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Many math teachers are not confident in their ability to leverage artificial intelligence in their teaching, and they aren’t getting the support they need to do so.
A new EdWeek Research Center survey shows that a majority of math teachers say they have not received training on using AI nor encouragement from supervisors to experiment with the technology.
That could stymie math teachers’ adoption of the technology, even as more educational products are infused with AI and teachers themselves acknowledge that their students will need to know how to use AI in future careers.
As it is, most math teachers are allowed to use AI-powered tools to teach math. In the EdWeek Research Center’s survey—which was conducted in February and included 411 elementary, middle, and high school math teachers—72 percent said they were permitted to use the technology in their schools.
But simply being allowed to use the technology isn’t enough. To really adopt the technology and incorporate it into instruction, teachers need meaningful professional development and the chance to experiment on their own, said Latrenda Knighten, the president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and a former math teacher. Knighten recently spoke with Education Week for a special series on AI in math instruction.
“They need professional development, and not someone who is from the company that you’re purchasing the tool from—they’re just showing you how to use it,” she said. “You want professional development from someone showing you how to integrate the tool, how to teach content-focused lessons but you’re using [AI] as just one more tool.”
So, how are schools doing at providing these essentials to math teachers? Their responses in the recent EdWeek Research Center survey show some weak spots. For example, more than half of math teachers say they have not been encouraged at all by their principals or supervisors to experiment with existing AI tools.
Meanwhile, nearly 7 in 10 math teachers said they have not yet received professional development on using artificial intelligence to teach their subject. Of those who have not had PD, 66 percent said that they would like training.
Among those who have received professional development, the EdWeek Research Center found that their reviews of that training are decidedly mixed.
That might be one reason why math teachers tend not to feel confident about their ability to leverage AI in math instruction. Sixty-three percent rate their skills as either nonexistent or poor, underscoring how a lack of training and encouragement could be affecting teachers’ adoption of this new technology.
And math teachers appear to be slower to adopt AI-powered tools than their peers in other subjects. A separate February survey from RAND found that English/language arts and science teachers were almost twice as likely to report using AI tools than math teachers.
It’s an issue that’s further complicated by math teachers’ skepticism of AI: A little more than half predicted in the EdWeek Research Center survey that over the next five years, AI-powered instructional tools will either cause math achievement in their schools to decline or remain flat.