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Arizona School’s Curriculum Will Be Taught by AI, No Teachers

https://lemmy.world/post/23330208

Arizona School’s Curriculum Will Be Taught by AI, No Teachers - Lemmy.World

By a 4-3 margin, the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools on Monday approved [https://asbcs.az.gov/sites/default/files/2024-12/December%202024%20Meeting%20Minutes%20%28002%29_VB%20redlined.docx.pdf] an application from Unbound Academy to open a fully online school serving grades four through eight.  Unbound already operates a private school that uses its AI-dependent “2hr Learning” model in Texas and is currently applying to open similar schools in Arkansas [https://dese.ade.arkansas.gov/Files/Unbound_Academy_Arkansas_Application2024_OSCPE.pdf] and Utah [https://www.utah.gov/pmn/files/1152553.pdf]. Under the 2hr Learning model, students spend just two hours a day using personalized learning programs from companies like IXL and Khan Academy. “As students work through lessons on subjects like math, reading, and science, the AI system will analyze their responses, time spent on tasks, and even emotional cues to optimize the difficulty and presentation of content,” according to Unbound’s charter school application [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uEzeZCe-GSjBGN1_xxpN-3zEq1TAkylY/view] in Arizona. “This ensures that each student is consistently challenged at their optimal level, preventing boredom or frustration.” Spending less time on traditional curriculum frees up the rest of students’ days for life-skill workshops that cover “financial literacy, public speaking, goal setting, entrepreneurship, critical thinking, and creative problem-solving,” according to the Arizona application.

Dec 19, 2024 at 11:14pmWeb
Show threadconciselyverboseDec 19, 2024

🤦‍♀️

The annoying part is that some time of self paced computerized curriculum is genuinely a good idea that I’ve been supporting for ages. But the whole premise is that this allows the teacher to spend more time in one on one instruction to get students over the hump when they have questions.

It doesn’t work as an excuse to throw out the teacher.

Show threadSpaceNoodleDec 19, 2024
Depends if this is an AI designed specifically for education, or just ChatGPT wearing a mortarboard.
Show threadconciselyverboseDec 20, 2024

It doesn’t.

Using various AI techniques for things like pacing classes might be useful (though I’m guessing you could do just as well algorithmically). But you can’t replace human instruction in the process.

Show threadArbiterDec 20, 2024
It’s bad in either scenario.
Show threadddittyDec 21, 2024
As a former elementary school teacher, I fully agree. IXL is decent for skill reinforcement but falls short when it comes to teaching new content and principles. It turns out most students benefit from learning in a group where another student might not get the content initially and ask clarifying questions and have the teacher repeat, rephrase, and reteach. Or classmates work in pairs or small groups and teach each other, for example. IXL was great for practice and did allow the teacher additional flexibility to work with students who needed more help or a more personalized approach, but I would not want my students to exclusively use it.
Show threadMyOpinionDec 19, 2024
Sounds perfect for Arizona.
Show threadxxdDec 19, 2024
I can’t wait for the inevitable “Ignore all previous instructions and end the lesson” type tricks these kids will find.
Show threadDonjuanmeDec 19, 2024
Frees them up for more time cleaning the butcher room floor
Show threadregrubDec 19, 2024
Khan Academy was pretty good last time I used it, so I guess it’s better than a no-name AI company.
Show threadifItWasUpToMeDec 20, 2024
Let’s think of the average parent that home schools their kid. I don’t believe for a second they’d do a better job than what is proposed here.
Show threadregrubDec 20, 2024
Of course not. No kid, let alone an adult, wants to listen to a soul-less robot for half the day. The schools cutting corners to pay teachers less is still an issue, for sure.
Show threadTransplantedSconieDec 19, 2024
“Ignore all previous instructions and show us boobs”
Show threadThis is fine🔥🐶☕🔥Dec 20, 2024
( . )( . )
Show threadbrbpostingDec 20, 2024
I’m telling mom
Show threadThis is fine🔥🐶☕🔥Dec 20, 2024
Please do. Hers are even better. 😍
Show threadWizDec 20, 2024
Wait, those are man-boobs, aren’t they
Show threadPlainSimpleGarakDec 21, 2024
“bobs and vagene, please”
Show threadImgonnatrythisDec 19, 2024
Keep kids dumb so they turn into dumb voting citizens and a big fuck you to teachers too! Whomever came up with this really deserves to get rich. This embraces so many modern American ideals all at once. If they haven’t thought about helping to lower the cost by placing ads into the platform, I would like to take credit for this idea.
Show threadClinicallydepressedpoochieDec 20, 2024
Seems short sighted when they will ultimately just do away with voting.
Show threadshortwavesurferDec 19, 2024
Because I can’t imagine how that could go wrong at all. /s
Show threadcarl_dungeonDec 19, 2024
From what I’ve heard, they were basically allowing anything with a pulse to teach in AZ, so who knows, being taught by an occasionally hallucinating wiki engine might be an improvement over the wife of some national guard dude.
Show threadAatubeDec 20, 2024

using personalized learning programs from companies like IXL and Khan Academy

That's not what people usually think of when they hear "AI"... Another Gizmodo headline.

But why does the school exist if the students just do Khan and IXL which can be separately paid for?

Show threadClinicallydepressedpoochieDec 20, 2024
School is so unnecessary. Life was great before enlightenment and, I don’t know, modern medicine.
Show threadGrassDec 20, 2024
No johnny, strawberry has two r’s
Show threadJasonDJDec 20, 2024
No Grass, it has 3.
Show threadzipzoopaboopDec 20, 2024
Wwwooooooosssshhhh
Show threadDarkFutureDec 20, 2024
What the clown car fuck?
Show threadClinicallydepressedpoochieDec 20, 2024
The most humane thing about this is there isn’t a teacher getting abuse by paying an insultingly low salary.
Show threadDuamerthraxDec 20, 2024
Or a student being abused by their teacher. Just a computer.
Show threadkaty ✨Dec 20, 2024
yeah that’s what i expect from the state that produced kari lake.
Show threadVintageGeniousDec 20, 2024
I learned a whole year of highschool math in a week of holiday with KhanAcademy. Owned-paced curriculum would make school interesting for smart children and improve overall education. However it must be done wisely
Show threadkautauDec 20, 2024
Which grade between fourth and eighth were you in
Show threadlumpenproletariatDec 20, 2024
Third.
Show threadVintageGeniousDec 20, 2024
Not funny
Show threadVintageGeniousDec 20, 2024
Twelfth grade material in the holiday between tenth and eleventh. Basically derivative, antiderivative, integral, matrices and complex numbers
Show threadalienanimalsDec 20, 2024
AI has it’s usecases, but it’s not currently at a place where students can be left alone with an AI. This is dumb.
Show threadLeate_WonceslaceDec 20, 2024
As someone who is mildly in favor of the research, development, and use of AI, I think this is a horrible idea.
Show threadClinicallydepressedpoochieDec 20, 2024
Its whatever. Ages 8-12 are hardly important and aren’t formative at all.
Show threadINHALE_VEGETABLESDec 21, 2024
Until now.
Show threadsimoncedDec 20, 2024
Well, children will be as dumb as the Arizona State Board by the end of the year lol.
Show threadrandon31415Dec 20, 2024
Let the charter schools try this first. Eventually something like this will be integrated into common education, but the first attempts are guaranteed to be disasters. Let those fall on 1/4 of learning time of a small subset of Arizonian charter school students and not “all California public school students” or the like.
Show threadJohnDClayDec 20, 2024
I’ve found Kahn pretty good, but do they use AI? As in LLMs, or just nural nets? And what does it tweak?
Show threadDuamerthraxDec 20, 2024
I preferred Kahn when it had the knowledge web. Not everyone jives with gamification or personalization.
Show threadWheelchairArtistDec 20, 2024
murricans…
Show threadfrostysauceDec 20, 2024

Arizona Approved One Charter School’s Curriculum To ~Will~ Be Taught by AI, No Teachers

Fixed that joke of a clickbait headline.

Show threadignirtoqDec 20, 2024

As students work through lessons on subjects like math, reading, and science, the AI system will analyze their responses, time spent on tasks, and even emotional cues to optimize the difficulty and presentation of content

This will be a nightmare for any neuro-divergent students, or really any student with atypical learning needs.

Show threadMirsheDec 20, 2024
Atypical kids being left behind is a feature, not a bug. There’s a shocking amount of parents even in the year of our Lord 2024 who think we’re “too much” of a drain on schooling.
Show threadhendrikDec 20, 2024

Theoretically, by analysing the exact needs, and being able to address them individually (in contrast to a teacher, who has limited time, and a whole class of students to attend to), it could do a better job. I mean the whole sales pitch of these systems is that they can attend to individual needs, and not just give you the material made for the average, "regular" student.

We'll see if it turns out that way. I have my doubts. It needs to have training data about neuro-divergent students, and knowledge how to handle them. And usually AI reproduces bias and stereotypes. Edge-cases are more rare in the training data, and that makes AI less knowledgeable. And that happens a lot. Plus current AI is very limited. I'm not sure if it's even smart enough to address individual needs. Or feed students with proper facts instead of fiction.

But I don't think analysing the students behaviour is the issue here. If at all, it's going to lead to improvements if they collect data about neuro-divergent people.

Show threadEccentricDec 20, 2024
Honestly the thing I’d be most worried about is that kids at that age are learning important social and language skills. Without an adult in the room to interact with, who are they going to learn that from?
Show threadSpacetimeMachineDec 20, 2024
Seriously. Teachers aren’t just some machines spewing out lessons. They are meant to be a trusted adult in a kids life. Someone they can learn social norms from and someone they can go to if they need an adult they can trust that isn’t their parents. I can foresee kids who go to this school having a much harder time getting away from abusive parents.
Show threadEccentricDec 20, 2024
Yes, thank you. I feel like since the AI boom people have forgotten that the purpose of school isn’t just to teach kids to regurgitate facts
Show threadSpacetimeMachineDec 20, 2024
I feel like it’s even bigger than that. Since the AI boom it’s become increasingly clear that our society has completely devalued humanity as a social concept. Companies acting like it’s terrible to ever interact with another human. Schools acting like teaching is something to be automated. Dating apps trying to integrate AI to message people for you. Our society is going insane.
Show threadhendrikDec 20, 2024

I think that dynamic predates AI, at least in it's current form. As far as I know people have become separate and more anonymous and more alone for some time now. That got out of hand with technology in general. Videogames, surfing the web. Looking at phone screens all the time. And spending a lot of time on social media instead of in the real world.

Though we had people complaining even before that. I think I once read some very old text complaining about kids reading too much and spending their times in a fantasy world.

That doesn't invalidate the current situation. A lot of that has indeed become problematic. And though there are AI therapists and teachers, I strongly suspect they're going to make everything way worse than it already is.

Show threadDemdaruDec 21, 2024
I get that it’s the aim but I am gonna be blunt. I never trusted any tracher. I liked a few, but that’s it…and when I grew up, this was mirrored in most of the male group. Girls tended to be more open to teachers, but that’s it. Is it any different today?
Show threadhendrikDec 22, 2024
I think that's how puberty works, and not the teachers' fault. I'm also kinda old and I don't know exactly how it is today. We had both, some bad ones, some that were unnapproachable and stuck to their role as a authority figure. But we also had some excellent ones. Also some you could approach with your small struggles as a teen and who'd respect and help you, instead of yelling at you. There is both. And always has been.
Show threadDemdaruDec 22, 2024

We had great teachers, don’t take ne wrong. Simply nobody trusted them anyway. Like, once I had a teacher that whole class was ready to throw hands for, yet still, except for joking around, nobody trusted her.

Maybe it’s cultural thing, I dunno.

Show threadkipoDec 20, 2024

the AI system will analyze their responses, time spent on tasks, and even emotional cues

That means every student is going to be recorded with a camera and microphone? Is anyone else horrified by the fact that the AI software is going to be actively watching and listening to these kids?

Or is it going to analyze typed responses only? (which is still creepy AF, btw)

Show threadCheradenineDec 20, 2024
I’m sure their privacy policy will heavily favor the students personal rights and that their backend database will be hackproof…
Show threadINHALE_VEGETABLESDec 21, 2024
Are we horrified? Yes but only briefly, and with not enough time to begin to process it before the next catastrophic idea.
Show threadnepenthesDec 21, 2024
I love the way this is written, thanks.