WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.060 Welcome to the deep dive, where we try to cut 00:00:02.060 --> 00:00:03.839 through the noise and really get to the heart 00:00:03.839 --> 00:00:06.360 of what matters. Today, we're plunging into a 00:00:06.360 --> 00:00:09.099 question that honestly feels more urgent almost 00:00:09.099 --> 00:00:11.820 every day. In a world where AI can practically 00:00:11.820 --> 00:00:15.519 teach itself, is human teaching becoming obsolete? 00:00:15.679 --> 00:00:18.100 We've gone on a deep dive into some excerpts 00:00:18.100 --> 00:00:21.260 from Teaching in the AI World, A Time for John 00:00:21.260 --> 00:00:23.600 Dewey, which is a really thought -provoking post 00:00:23.600 --> 00:00:26.739 by Gary Ackerman over on hackscience .education. 00:00:27.140 --> 00:00:28.980 And our mission really is to dig out the crucial 00:00:28.980 --> 00:00:31.000 takeaways on how a philosopher from a century 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:34.159 ago, John Dewey, offers this enduring and, well, 00:00:34.340 --> 00:00:36.439 kind of eerily relevant framework for education 00:00:36.439 --> 00:00:40.170 now in this age of AI. It is quite remarkable, 00:00:40.490 --> 00:00:41.789 actually. Dewey's ideas, you know, they didn't 00:00:41.789 --> 00:00:43.969 just appear out of nowhere. They came about during 00:00:43.969 --> 00:00:46.189 this period of massive industrial upheaval in 00:00:46.189 --> 00:00:49.070 the U .S. right around the late 19th, early 20th 00:00:49.070 --> 00:00:51.090 centuries. The whole country was shifting really 00:00:51.090 --> 00:00:53.630 rapidly from being mostly agricultural to this 00:00:53.630 --> 00:00:56.509 urban industrial kind of powerhouse. And that 00:00:56.509 --> 00:00:59.210 historical context, this backdrop of profound 00:00:59.210 --> 00:01:01.950 systemic change, it just makes his insights, 00:01:01.950 --> 00:01:04.290 yeah, uncannily relevant to our digital revolution 00:01:04.290 --> 00:01:06.569 today. Right. And this is where we hit that central 00:01:06.569 --> 00:01:09.689 puzzle, isn't it? We know AI can handle assessments. 00:01:10.030 --> 00:01:12.810 It can fine tune curricula, even crank out personalized 00:01:12.810 --> 00:01:15.150 learning paths. Seems great. But Dewey pulls 00:01:15.150 --> 00:01:17.870 us back and reminds us that education isn't just 00:01:17.870 --> 00:01:21.170 downloading information. He called it a reconstruction 00:01:21.170 --> 00:01:23.069 of experience. Reconstruction of experience. 00:01:23.569 --> 00:01:25.810 Yeah. What he really meant, I think, was that 00:01:25.810 --> 00:01:27.969 real transformative learning has to be active. 00:01:28.069 --> 00:01:30.450 It has to be deeply social. And it needs to be 00:01:30.450 --> 00:01:34.129 rooted in real world meaning. And the core insight 00:01:34.090 --> 00:01:37.269 here is pretty stark. No chat bot, doesn't matter 00:01:37.269 --> 00:01:39.750 how advanced, can reconstruct experience for 00:01:39.750 --> 00:01:42.569 a human learner. That's on us. OK, so let's really 00:01:42.569 --> 00:01:45.049 unpack this idea, this reconstruction of experience. 00:01:45.849 --> 00:01:48.290 One of Dewey's absolute foundational principles 00:01:48.290 --> 00:01:51.590 was experiential learning, learning by doing. 00:01:51.879 --> 00:01:54.079 And this was his direct challenge to the old 00:01:54.079 --> 00:01:56.540 ways, the rote memorization, the really rigid 00:01:56.540 --> 00:01:58.879 standardized schooling. He insisted that genuine 00:01:58.879 --> 00:02:01.299 knowledge has to grow from actually doing things, 00:02:01.700 --> 00:02:03.680 engaging with the world, and then thinking about 00:02:03.680 --> 00:02:05.439 it. As he famously put it, and you can find this 00:02:05.439 --> 00:02:08.000 in his 1938 work, Experience and Education, we 00:02:08.000 --> 00:02:10.300 do not learn from experience. We learn from reflecting 00:02:10.300 --> 00:02:12.400 on experience. That's such a powerful distinction. 00:02:12.740 --> 00:02:14.840 And it really highlights a potential pitfall, 00:02:14.840 --> 00:02:18.039 I think, in the AI -driven classroom. Think about 00:02:18.039 --> 00:02:20.800 those intelligent tutoring systems, maybe the 00:02:20.800 --> 00:02:23.580 ones that guide students step by step through, 00:02:23.580 --> 00:02:27.159 say, a math problem. While they seem efficient 00:02:27.159 --> 00:02:29.699 on the surface, there's a genuine risk that learners 00:02:29.699 --> 00:02:32.939 become, well, over -assisted. They're kind of 00:02:32.939 --> 00:02:35.750 shielded from what Dewey called productive struggle. 00:02:35.909 --> 00:02:37.750 Productive struggle. Yeah, that's such a key 00:02:37.750 --> 00:02:40.110 phrase, isn't it? It forces us to ask, you know, 00:02:40.449 --> 00:02:42.789 are students simply completing tasks handed to 00:02:42.789 --> 00:02:45.370 them by machines or are they truly formulating 00:02:45.370 --> 00:02:47.469 their own questions, testing their own ideas, 00:02:47.810 --> 00:02:49.789 discovering patterns for themselves? Exactly. 00:02:50.050 --> 00:02:52.389 Technology really should augment, always deepen, 00:02:52.610 --> 00:02:55.250 not just replace those crucial opportunities 00:02:55.250 --> 00:02:58.590 to wrestle with complexity, with ambiguity. And 00:02:58.590 --> 00:03:00.689 what's fascinating here is that productive struggle 00:03:00.689 --> 00:03:03.409 isn't just about making things arbitrarily difficult. 00:03:03.810 --> 00:03:06.729 It emerges from problems that are genuinely relevant 00:03:06.729 --> 00:03:09.689 and interesting to the students themselves. When 00:03:09.689 --> 00:03:11.849 learning focuses on these kinds of authentic 00:03:11.849 --> 00:03:14.770 challenges, it opens up the potential for a much 00:03:14.770 --> 00:03:17.090 deeper kind of learning, one that can actually 00:03:17.090 --> 00:03:19.669 change how students see the world. And that's 00:03:19.669 --> 00:03:22.069 far more effective, surely, than just clear learning 00:03:22.069 --> 00:03:25.259 objectives that, well, frankly, might have no 00:03:25.259 --> 00:03:27.520 real meaning to them personally. In this kind 00:03:27.520 --> 00:03:30.020 of experiential learning, it fundamentally demands 00:03:30.020 --> 00:03:33.639 autonomy, right? Dewey saw the learner as an 00:03:33.639 --> 00:03:35.879 active participant, a creator of meaning, not 00:03:35.879 --> 00:03:38.639 just some passive recipient waiting for information. 00:03:38.879 --> 00:03:42.039 And that view directly challenges these overly 00:03:42.039 --> 00:03:44.419 prescriptive AI systems that can sometimes narrow 00:03:44.419 --> 00:03:46.719 learning down into simple, almost behaviorist 00:03:46.719 --> 00:03:49.180 feedback loops, like if you do this, you get 00:03:49.180 --> 00:03:51.879 that reward. Like training a pet on those. Exactly. 00:03:52.060 --> 00:03:54.759 The source warns that if we lose what it calls 00:03:54.759 --> 00:03:56.840 the messiness of learning, that struggle, that 00:03:56.840 --> 00:03:59.979 exploration, we risk losing creativity, resilience, 00:04:00.360 --> 00:04:02.210 even that independent critical thought qualities 00:04:02.210 --> 00:04:04.669 machines just, well, they can't replicate. Now, 00:04:04.930 --> 00:04:06.750 here's where Dewey gets really interesting about 00:04:06.750 --> 00:04:09.409 the social side of learning. He famously conceived 00:04:09.409 --> 00:04:11.689 of the classroom as a miniature society. Just 00:04:11.689 --> 00:04:13.830 imagine that. A space where democratic habits 00:04:13.830 --> 00:04:16.670 are actually forged through collaboration, through 00:04:16.670 --> 00:04:19.990 dialogue, through mutual respect. And this social 00:04:19.990 --> 00:04:22.750 dimension, it's especially critical now. Why? 00:04:22.889 --> 00:04:25.529 because powerful algorithms are already subtly 00:04:25.529 --> 00:04:27.610 shaping things. They're structuring access to 00:04:27.610 --> 00:04:29.310 knowledge, they're sorting students into groups, 00:04:29.709 --> 00:04:31.889 they're even predicting future academic paths. 00:04:32.870 --> 00:04:35.769 And critically, these AI systems, they're trained 00:04:35.769 --> 00:04:38.250 on vast amounts of existing data. And that data 00:04:38.250 --> 00:04:40.470 inherently reflects the past biases and all. 00:04:40.689 --> 00:04:42.910 Right. So Dewey's philosophy, especially as this 00:04:42.910 --> 00:04:45.889 idea of the classroom as a mini society, it basically 00:04:45.889 --> 00:04:48.430 compels educators to really interrogate these 00:04:48.430 --> 00:04:50.649 systems. It pushes us to ask those essential 00:04:50.649 --> 00:04:53.529 questions like, what fundamental values are actually 00:04:53.529 --> 00:04:55.709 built into the educational technologies we're 00:04:55.709 --> 00:04:59.629 using? And who gets to decide which data, which 00:04:59.629 --> 00:05:02.790 information truly matters in shaping a student's 00:05:02.790 --> 00:05:05.810 journey? Who's making those choices? Dewey's 00:05:05.810 --> 00:05:07.829 democratic vision, it really calls for transparency 00:05:07.829 --> 00:05:10.689 here and active participation. It's simply not 00:05:10.689 --> 00:05:13.050 enough for students to just learn with technology. 00:05:13.589 --> 00:05:15.850 They absolutely must learn to question it, to 00:05:15.850 --> 00:05:18.389 understand its structure, its limitations. And 00:05:18.389 --> 00:05:20.170 this is a point that frankly isn't always at 00:05:20.170 --> 00:05:22.550 the forefront of what we teach students or even 00:05:22.550 --> 00:05:25.110 what we necessarily empower educators to explore 00:05:25.110 --> 00:05:27.449 fully. It's about understanding the underlying 00:05:27.449 --> 00:05:30.089 design. Yeah, the why behind the what. Precisely. 00:05:30.939 --> 00:05:33.160 As our classrooms get more and more connected, 00:05:33.160 --> 00:05:35.819 you know, to global networks, digital tools everywhere, 00:05:36.240 --> 00:05:38.759 Dewey's commitment to what he called social intelligence 00:05:38.759 --> 00:05:41.860 becomes this crucial safeguard against, well, 00:05:42.180 --> 00:05:45.139 alienation, feeling disconnected. Teaching has 00:05:45.139 --> 00:05:48.000 to intentionally cultivate empathy, shared inquiry, 00:05:48.279 --> 00:05:51.360 a deep sense of belonging. Algorithms might personalize 00:05:51.360 --> 00:05:54.060 content down to a last detail, sure, but they 00:05:54.060 --> 00:05:57.560 cannot build community. That task remains firmly 00:05:57.560 --> 00:06:00.649 and I'd say wonderfully. in the human domain. 00:06:00.970 --> 00:06:03.370 Absolutely, it's about connection. Okay, moving 00:06:03.370 --> 00:06:05.449 on to how we actually measure learning. This 00:06:05.449 --> 00:06:07.610 is another big one. Dewey viewed intelligence 00:06:07.610 --> 00:06:10.110 not as some fixed mark you hit like a score on 00:06:10.110 --> 00:06:12.870 a test, but as this dynamic capacity to grow, 00:06:13.170 --> 00:06:15.930 to adapt, to continually reconstruct your understanding. 00:06:16.329 --> 00:06:18.410 He was famously a vocal critic of standardized 00:06:18.410 --> 00:06:20.829 testing, seeing it as just far too simplistic, 00:06:21.009 --> 00:06:24.160 too reductive. In this view, It stands in really 00:06:24.160 --> 00:06:26.939 stark contrast to many of today's AI systems, 00:06:27.000 --> 00:06:29.120 doesn't it? Because they're often oriented around 00:06:29.120 --> 00:06:31.300 these static metrics, things like grades, completion 00:06:31.300 --> 00:06:33.720 rates, maybe engagement scores. And while these 00:06:33.720 --> 00:06:36.279 measures might offer useful snapshots, Maybe. 00:06:36.899 --> 00:06:39.420 They simply cannot capture the true trajectory 00:06:39.420 --> 00:06:41.860 of intellectual and personal growth over time. 00:06:42.319 --> 00:06:44.620 It's like looking at one photograph instead of 00:06:44.620 --> 00:06:46.899 the whole album of someone's life. That's a perfect 00:06:46.899 --> 00:06:49.540 analogy, and it leads right into Dewey's powerful 00:06:49.540 --> 00:06:52.120 warning against mistaking the quantifiable for 00:06:52.120 --> 00:06:54.899 the meaningful. When teaching is guided solely 00:06:54.899 --> 00:06:57.399 by algorithmic feedback, the source suggests 00:06:57.399 --> 00:07:00.199 we risk, and I quote, collapsing learning into 00:07:00.199 --> 00:07:03.889 performance. Hmm performance not learning which 00:07:03.889 --> 00:07:06.230 as you said has very little to do with actual 00:07:06.230 --> 00:07:09.649 genuine understanding or growth exactly So instead 00:07:09.649 --> 00:07:12.329 educators really need to reassert the centrality 00:07:12.329 --> 00:07:14.149 of reflection Just as do we argue for things 00:07:14.149 --> 00:07:16.750 like learning journals or project -based assessments 00:07:16.750 --> 00:07:19.290 portfolio evaluations today's educators have 00:07:19.290 --> 00:07:22.189 to explore how technology can document not just 00:07:22.189 --> 00:07:25.389 the final answers But the thought processes themselves 00:07:25.389 --> 00:07:28.470 the journey The future of education, I think, 00:07:28.850 --> 00:07:31.050 really lies in integrating data with narrative, 00:07:31.050 --> 00:07:33.569 you know, metrics with metacognition, that ability 00:07:33.569 --> 00:07:35.990 to think about how you think and learn. That's 00:07:35.990 --> 00:07:40.029 huge. Now, the rise of AI in education, it sometimes 00:07:40.029 --> 00:07:42.449 casts teachers in what can feel like these supporting 00:07:42.449 --> 00:07:45.269 roles, right? Implementing tech platforms, managing 00:07:45.269 --> 00:07:47.649 data flows, responding to automated reports. 00:07:47.689 --> 00:07:49.490 It can feel like they're becoming technicians. 00:07:49.949 --> 00:07:52.069 But Dewey's essential conception of the teacher 00:07:52.069 --> 00:07:55.300 as a guide and co -enquirer. That remains absolutely 00:07:55.300 --> 00:07:58.000 vital, maybe more vital than ever. Teachers are 00:07:58.000 --> 00:07:59.980 the ones who must design these rich contexts 00:07:59.980 --> 00:08:02.180 for exploration. They're the ones who foster 00:08:02.180 --> 00:08:04.600 classrooms where students can truly debate ideas, 00:08:05.079 --> 00:08:07.199 examine their own assumptions, make those profound 00:08:07.199 --> 00:08:09.680 connections across different disciplines. Yeah. 00:08:10.379 --> 00:08:13.439 So while technology is undeniably a powerful 00:08:13.439 --> 00:08:16.220 tool, maybe like a magnificent hammer, perhaps 00:08:16.220 --> 00:08:18.339 the teacher is still the architect. That's a 00:08:18.339 --> 00:08:20.389 great way to put it. In the face of increasing 00:08:20.389 --> 00:08:23.050 automation, the teacher's role becomes even more 00:08:23.050 --> 00:08:24.889 critical in shaping the environment, the whole 00:08:24.889 --> 00:08:27.449 ecosystem where meaningful growth can actually 00:08:27.449 --> 00:08:29.810 happen. It's about designing the conditions for 00:08:29.810 --> 00:08:32.450 discovery. And educators must actively resist, 00:08:32.450 --> 00:08:35.210 I think, the reduction of their role to just 00:08:35.210 --> 00:08:38.389 technical facilitation. The true task of teaching, 00:08:38.529 --> 00:08:40.990 according to Dewey, is deeply creative. It's 00:08:40.990 --> 00:08:43.669 ethical and aesthetic, even. It involves judgment, 00:08:44.029 --> 00:08:47.669 empathy, improvisation. And no AI, however sophisticated 00:08:47.669 --> 00:08:50.309 it gets, can substitute for those forms of human 00:08:50.309 --> 00:08:52.429 responsiveness and connection. Okay, perhaps 00:08:52.429 --> 00:08:54.669 Dewey's most powerful insights, especially for 00:08:54.669 --> 00:08:57.730 right now, is his embrace of uncertainty. He 00:08:57.730 --> 00:08:59.769 saw learning not as some endpoint where you arrive 00:08:59.769 --> 00:09:01.789 at the right answer, but as this open -ended 00:09:01.789 --> 00:09:04.110 journey where even provisional conclusions just 00:09:04.110 --> 00:09:07.350 spur new questions, new inquiries. And this contrasts 00:09:07.350 --> 00:09:09.850 so sharply with many contemporary AI models, 00:09:09.990 --> 00:09:12.429 which often emphasize prediction and optimization, 00:09:12.850 --> 00:09:15.409 trying to give us those seemingly perfect final 00:09:15.409 --> 00:09:18.009 answers. Yet in a world that's just dominated 00:09:18.009 --> 00:09:21.070 by rapidly evolving technologies, constant change, 00:09:21.889 --> 00:09:24.529 the need to tolerate and maybe even celebrate 00:09:24.529 --> 00:09:27.820 uncertainty. paramount. It's crucial. Students 00:09:27.820 --> 00:09:30.820 have to learn not just what is known, but maybe 00:09:30.820 --> 00:09:33.740 more importantly, how to navigate what is unknowable. 00:09:33.850 --> 00:09:35.929 That's the real skill for the future. Yeah, that 00:09:35.929 --> 00:09:38.330 shifts education fundamentally, doesn't it? Away 00:09:38.330 --> 00:09:40.830 from simple content delivery towards capacity 00:09:40.830 --> 00:09:43.269 building. Yeah. It moves the focus from, OK, 00:09:43.330 --> 00:09:45.929 what is the right answer to the much more profound 00:09:45.929 --> 00:09:47.970 question of how do I even approach this problem? 00:09:48.029 --> 00:09:50.009 How do I frame the question in the first place? 00:09:50.230 --> 00:09:52.649 Exactly. Ultimately, teaching in the age of AI, 00:09:52.649 --> 00:09:55.149 it has to move beyond just acquiring knowledge. 00:09:55.350 --> 00:09:58.070 It needs to be about cultivating truly flexible 00:09:58.070 --> 00:10:00.149 thinkers, individuals who can adapt, who can 00:10:00.149 --> 00:10:02.830 inquire deeply, who constantly question assumptions. 00:10:03.149 --> 00:10:06.409 their own and others. And Dewey's vision really 00:10:06.409 --> 00:10:08.429 offers the perfect scaffolding for building those 00:10:08.429 --> 00:10:11.860 kinds of minds. So, after all this... What does 00:10:11.860 --> 00:10:14.200 it all mean for us now? Where does this leave 00:10:14.200 --> 00:10:17.220 us? It seems like while AI may indeed reshape 00:10:17.220 --> 00:10:20.639 the mechanics, the how of education, Dewey's 00:10:20.639 --> 00:10:22.840 deeper questions, they just persist, don't they? 00:10:22.899 --> 00:10:25.620 Questions like, what kind of society are we truly 00:10:25.620 --> 00:10:28.039 preparing students to enter? And maybe even more 00:10:28.039 --> 00:10:29.879 importantly, what kind of individuals are we 00:10:29.879 --> 00:10:32.500 genuinely helping them to become? I think that's 00:10:32.500 --> 00:10:34.779 right. In a time when we have machine -generated 00:10:34.779 --> 00:10:37.519 content, predictive analytics offering these 00:10:37.519 --> 00:10:40.340 unprecedented tools, John Dewey reminds us that 00:10:40.340 --> 00:10:43.330 the hard of education, the real core lies not 00:10:43.330 --> 00:10:46.669 in automation, but in reflection, in collaboration, 00:10:47.129 --> 00:10:49.950 and in genuinely engaged human interaction, connection. 00:10:50.450 --> 00:10:52.269 His theories aren't just relevant today. I'd 00:10:52.269 --> 00:10:54.509 argue they're vital for navigating this new educational 00:10:54.509 --> 00:10:57.049 landscape. Dooley insisted that education is 00:10:57.049 --> 00:10:59.370 fundamentally, at its core, a human endeavor. 00:10:59.629 --> 00:11:01.389 And if we teach with that conviction, really 00:11:01.389 --> 00:11:03.409 hold on to that, then even in a world increasingly 00:11:03.409 --> 00:11:05.649 powered by AI, we can truly preserve the soul 00:11:05.649 --> 00:11:08.029 of learning. So maybe the question for you listening 00:11:08.029 --> 00:11:11.009 is, what does preserving the soul of learning 00:11:11.009 --> 00:11:13.850 mean to you as AI continues to evolve? Something 00:11:13.850 --> 00:11:14.450 to think about.