AI for Personalization at Scale in the Early Childhood Classroom: From Standby to Takeoff ✈️

Concerned about the use of AI in early childhood classrooms but keen on understanding its power to personalize the learning experience? We’ve got you 🤝

Over the past few years, there has been a lot of discourse around the use of AI in the early childhood classroom. Hundreds of companies released new AI tools to enhance learning, thousands of policy makers worked hard to inform the public about the guidelines of using these tools, and millions of students have been impacted by the developments of these technologies within their classrooms. 

While all of this has been rapidly accelerating, there remains a gap in the production and availability of AI tools and their adoption rates within early childhood classrooms. 

In this article, we’ll take you on a journey from standby to takeoff on a use case of AI within the early childhood classroom and address the main concerns by educators regarding it. So… buckle up for what’s ahead: 

• A Quick Trip Down Memory Lane: Technology in the Early Childhood Classroom
• On the Runway: Artificial Intelligence in Early Childhood Classrooms
• Takeoff: AI as a Tool for Personalization at Scale in Early Childhood Education 
• In the Sky: Where Do We Land? 

A Quick Trip Down Memory Lane: Technology in the Early Childhood Classroom 

The use of technology in early childhood classrooms is far from new. If you’ve been an educator for a while (or even a recent student), you may remember “orienting  and calibrating” the smart board by clicking on various corners of the screen 🖊️. 

I vividly recall the absolute RUSH and EXCITEMENT this process gave me (as a student) but the absolute frustration it gave my teachers because of the interruption - it was truly a core memory of my schooling experience.

Whether it was using fancy smartboard markers, iPads, or learning apps, new tech always made its way to the early childhood classroom, often providing a mix of excitement and challenges. With the rapid change of technology over the years, there has also been a change in the way technology is being used or even perceived inside the classroom. 

10 years ago, it wasn’t uncommon to see that the only person using or navigating the technology was the teacher. Nowadays, this approach to technology in the classroom is changing, as students are now much more adept at using tech and are quickly becoming digital natives even before they come into school. 

In fact, the talk surrounding tech is evolving so much in the context of education that most (if not all) we hear nowadays is about…AI…Artificial Intelligence… Artificial... Intelligence 🤯!!!

On the Runway: Artificial Intelligence in Early Childhood Classrooms

By now, especially if you’re an early childhood classroom teacher or educator, you’ve probably heard about it, you’ve probably read about it, and you’ve probably developed some sort of opinion about it and how it will impact the classroom. 

Despite the hype surrounding the fast adoption of AI in educational settings, 2 of every 3 educators reported that they still haven’t used any AI tools in their classrooms, according to a 2023 EdWeek Research Center survey. The reason behind these rates can stem from the  common concerns of early childhood teachers when it comes to using AI in classrooms, including: 

• Uncertainty: I’m not sure how AI can help me enhance the classroom learning experience  
• Time: I don’t have enough time to learn how to use AI tools on my own 
• Cost: I don’t have enough funding to access these tools and use them in my classroom 
• Risks: I’m concerned about the ethics and data privacy issues of using such AI for early childhood 

If you have any, or all, of these concerns about AI for early childhood, we hear you. To help you formulate a more informed opinion about this topic (aka become the coolest teacher in town 🤓), I’ll walk you through a use case of AI in the early childhood classroom and address the concerns above within that context. 

Takeoff: AI as a Tool for Personalization at Scale in Early Childhood Education 

There are many ways AI can be beneficial to the early childhood classroom, but one of its most powerful features is that it can provide personalized learning at scale. Let’s dive into what this can mean for educators considering the statements above. 

#1- Uncertainty: I’m not sure how AI can help me enhance the classroom learning experience  

So you might get that AI can “personalize” the learning experience for your students. But what does that really mean in an educational setting? 

Well, here are some pointers. For decades, educators around the globe have expressed their concerns that the biggest challenge of education is that it relies on a “one-size-fits-all” model. AI inherently challenges this approach, as one of the biggest benefits to using it is that it provides adaptive learning that can be customized to needs, levels, preferences, pace, and ability. 

Through adaptive learning, AI enables personalization at scale because it is able to gather, analyze, and understand various data points about every student. Below are examples of how various AI methods can personalize education at scale and help with enhancing the learning experience: 

1. AI-powered tutoring: These systems learn from a wide variety of learning material and tailor the learning journey based on each students’ level. They offer bespoke feedback, explanation, and analysis. 

2. Individualized learning programs: With the help of AI, teachers can generate multiple learning programs and paths to accommodate various students’ needs within a single classroom. 

3. Multimodal experiences: Because not every child learns the same way, AI can provide activities using various multimodal learning methods (visual, auditory, sensory) to suit the needs of different children. 

4. Individualized analysis and recommendations: Recommendations based on individual learning analysis can also be generated by AI, allowing teachers to accommodate multiple children at once. 

These are only 4 examples of how AI can provide personalization at scale inside an early childhood classroom. There are now tens of AI tools available that specifically address each of these personalization techniques that teachers can refer to for every approach they choose to follow. You can find an example of one here. 

#2 - Time: I don’t have enough time to learn how to use AI tools on my own 

When 90% of teachers are experiencing high burnout levels and due to overwork and stress, this is a very fair concern. Integrating AI, or any other technology, in the early childhood classroom requires additional research, experimentation, and time from teachers. But the beauty about AI is that once the initial learning curve to use the tool is completed, it is  found to reduce up to 13 hours of work per week or 20-30% of teachers’ time. 

What can you do about this time constraint issue then? Well, you can use AI 😏. It's true that learning how to use a new technology from scratch can be difficult. But there are so many AI tools that have been developed to be intuitive and user-friendly first, like chatbots, that can narrow down concepts, summarize teaching methods, and provide examples on how various tools can be used within a classroom. You can start there, and once you have an idea of how things can work, using various tools to personalize the learning experience at scale will not sound like a challenge anymore. 

For example,  try writing “give me a personalized lesson plan structure for a math lesson that incorporates various AI tools for an early childhood classroom” into ChatGPT and explore some initial ideas on how you can structure your lesson, use different kinds of AI tools, and gather thoughts on potential learning outcomes. You can then brainstorm ideas to scale these recommendations, select your AI tools, and assess how you can structure your lesson according to your students’ needs. 

#3 - Cost: I don’t have enough funding to access these tools and use them in my classroom 

Although education technology expenditure (particularly AI-powered) is expected to reach $341 billion by 2025, the funding is typically dedicated to build these tools and not to provide them at schools for teachers. 

Despite this systematic issue (that needs way more in-depth unpacking 📦), AI and edtech tools are becoming increasingly accessible for teachers and educators. Multiple AI tools provide free, or heavily discounted, pricing for educators to use within their classrooms. 

Let’s say you’re trying to personalize a specific lesson at scale for different learners in your classroom (visual, logical, verbal etc.). If you don’t already have a specific platform your school is using, you can do a simple search on Google for tools that support these kinds of personalization experience, and see which ones provide free access, even if it's partial. 

Nookly, for instance, can help personalize the learning experience at scale because it provides various social and emotional skills for children, facilitates visual and textual learning (among many other skills), and develops literacy. As of now, everyone can use Nookly to generate social stories for free! Similarly, there are several other platforms with varying learning purposes that provide free access at times that you can use. 

#4 - Risks: I’m concerned about the ethics and data privacy issues of using such AI for early childhood 

A recent survey shows that when asked about AI, 98% of educators expressed a need for “education on ethical AI usage” in the classroom. This need is absolutely well-founded. With new technology, educators have the right to understand the precautions they need to take to protect their students’ data security and privacy. 

The response to this informational need for educators has been well-received by governments, educational institutions, and policy makers. In fact, in the past few years, there have been over “300 AI ethics guidelines and policy documents” issued globally (European Education Area, UNICEF, OECD, Raspberry Pi Foundation) to support the public on how to use AI ethically with children. 

When you’re using AI to personalize the classroom experience using multiple AI tools, here are some ethical best practices, developed in the Policy Guidance on AI for Children, UNICEF (2020), to keep in mind: 

1. Support children’s development and wellbeing

2. Ensure inclusion of and for children 

3. Prioritize fairness and non-discrimination for children

4. Protect children’s data and privacy 

5. Ensure safety for children 

6. Provide transparency, explainability, and accountability for children 

7. Empower governments and businesses with knowledge of AI and children’s rights

8. Prepare children for present and future developments in AI 

9. Create an enabling environment

If you're incorporating an AI tool to personalize elements of your teaching, you can assess your methods by asking yourself questions like: 

• Am I providing an explanation of how this AI tool works in words my young students will understand? 
• Am I testing out this tool beforehand to make sure it is safe for my students? 
• Is this tool providing a non-discriminatory and inclusive environment for my students? 
• And the list goes on! 

In the Sky: Where Do We Land? 

Well, maybe we’re not meant to. The rate at which AI is developing practices, whether they’re educational, personal, work-related, or anything really, is incredible. Today’s students who are using multiple AI technologies in their early childhood classrooms, will probably, in 20 years or so, look back at the technologies we currently consider so highly developed the way I now look back at that  groundbreaking ✨smartboard ✨ I had in middle school. 

This article outlined one capability of AI within the early childhood classroom, but there is so much more to unpack. With the rise of AI inclusion in education, there is so much potential for early childhood educators to personalize the learning experience for students at a scale that is truly unprecedented. Having that said, there needs to be an awareness that with the widespread availability of these tools, educators, policymakers, and tech developers must also take a step not only to consider how to use them, but to consciously evaluate their impact, effectiveness, and implications on students in the short and long terms.