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Study Finds AI-Powered Chatbots Can Take the Pressure Off Educators

When the COVID-19 pandemic spread all over the globe, it affected nearly everyone in every walk of life. While healthcare workers manned the front lines, educators were not far behind. Teachers, from kindergarten up to university level, were expected to quickly ramp up online teaching by digitizing their curriculum and communicating it to students over teleconference.

Needless to say, nearly two years later, educators are still struggling to adapt. Issues that were once resolved in person are now teeming inboxes, text messages, app messages and disgruntled phone calls from parents and administrators. For some, however, there is some relief in the form of technology…specifically, artificial intelligence, or AI.

According to a recent article by Phys.org, the ethical and strategic use of AI in educational settings can support faculty in troubleshooting and innovating their online teaching practices. Specifically, this AI comes in the form of chatbots.

“Used strategically, chatbots could take over repetitive low-level guidance tasks that teaching and learning centers field and help avoid overload,” according to the Phys.org article. “A chatbot, also called a conversational or virtual agent, is a software or computer system designed to communicate with humans using natural language processing.”

The conclusion is based on research conducted in mid-2020 at 19 centers of teaching and learning and their equivalents from Canada, the United States, Lebanon, the United Kingdom and France.

Chatbots are ideal because they are intelligent automated support resources that are available 24 hours a day to answer basic questions, direct students and staff to resources, and route more complex communications to the right human personnel.

“A collaboration between the centers' experts and technology could provide better services and support for faculty to improve the learning experiences they create for students,” wrote the Phys.org article’s authors. “Chatbots can guide faculty towards appropriate and effective resources and professional development activities, such as how-to articles, tutorials and upcoming workshops. These would be tailored to suit faculties' individual needs, their varied digital skills levels and backgrounds in designing hybrid learning experiences.”

Edited by Luke Bellos