Nikol Rummel is currently on secondment as a research professor at the Center for Advanced Internet Studies. In the summer of 2027, she will return to the Educational Psychology and Technology Research Group at Ruhr University Bochum.
Educational Science
I Connect Learning and Teaching with Artificial Intelligence
Nikol Rummel investigates teaching and learning processes from an educational-psychological perspective and explores the potential role that intelligent educational technologies can play in this context.
I connect learning with AI. When it comes to generative AI in education, people often ask: Does it make learning better or worse? This question doesn’t go far enough. After all, the same technology can be used in very different ways. Think of a Thermomix. If you just follow the instructions step by step, you might learn very little about cooking itself. Yet, the same appliance can also encourage you to adapt recipes, experiment, or exchange ideas with others. The same is true for learning with AI: Learners can hand over an entire task to the AI and thereby miss valuable opportunities to think and learn for themselves. Or learners can question AI responses, develop their own ideas, and use AI as a partner in exploring a problem. Depending on how it is used, the same technology can support very different forms of engagement: from accepting a ready-made answer to thinking critically, creating something new, and learning with others. What matters is how we design learning activities around AI. The aim should be to use AI in ways that deepen and extend learners’ thinking, while keeping them actively involved in the learning process.
