Research Hub: Digital Education
What is the aim of the Research Hub Digital Education?
We believe that the development of artificial intelligence and other technological advancements will bring about significant changes in education. Despite the challenges and risks, we see this as a major opportunity for the education system. Our research aims to contribute to a well-founded understanding of what digitally and AI-supported teaching means for educators and learners. We also specifically investigate how interactive and adaptive learning experiences can be effectively enhanced through digital tools. Additionally, we consider it our responsibility to develop appropriate tools based on valid research findings, ensuring that this field is not driven primarily by commercial interests.
How can schools benefit from this research?
High-quality AI technologies in education aim to optimize teaching and learning by addressing the needs of individual learners. Digital media support and relieve educators, and in times of teacher shortages and unforeseen disruptions like global pandemics, they help maintain instruction and make the best use of available resources. Evidence-based, independent research and the provision of corresponding applications guarantee quality and provide crucial decision-making foundations.
HUB-Responsibles
Prof. Dr. Xiaobin Chen
with contributions from Prof. Dr. Luise von Keyserlingk and Prof. Dr. Ulrich Trautwein
Recent Publications
- Bear, E. & Chen, X. (2023). Evaluating a conversational agent for second language learning aligned with the school curriculum. In Proceedings of the International Conference of Artificial Intelligence in Education (AIED 2023, Doctoral Consortium). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36336-8_22
- Bühler, B., Hou, R., Bozkir, E., Goldberg, P., Gerjets, P., Trautwein, U., & Kasneci, E. (2023). Automated hand-raising detection in classroom videos: A view-invariant and occlusion-robust machine learning approach. In International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (pp. 102-113). Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland.
- Fütterer, T., Fischer, C., Alekseeva, A. Chen, X., Tate, T., Warschauer, M., & Gerjets, P. (2023). ChatGPT in education: global reactions to AI innovations. Nature Scientific Reports, 13, 15310. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-42227-6
Selected Projects
AISLA
The Aisla project is developing an intelligent language assistant that allows English learners to practice the language in everyday situations. The goal is to provide individual speaking practice and instant feedback through a mobile app, similar to a private tutor. Aisla detects the user’s current scenario (e.g., a restaurant) and presents appropriate learning tasks, supported by the latest speech processing and artificial intelligence technologies.
Polke
The POLKE project explores the use of AI in education, focusing on the extraction of linguistic knowledge and the generation of natural language with controllable readability. It aims to develop methods for modeling the linguistic knowledge of foreign language learners and to create technologies that can automatically adjust the difficulty level of the generated language.