SBIR Phase I: Artificial Intelligence Tutoring and Assessment for Teacher Development

This Small Business Technology Transfer Phase I research project focuses on bringing the power and benefits of cutting-edge artificial intelligence tutoring technology to the arena of teacher professional development. The need for effective, high-quality professional development in science is particularly serious for teachers who are new and/or teaching outside their field of expertise. Conventional models of professional development (e.g. attending workshops and seminars) have little impact for a truly struggling teacher. Web-based materials, though available on demand, currently lack the depth and sophistication needed to effectively meet the needs of the new teacher for pedagogy and content in complex scientific subjects. The proposed innovation is the creation of professional development resources that use advanced AI technology to model and teach proven effective content and pedagogical strategies of an outstanding teacher, and provide the teacher with a sophisticated means of self-monitoring and assessment. This will have an especially meaningful impact for new teachers and teachers struggling out-of-field. The results of this research will be an artificial intelligence-based professional development system delivered in a just-in-time fashion over the Internet. The ability to leverage proven effective artificial intelligence educational technology for professional development represents a new design paradigm, which will have broad implications for developing new models of sophisticated, AI-based professional development in many subjects beyond chemistry. Though the impact will be most immediate for new teachers and teachers struggling out of field, the technology and approach hold potential to benefit teachers at all levels of experience. The prospective applications of the approach will address the goals of the American Competitiveness Initiative (ACI) and Highly Qualified Teachers in No Child Left Behind.