For me, the birds in the photo at the top represent the connections we build with our students and the relationships they develop with each other in our classes. (I also wonder what the birds are discussing 😀.) Learning does not only involve analytical thinking (working memory, etc.) but also social thinking (e.g. the mentalizing network in which we pick up on other people’s facial cues, body language, and verbal cues to figure out their thoughts, moods, and intentions). If we think about online teaching, especially asynchronous courses, successful online courses intentionally incorporate the social element of teaching/learning into the course design. When students do not feel a connection with their peers or teacher, they are more likely to drop out of the course and therefore learn less than they might have otherwise.

I think if we allow AI to take on too much of our teaching responsibility, we will neglect social thinking. I agree that AI might be useful for some teaching tasks, and it will probably get even better with time and more development. Still, teachers are best and will remain best at facilitating the social aspects of teaching. Mohammad Khari explains this so well in his article “The Kernel of Teaching: Human Connection” in the Oct. issue of Mind Brain Ed Think Tanks: https://www.mindbrained.org/2021/10/the-kernel-of-teaching-human-connection/ (In fact, the entire issue is worth reading: https://www.mindbrained.org/october-2021-teacher-to-student/ .) Instead of developing teacher bots, our efforts and money would be better spent 1) ensuring that everyone has equal access to quality educational resources (including teachers!), and 2) helping teachers develop their skills so that in turn they can help their students develop their analytical thinking and social thinking.