Artificial intelligence-powered tools can help students learn math, but educators should also explain why students should be skeptical of the technology, concludes the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics in a .
NCTM is among the first teaching organizations to take an official position on AI.
And its early stance may be especially influential: Educators are looking for guidance on how to use AI in the classroom but don鈥檛 feel that it must come from government officials, experts say. It can come from prominent, trusted organizations such as NCTM.
AI has 鈥渂een around forever, but with ChatGPT, it鈥檚 [becoming] that much more common,鈥� said Kevin Dykema, who teaches middle school math in Michigan and is the president of NCTM. 鈥淢ath educators are looking for some guidance: 鈥楬ow do you best integrate AI into the classroom?鈥� This was a perfect opportunity for us to get out in front of the field.鈥�
AI has great potential to make math teachers鈥� lives easier, by helping to create quizzes or tests, for example, the NCTM guidance says. It may also help personalize learning for students by presenting them with problems tailored not only to a particular math skill but to their own interests.
But the technology also tends to 鈥渉allucinate鈥濃�攃ome up with answers that are 鈥渦ntrue or unreasonable,鈥� NCTM writes, adding that AI tools don鈥檛 always cite the sources for their information, giving students the 鈥渋llusion that the ideas do not need to be cited or vetted.鈥�
And AI tools tend to reflect the biases in society, which typically show up in the data used to train the technology.
鈥榃hat can we de-emphasize?鈥�
Math educators are already accustomed to changing how they teach because of a new technology, Dykema said.
After all, even before ChatGPT arrived in late 2022, raising educators鈥� awareness of AI, tools like PhotoMath were already solving algebra equations for students.
Before that, calculators were the game changer.
鈥淭echnology has evolved in such a way that it鈥檚 forcing us to think about what is that critical content that鈥檚 necessary for students,鈥� Dykema said. 鈥淐alculators came out, and we had to figure out 鈥榟ow do we better integrate this new technology called a calculator into the classrooms? And what does that mean in terms of what we teach? What can we de-emphasize?鈥欌��
AI has highlighted the need for a similar, deep rethinking of how schools teach math, he said.
鈥淲e need to continue to help our students see that math is used in real life, that math is not something that鈥檚 just done in that K-12 classroom,鈥� Dykema said. 鈥淢athematics has historically, and continues to be used, to solve real-world problems.鈥�
The organization also recommends that math educators be on the front lines of developing and testing AI tools aimed at teaching or reinforcing math skills.
The good news for math educators: It will take teachers with more math expertise, not less, to properly vet cutting-edge math education technology.
AI has 鈥渢he potential to change how we do things,鈥� Dykema said. But he added that 鈥渢here鈥檚 a lot of limitations to some of the initial AI [tools] that are out there. And we need to recognize just because it says 鈥榩owered by AI鈥� doesn鈥檛 mean it鈥檚 necessarily good.鈥�
