Role of AI in the Education Industry

 

Artificial Intelligence in Education

Now, almost every day, we come across a news or a piece of content about artificial intelligence. For example, news like “Artificial intelligence beat the world champion in complex strategy game” is quite interesting for digital game lovers. Similarly, for sci-fi lovers who have entered our lives by Hollywood productions, at least one movie per term, “Matrix 4 is on the way!” The news is followed with great interest. Or, for the new generation of technology lovers, who show that completely driverless - electric cars will enter our lives, which will interest almost everyone, the news of "Elon Musk's new smart car" can be seen in every news channel, including local channels. And finally, "education by expert systems according to our learning speed and style" is very attractive news for both students and teachers at home, whenever and however we want, without going to school. As a result, artificial intelligence applications are decreasing day by day in terms of cost and increasing day by day in terms of performance and awareness with the investments and technological developments. Although it sometimes stays in the background in our daily lives, it has been integrated, widespread and inevitable in terms of impact. And this technology is used effectively in many different fields, from Siri to digital journalism, from stock movement prediction to crime prediction, from facial recognition to medical diagnostics (Holmes et al., 2019). However, the subject of this study is to reveal how artificial intelligence, which has already entered the classroom in different ways, contributes to education and with which applications it is used (Luckin, Holmes, Griffiths, & Forcier, 2016). In fact, while the subject of artificial intelligence in education is perceived by many as the inclusion of “robot teachers” in education, the reality is a little different than anticipated. Artificial intelligence can be grouped under three headings in terms of areas of interest. These are data-based, logic-based and knowledge-based artificial intelligence approaches. From the 1980s to the 2000s, educational applications of artificial intelligence were mostly based on a knowledge-based approach (Sleeman & Brown, 1982). In the specified period, research areas were mostly on structures consisting of three modules, namely domain, student and pedagogical, under the name of intelligent teaching systems (Woolf, 2009). In a typical learning management system for that day, the domain module defined the area to be learned, the student module defined the student's knowledge and learning status, and the pedagogical module defined the pedagogical presentation of learning materials to the student with an adaptive and interactive interface. When artificial intelligence studies in education are examined today, different applications can be seen in almost every field, not only knowledge-based, but also data and logic-based artificial intelligence and artificial intelligence applications. These include personalized education or dialogue education systems, exploratory education, data mining in education, article analysis of students, smart agents, chatbots, education for children with special needs, child-robot interaction, assessment systems based on artificial intelligence, automatic test creation systems. Note that these areas are mostly about supporting learning. However, artificial intelligence in education also supports schools and universities administratively. For example, curriculum, personnel schedules, exam management, cyber security, facility management and security are areas where artificial intelligence contributes directly to school management and indirectly to teaching (Holmes et al., 2019).

According to Edward Fredkin, a world-renowned developer and authority at the forefront of his work in the field of artificial intelligence, “There are three great events in history. The first of these is the creation of the universe. The second is the beginning of life. The third is the emergence of artificial intelligence.” Based on this sentence, it can be said that the potential of artificial intelligence and the point it can go are far beyond what is imagined. It is certain that this technology, which is advancing at a dizzying pace, adds strength to education from different aspects and will create a greater acceleration in overcoming the problems encountered in the teaching process.

Reference

Arslan, K. (2017). Eğitimde Yapay Zeka ve Uygulamaları. Batı Anadolu Eğitim Bilimleri Dergisi, 11(1), 71-88

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