Learning to write well is a challenging, continuous process of editing, deleting, and revising texts. It is of great importance to use self regulation, meaning to control and steer one’s own learning process. A systematic and consistent curriculum, including extensive teacher feedback, is needed to develop self regulation. How can AI map students’ self regulation in their reading and writing skills? And how can the teacher provide proper support for students in developing self regulation skills. Project leader Igor Wassink, who is the strategic advisor education and technology at educational group Quadraam, and head of science Joep van der Graaf, university lecturer and researcher at Radboud University, will tell us more.
Project Self Regulation: ‘Two birds with one stone’
NOLAI’s first ten co-creation projects were launched in September 2023. What happened during that first year? Who are collaborating on the various projects, how does such a co-creation project work in practice? This time we are taking a look into the project ‘Developing self regulation for writing essays’.
Quick developments
Igor has been giving advice regarding learning and teaching with IT to boards, directors, and other employees at a school-wide level. Thanks to his experience as a teacher, team leader, and director, he is able to look at education with an open mind. “I strongly feel that it is necessary to redesign education. Technology is rapidly developing and that is potentially disruptive for society and thus also education. We must prepare our students for a society in which human and technology are intrinsically connected.”
As a NOLAI partner, Quadraam investigates the opportunities and risks of AI, also in language education. “The Flora algorithm has been researched a lot and has also been used in many experiments. It is interesting to see if we can apply it in Dutch, for instance in the basic skills Language. How can the effect be greater by using AI, aiming to improve both language skills and the capacity for self regulation? This projects allows us to get two birds with one stone.”
Comfortable in contemporary education
As of right now, a pilot has been started in four classes of the Candea College in Duiven, a Quadraam school. “The material was designed for havo and vwo classes, and the ambition is to expand it to include other educational forms within Quadraam. Currently, six teachers are involved in the project, and the diversity of the team makes the project fun. The subjects these teachers teach are geography, biology, history, Dutch, and English.
'We want to match the students’ needs in order to equip them with the tools they need in society'
While it was fairly easy to find these teachers that were willing to participate, they each have their own view on AI in education. “Some of the teachers see a great value in it, but there are also teachers that are more sceptical of it and who tell us ‘show us what it can do for us’. At Quadraam we truly want to find out when technology can enrich, support, and strengthen education, but sometimes you also have to indicate when it doesn’t help and you’d prefer to approach it from a more traditional angle. Eventually, we want to enhance the competence and comfort regarding the modernisation of the entirety of education. We want to match the students’ needs in order to equip them with the tools they need in society. And the board has recognised this need now.
Insights into the learning process
As a scientist at Radboud University’s Adaptive Learning Lab, Joep is interested in adaptivity in learning. This project expands upon his own research. In this pilot phase, in which the project is in-between concept and development, teachers and students got to try out the materials that the researchers already had developed. “One of the topics of the essay that the students had to write for this pilot is ‘red and white blood cells’. That matches the contents of the biology course. The goal is that the student summarises what is there and connects various different topics.”
'It would be great if students are able to better envision how they want to approach a task, for that will be useful for them throughout their lives.'
AI monitors the mouse clicks and keyboard hits to match these to actions such as ‘opening essay’ and ‘typing text’ over the course of the 45-minute writing process. “The students are shown a timeline with their actions, such as ‘reading’ and ‘writing’, but also ‘planning’ and ‘orienting’, for instance. Eventually we want to develop a dashboard. Teachers want to ensure that students realise the benefit of the project, considering it is easier for students to set goals regarding the quality of their written work as opposed to the form of their learning process. It would be great if students are able to better envision how they want to approach a task, for that will be useful for them throughout their lives.”
At the cradle
Support at individual and board levels determines how schools can contribute to the development of AI in education. “The pilot uses a validated algorithm, and previous research has shown that it can describe the students’ actions fairly accurately. We are happy to see this and want to develop it further. One of the teachers also explained this to a colleague who had a slight aversion to the use of AI. The aversion decreased once that colleague heard this story,” Joep says.
Igor concludes: “I would love for Quadraam to contribute to the design of AI’s role in the education process. I think it is a great development to be at the cradle of it. I would love for other schools to experience it. People are allowed to experiment and make mistakes. It is all dependent on a supervisor who realises that this is important. If it then happens at a board level as well, that’s great.”
Contact information
- Organizational unit
- National Education Lab AI (NOLAI)
- Theme
- Artificial intelligence (AI), Education
