Tech Advances
"We All Need a Personal Assistant": University Professors' Use of AI to Facilitate Teaching and Learning
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Dr. Salma Waly
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become an undeniable reality in our world—constantly advancing, expanding, and impacting nearly every field. As educators and academic institutions, it is crucial that we not only acknowledge the presence of AI but also proactively embrace, adopt, and leverage it to support teaching, enrich learning experiences, and improve educational outcomes. While extensive research has focused on how K-12 educators integrate AI into their teaching practices and the effects on student outcomes, there remains a significant gap in understanding how university professors are utilizing AI to enhance higher education. This paper sheds light on a qualitative study involving 20 university professors from various disciplines across the UAE, examining how AI has influenced, transformed, or reshaped their roles as educators, researchers, and practitioners. The study explores the myriad ways in which AI has impacted their day-to-day tasks, from streamlining research processes and preparing instructional materials to delivering knowledge more effectively and assessing student progress. The findings presented are both insightful and practical, offering valuable perspectives for professors in higher education. The offer deeper understanding of how AI can be harnessed to improve efficiency in areas such as course planning, content creation, personalized teaching, and data-driven decision-making. This content is valuable for educators, researchers, and leaders in higher education, aiming to provide actionable tips and strategies to help professors integrate AI effectively into their academic practices, ultimately fostering a more innovative and responsive educational environment.
Lexical Semantic Analysis of AI-Driven Paraphrasing Output: The Case Study of QuillBot, Scribber, and Semrush
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Rima Jamil Malkawi
The study examines the efficiency of Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven paraphrasing tools in preserving the originality of the source text from a lexicon semantics perspective, particularly for educational purposes. Drawing on Taylor’s (2017) linguistic framework, we conduct a comparative qualitative analysis of paraphrased output generated by three popular AI-driven paraphrasing tools: QuillBot, Scribber, and Semrush. The corpus consists of 100 abstracts belonging to two disciplines: hard science and soft science. To ensure consistency in the evaluation process, a questionnaire was distributed to linguistic experts (e.g., PhD holders) to examine the lexical semantics and coherence using a predefined academic writing rubric. The findings show that while the three AI paraphrasing tools provided a moderate ability to maintain the lexical semantics of original source texts, QuillBot and Scribbr excel in preserving the lexical semantics in hard science abstracts, whereas Semrush performs better in paraphrasing the soft science abstracts. In addition, QuillBot scores the highest in providing coherence and clarity. In contrast, Semursh scores the lowest due to its adherence to maintaining the grammatical structure over the originality of the source text. This study provides a practical educational guide for educators, students, and language learners on the challenges and opportunities of using AI-driven paraphrasing tools to improve the human learning process in academic writing.
Featured Exploring Virtual Reality Inside Healthcare Curricula: UK College Educators and Student Experiences
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Laura Sheerman
Virtual reality (VR) presents opportunities for new pedagogical approaches in the classroom that can enhance student learning in healthcare qualifications. UK Further Education (FE) colleges aim to equip 16-18+ year-old students with the skills and knowledge required to enter the workplace. Exposing young students to a range of different experiences is a challenge in healthcare because of industry placement restrictions. VR has the potential to enrich health curricula through the provision of on-demand, safe, and close to life healthcare scenarios for use in the classroom. Reports of VR explorations in real-world classroom settings are scarce, but crucial to understanding practical and pedagogical implications. This mixed-methods case study reports the experiences of four educators and eleven students after a weekly exposure to VR over 4 weeks. Semi-structured interviews and in-class surveys were completed. Four themes are discussed: 1. Engagement; 2. Barriers to Learning; 3. Knowledge Consolidation and 4. Practical Preparation. Implications for the integration of VR in the classroom are highlighted from both perspectives. Compared with non-VR learning, students felt VR was engaging and authentic and helped create unique, effective learning experiences by connecting current and previous learning. Students also experienced adverse effects, challenges with orientation to hardware, and psychological discomfort.
