How Teachers Navigate an "Arrival Technology"

With Guest Justin Reich

AI arrived in classrooms at the same time it arrived in businesses and homes. And while it may speed up tasks at work, teachers, students and parents are still in the early and often painful stages of figuring out how or even if it will make learning “more efficient.” In this episode of Future Fluent, Jeremy and Betsy talk with Dr. Justin Reich, an MIT professor and researcher, and cohost of The Homework Machine podcast. Reich’s been studying Chat GPT's role in school since November 2020. Reich and his team listen closely to teachers through their research. He worries that AI is already slowing down learning. “I think we’re going to find that there are millions and millions fewer minutes of homework being done at all secondary grade levels this year,” he warns. Join us for the full conversation.

Justin Reich

Justin Reich is an educational researcher interested in the future of learning in a networked world. He is an associate professor of digital media at MIT and the director of the MIT Teaching Systems Lab, which aspires to design, implement and research the future of teacher learning. 

He is the host of the TeachLab podcast and the new series The Homework Machine about AI in K-12 Schools. 

He is the author of Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools andFailure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education from Harvard University Press. He is the instructor for several open online courses at MIT including including Sorting Truth from Fiction: Civic Online Reasoning and Becoming a More Equitable Educator: Mindsets and Practices. Justin is a former fellow and faculty associate of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. Justin started his career teaching 9th grade world history, coaching wrestling, and leading outdoor activities. 

Our wide ranging conversation with Justin Reich touched on some great resources if you’d like to dive further into the question of what we should be teaching either about or with AI. 

• Get started by jumping into the podcast that Justin cohosts called The Homework Machine. It explores the art and craft of teaching through interviews with more than 120 teachers and students from across a wide variety of subjects. 

• Prefer to read about AI? Browse this downloadable (and free) PDF from Reich and his colleagues called: A Guide to AI in Schools: Perspectives for the Perplexed. 

• Justin’s past books are well worth exploring, too. He wrote Iterate: The Secret To Innovation In Schools (published in 2023) and Failure To Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can't Transform Education (published in 2020). 

• Want to understand more about how we teach and learn? Check out the National Tutoring Observatory, a research program aimed at improving teaching and learning at scale by studying great tutors. 

• Also seminal: the work of cognitive and learning scientist, Michelene (“Micky”) T.H. Chi. She has built a rich collection of research around how students learn, study and solve problems. 

• Verified: How to think straight, get duped less, and make better decisions about what to believe online by Mike Caulfield and Sam Wineburg (2023) explores what we should trust online.   

• And when it’s all too much, try a little fiction: Babel - An Arcane History by R.F. Kuang (2022), is a historical fantasy, a sort of Harry Potter meets linguists in a complex world.