-human-teachers/

Murray, T., Nietfeld, J., & Sztajn, P. (2018). Toward measuring and maintaining the zone of proximal development in adaptive instructional systems. International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education, 28(2), 186–210. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40593-017-0150-8

Rober, M. (2018, April). The Super Mario effect – Tricking your brain into learning more [Video]. TEDxPenn. https://www.ted.com/talks/mark_rober_the_super_mario_effect_tricking_your_brain_into_learning_more

U.S. Department of Education. (2023). Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Teaching and Learning: Insights and Recommendations. Office of Educational Technology. https://tech.ed.gov/ai/