This guest post features the reflections of Asst Prof John Komar from NIE (Physical Education & Sports Science), an experienced educator with a passion for exploring the intersection of technology and teaching. In this post, he shares his insights on the impact of technology and AI in the classroom, highlighting both their potential benefits and drawbacks. He also discusses his own project, which uses computer vision and AI to reinforce personal connections and interactions between teachers and students.
As an educator, I have witnessed the integration of technology and AI in the classroom, and I am both excited and apprehensive about their potential benefits and drawbacks. While I recognise that incorporating new technologies in the classroom has value, I believe that we should focus on the effect of the technology rather than the technology itself.
A few years ago, I led a team that developed an online feedback system for students. At first, the tool seemed interesting and useful, and the students liked it. They could scan a QR code that linked to a web application and provide feedback on their understanding of the lesson content and ask open questions to the lecturer. However, what I noticed was that the easy way to ask questions online killed the human interactions during the lessons. The classroom and lesson time should be perceived as a safe space for students to speak in public, ask questions, make mistakes, and learn. With this new system, the students were indeed asking more questions, but they were writing them in a different channel — the technology didn’t help them to learn how to speak in public and ask questions verbally. In the end, we decided to turn the system off on the day of the lesson, and turn it back on the rest of the week (when the students were doing their homework).
Currently, I am working on a big project that uses computer vision and AI in the classroom to automatically detect the teachers’ activity and the students’ responses. Our vision behind this project is that there is no ideal way of teaching, but good lecturers are lecturers who efficiently adapt their teaching style to the audience. The system is transparent for the teacher and the students, mainly using microphones and cameras located in the classroom. The outcome of the system is a simple report for the lecturer, showing what activity he deployed during the lesson and what the response was from the students. The goal of this project is to highlight and reinforce the relationship and interactions between the lecturer and the students.
When I was a student, my own involvement and participation in school across different disciplines were strongly associated with my relationship with the lecturer (whether good or bad); teaching is, above all else, a personal relationship between individuals, and technology should focus on fostering this. Our pedagogical philosophies, innovative ideas, and approaches should drive our teaching activities, while we use technology and AI to enhance their implementation.
