Automated Generation of Personalized Pedagogical Interventions in Intelligent Tutoring Systems

Despite artificial intelligence (AI) having transformed major aspects of our society, only a fraction of its potential has been explored, let alone deployed, for education. AI-powered learning can provide millions of learners with personalized, active, and practical learning experiences, which are key to successful learning. This is especially relevant in the context of online learning platforms. In this talk, I will first present the Korbit Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS), which provides a dialogue-based practical learning experience online. I will then describe the AI approaches that we use to provide learners on our platform with highly personalized and active learning experiences. Finally, I will present and discuss the results of a comparative head-to-head study on learning outcomes for Korbit and a popular MOOC platform that follows a traditional model delivering content using lecture videos and multiple-choice quizzes. Our experiments demonstrate a huge and statistically significant increase in learning outcomes, with students on the Korbit platform showing higher course completion rates and achieving learning gains two to 2.5 times higher than students on an online platform who do not receive personalized feedback. These results highlight the tremendous impact that can be achieved with an AI-powered system, making high-quality learning experiences available to millions of learners around the world.