I’ve been telling colleagues for the last five years that artificial intelligence in education has the potential to make educators’ and students’ lives easier. This is accomplished by allowing machines to undertake jobs that are normally performed by people. As a result, instructors are free to focus on jobs that cannot be completed by AI and require emotional intelligence and expertise.

However, how might AI be applied in more delicate areas of education, such as literacy? I feel that there are several reading and literacy activities and evaluations that instructors conduct on their own, but that AI could readily facilitate. In this article, I’ll describe some of the learning activities that I used to do as a teacher before 2008 that AI can now do.

What effect would this have on literacy rates? Because if activities like these can be automated, educators can devote their attention to students who require more rigorous academic interventions.

Relationships based on Question-and-Answer (QARS). 

Is a reading technique that aims to assist learners in distinguishing between questions with answers that can be found directly in the text (“right there”), questions with answers that can be found in the text but require synthesis (“putting it together”), and questions that require the reader to use prior knowledge to find the answers (“on my own”). A forward-thinking edtech firm may utilize machine learning to automate this operation and include it in one of its existing apps.

GRASP (Guided Reading And Summarizing Procedure).

 Is a reading strategy (used under teacher guidance) in which learners read to collect information and try to remember as much as possible, make a list of what they remember after the reading, reread the material to add to, delete, and correct information, and then organize information based on their details. The majority of this activity can be automated with AI, although variable amounts of teacher direction are still required.

Informal Reading Inventory. 

A type of assessment in which students read a series of passages and answer questions, allowing the instructor to monitor students’ reading practices, pick relevant reading material, determine three learner reading levels, and learn about students’ strengths and shortcomings. This task could simply be performed by AI. In fact, I am certain that companies are doing this presently, but I am unaware of their existence.

Quick writes. 

An informal writing strategy for determining learners’ past knowledge of specific topics, monitoring comprehension, or summarizing newly learned knowledge. Learners write down what they know about a particular topic, which can subsequently be utilized to set a starting point for teaching, evaluate learner learning, and organize future sessions. AI is currently being used to rate learner essays, thus I see no reason why it couldn’t be used to examine and evaluate this activity. 

AI could use reputable online sources or a database to validate the learner’s prior knowledge. It may provide insights regarding a learner’s level of familiarity with the subject matter, allowing educators to build individualized learning paths for each learner.

What other items would you add to my list?