Impact of AI Application on Digital Education Focused on STE(A)M

Abstract

Digitization is omnipresent and digital transformations are thus constantly taking place in all areas of society. Of course, education is also subject to these changes. Since it is an absolute prerequisite for both the future security of society and the development of the individual, it must be innovated continuously in order to guarantee the future opportunities of future generations. To ensure that these developments can be planned and shaped systematically, there are varieties of initiatives by education stakeholders. Current studies emphasize that the further digitisation of education is a very complex and demanding process, although successful theories, concepts and models already exist.

Although the key role of the digitisation of education is taken into account, the new challenge of the interplay between human and artificial intelligence is emerging. Artificial intelligence has been researched and taught for many years, especially in the context of knowledge-based systems], but with digitisation it is gaining a completely new status and an exploding range of applications. The individual field of artificial intelligence is increasingly linked with other scientific fields in an interdisciplinary way, resulting in new methodological, technological, social and ethical challenges. 

Existing target systems in research and teaching are not to be replaced completely, but should rather be questioned and further developed in a very comprehensive way. For this reason, the proven problem-solving processes are being made more dynamic and agile. They will be optimised with the methods and means of digitisation as well as artificial intelligence. Due to the omnipresence of digitization and artificial intelligence, all processes, structures and functions must also be reviewed and adapted in education.

A prerequisite for this is a renaissance of the interaction of science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and their combination with areas of humanities, economics and social sciences. Applications of artificial intelligence are finding their way into all the above-mentioned scientific fields and promote their networking. These developments are already becoming visible in complex research and education projects, making it possible to demonstrate the sustainability of the new approaches in an exemplary manner.

However, the rapid development of digitalisation in general and of artificial intelligence in particular is generating distortions in the systems. Seeking solutions for them is also on the agenda of research and teaching. This paper contributes to this debate by applying a systemic approach to develop a new understanding of the relationships between digitalisation and artificial intelligence. 

First, an overview of digitalisation in education as well as of smart systems based on human and artificial intelligence will be presented. The next section of this paper explains the theoretical basis of this research before discussing a specific example of STEAM influence on education. Finally, ethical borders of digitalisation and AI in education are highlighted.