Generative AI in education has been the talk of the town for the past couple of years, whether in good or bad terms. Although the technology has received praise in areas like science for aiding in vital breakthroughs, it has also received criticism from artists looking to protect their likeness and creations.
Education is no exception either, with recent studies hinting at the pros and cons of AI in education. For instance, a recent University of South Carolina report showed that, when asked to brainstorm ideas with AI, the tech could have “potential negative effects on students’ creative thinking skills and self-confidence.” Participants also expressed that, while it was good to have an extra brain to help come up with ideas, they felt that AI was “the easy way out” and didn’t allow them to think for themselves.
In the midst of these mixed opinions, we can’t take for granted the benefits of AI in education, which have opened the space for teachers and students alike to achieve more through condensing information, automating tasks, and providing overall extra support. While we can’t overlook the negatives, the truth is that, when used for good, AI can have an immensely positive impact on students.
Let’s explore three ways students can leverage AI without the downsides, responsibly befriending the technology to expand their knowledge and skills rather than hindering their learning curve.
Adapting To Learning Types with Multimodal Accessibility
With the number of K-12 students with disabilities increasing in recent years, it has never been more vital to equip schools with accessibility tools that cater to all kinds of learning needs. On top of this, in 2024, the US Department of Justice issued the ADA Title II Regulation, which requires all state and local government institutions to make their online and digital content fully accessible by 2026 and 2027 — public schools included.
Thankfully, tech advancements are helping make this possible, further proving the benefits of AI in education. For instance, experts say this technology is increasingly joining the accessibility conversation as a pivotal tool to foster accessibility in the classroom: “[It] has such promise for creating tools and environments and experiences that are really personalized for individuals or communities that have been left out in the past and have been marginalized.”
As such, there are myriad ways AI can directly impact inclusivity in the classroom. For one, it could help convert a PDF into a screen reader or tactile diagrams, allowing people with visual impairments to keep up during class. Conversely, it can turn spoken lectures into readable text or translate them into sign language, and even generate visualizations to make it easier to understand abstract concepts. This multimodal approach to accessibility caters to any student who needs or prefers to access educational content beyond what is presented — turning the visual into auditory and vice versa, and transforming content in ways that break down barriers to inclusion.
This way, teachers don’t need to stretch themselves to tackle every possible learning type; AI can do it for them through the students’ tablets or laptops.
Preparing Debates and Contrasting Viewpoints
Having trouble thinking outside the box? School debates, essays, and presentations often challenge students to step into shoes they have never worn before to build their argumentative skills in class. Sometimes, that’s not so easy to do. How can they write and practice their best speech without a tip-top counterargument on the other end to sharpen their talking points?
This is where AI can serve as a useful partner to build debating skills by offering strong opposing responses to a student’s argument. While the tech isn’t meant to be the end-all-be-all of critical thinking, it can be prompted to refute an argument and offer reputable sources to help strengthen a student’s point of view, successfully preparing them for a presentation, essay, or debate.
This is where robust prompting skills will also come in handy, and where teachers must guide students to arrive at the best possible answer from an AI tool, one without bias and a full understanding of inclusive viewpoints. Thankfully, there are apps designed just for this — such as Kialo Edu and Debate Island — allowing students to prepare their debates with a safe and education-focused platform.
Creating Adaptive Study Schedules with Generative AI in Education
One irrefutable truth is that study time directly affects performance in school. A 2022 study proves this, but also warns that spending more time than necessary studying doesn’t impact performance, leaving students feeling burned out without significant benefits. How much a student studies for a subject also relies on how easily they grasp the material or whether they need more time to process and apply the information. So, all in all, building a study schedule must balance skill with availability and other factors such as deadlines — it already sounds tricky.
Although students can try their best to craft a schedule on their own, AI can also lend a helping hand to do it in a fraction of the time and, possibly, more accurately. By providing tools with information like grades, class difficulty, extracurricular activities, and upcoming deadlines, the AI can build a suitable schedule that takes into account availability and the intensity needed to improve certain grades. As grades roll in, the platform can also adapt depending on improvements or declines, shifting to new schedules that create more or less time on a given subject to address weak spots.
There are many online tools especially designed to help students in this area, even going the extra mile by offering tutoring or complementary material to directly tackle pain points.
The benefits of AI in education are directly related to the good use students give it. Ultimately, the technology must be used as a support rather than a replacement for critical analysis, revising, and doing assignments altogether. Today’s teachers have the unique duty to educate students on the proper usage of AI, clearly outlining its advantages as well as its negative effects if used incorrectly.
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