Collaborative Research: FW-HTF: Augmented Cognition for Teaching: Transforming Teacher Work with Intelligent Cognitive Assistants

人类技术前沿工作的未来（FW-HTF）是美国国家科学基金会（NSF）宣布的未来投资十大新构想之一。FW-HTF跨部门计划旨在通过支持融合研究来应对不断变化的就业和工作环境的挑战和机遇。这个奖项部分实现了这一目标。K-12 STEM教师对美国经济至关重要。由于对教学质量的投资代表着巨大的经济价值，教育质量已被确定为国内生产总值经济增长的重要决定因素。然而，美国的教师队伍正在经历一场危机：各级教师供不应求，新教师的流失率非常高。此外，虽然STEM教学是最需要的领域之一，但STEM教师的离职率很高。这些发展需要创新的劳动力增强技术，以提高K-12 STEM教师的绩效和工作生活质量。为了解决这一关键的国家需求，该项目将研究教师的智能认知助手如何改变教师的工作，从而显著提高教师的绩效和教师的工作生活质量。该项目以设计、开发和评估用于教师智能认知助手的教学智能增强认知（I-ACT）框架为中心。I-ACT认知助理的重点是帮助K-12 STEM教师进行技术丰富的探究教学，支持协作式、基于问题的STEM学习，它为教师提供(1)前瞻性教学指导（课堂教学前的准备支持），(2)并行教学指导（课堂教学期间的实时支持），以及(3)回顾性教学指导（课堂教学后实践社区内的反思支持）。该项目最终将在北卡罗来纳州和印第安纳州的公立中学进行I-ACT全面实施版本的实验。该项目通过两个主要推动力实现其目标。首先，研究团队将为K-12 STEM教师设计和开发I-ACT认知助手，并在公立学校的课堂上进行测试。利用基于人工智能的多模态学习分析和社会建构主义教学法理论，I-ACT认知助理使用教师编排的机器学习模型在整个教学工作流程中提供指导。I-ACT认知助手在一个紧密的反馈循环中运行，在这个循环中，收集的数据将驱动机器学习的连续迭代，以训练改进的I-ACT认知助手功能的教师支持模型。其次，研究小组将调查I-ACT认知助手如何提高K-12 STEM教师的绩效和教师的工作生活质量。该团队将与项目合作学校的中学科学教师进行焦点小组、案例研究、半结构化访谈和对教师在学校实施I-ACT认知助手的观察。该团队还将进行准实验研究，以确定I-ACT对教师绩效和工作生活质量的影响。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Future of Work at the Human-Technology Frontier (FW-HTF) is one of 10 new Big Ideas for Future Investment announced by NSF. The FW-HTF cross-directorate program aims to respond to the challenges and opportunities of the changing landscape of jobs and work by supporting convergent research. This award fulfills part of that aim. K-12 STEM teachers are critical to the US economy. With investments in teaching quality representing enormous economic value, the quality of education has been identified as a significant determinant of gross domestic product economic growth. However, the US teacher workforce is experiencing a crisis: teacher demand exceeds supply at every level, and attrition is extraordinarily high for new teachers. Further, while STEM teaching represents one of the areas of highest need, STEM teachers leave the profession at high rates. These developments call for innovative workforce augmentation technologies to improve K-12 STEM teachers' performance and quality of work-life. To address this critical national need, the project will investigate how intelligent cognitive assistants for teachers can transform teacher work to significantly increase teacher performance and teacher quality of work-life. The project centers on the design, development, and evaluation of the Intelligent Augmented Cognition for Teaching (I-ACT) framework for intelligent cognitive assistants for teachers. With a focus on assisting K-12 STEM teachers in technology-rich inquiry teaching that supports collaborative, problem-based STEM learning, I-ACT cognitive assistants provide teachers with (1) prospective pedagogical guidance (preparation support preceding classroom teaching), (2) concurrent pedagogical guidance (real-time support during classroom teaching), and (3) retrospective pedagogical guidance (reflection support within a community of practice following classroom teaching). The project will culminate with an experiment conducted with a fully implemented version of I-ACT in public middle schools in North Carolina and Indiana.The project realizes its objective through two primary thrusts. First, the research team will design and develop I-ACT cognitive assistants for K-12 STEM teachers and test them in public school classrooms. Utilizing AI-based multimodal learning analytics and a social constructivist theory of pedagogy, I-ACT cognitive assistants use machine-learned models of teacher orchestration to provide guidance throughout the full teaching workflow. I-ACT cognitive assistants operate in a tight feedback loop in which collected data will drive successive iterations of machine learning to train refined teacher support models for improved I-ACT cognitive assistant functionalities. Second, the research team will investigate how I-ACT cognitive assistants improve K-12 STEM teacher performance and teacher quality of work-life. The team will conduct focus groups, case studies, semi-structured interviews, and observations of teachers using I-ACT cognitive assistants in school implementations with middle school science teachers at the project's partner schools. The team will also conduct quasi-experimental studies to determine I-ACT impact on teacher performance and quality of work-life.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.