Keeping Up with the Gen Zs: a Sceptic’s Guide to Adapting Existing Teaching Materials for an AI-Savvy Audience
Speaker: Ross Bennie (Bern University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland)
Abstract
This interactive talk investigates the challenges of adapting to AI in an English teaching environment. Seen through the lens of an elementary university course developing sound reading research practice, the talk describes a technosceptic – but never technophobic – incremental approach to improving learning outcomes using AI.
The presenter gives practical examples of how a course design which had become outdated and overwhelmed by students’ use of AI tools to reduce their own effort is now becoming an opportunity for them to exploit AI, not to take shortcuts but instead to empower and enhance their own learning. Course redevelopment is an ongoing process, and the presenter invites the audience, whether AI-in-education experts or novices, to contribute suggestions which might lead to a better way forward.
Looking to the future, two issues present themselves. First, what scope is there for automated assessment, which would allow much greater individualisation of learning? Second, how should we meet the learning needs of digital-native students? Do we need a radical disruption of the teacher-student relationship, or is there still a place for classroom learning? In keeping with the incremental approach to the application of AI to education, the presenter can show some evidence that traditional classroom interaction should continue as a mainstay of educational practice.
Bio
Ross Bennie is a Scot who has lived in Switzerland for over 25 years. A first degree in electronics led to a decade working as a software engineer. His wife got a job in Switzerland and he went with her, eventually reinventing himself as a teacher of English as a second language. After completing a master’s qualification in teaching English to adults, he took up his current position teaching business administration students at Bern University of Applied Sciences. He has since gained a qualification in university didactics and become a Swiss citizen.