ADCET Webinar: Reflecting on 2024 - AI for students and staff
Darren Britten and Elizabeth Hitches presented an exciting webinar that explored the transformative power of AI in education throughout 2024, and looked back at the range of innovative tools and strategies that reshaped the learning landscape for both students and educators.
This webinar delivered practical strategies for those just beginning to explore the world of AI, as well as providing a deeper insight into the latest advanced tools that have emerged. They also explore how AI can support Universal Design for Learning through providing options for personalised learning, interactive study aids, efficient content creation, multi-modal content development and AI-driven accessibility. A curated list of resources and links were provided to further exploration, setting the stage for an inspiring and informed approach to 2025.
Presenters
Darren Britten is the National Assistive Technology Officer with ADCET and has been involved in inclusive practice and accessible resource development in the tertiary sector for over two decades. Darren has a passion for technology and how information is delivered and accessed. He has been active in designing and developing learning objects for online learning, providing advice and training to academic staff around digital equity and accessibility and working with students and staff on improving educational outcomes for students with disability.
Elizabeth Hitches is a PhD candidate at the Institute for Social Science Research, University of Queensland, Australia. Her research interests lie in inclusive education at a national and international level, as well as equity, achievement, and wellbeing for students with disability, chronic health conditions and/or accessibility requirements. Her research is currently exploring academic stress in higher education, and how this can be reduced in inclusive and accessible ways through a UDL lens. She is also a sessional academic teaching in inclusive education across various universities, and a teacher of research methods at the University of Queensland.
Resources
AI Tools demonstrated
- Goblin Tools - a collection of small, simple, single-task tools, mostly designed to help neurodivergent people with tasks they find overwhelming or difficult
- ChatGPT - a chatbot that uses natural language processing to generate human-like responses to questions and prompts
- Google NotebookLM - a personalised AI collaborator that becomes an instant expert based on the documents you upload NotebookLM
- Hume (EVI) - real-time, customisable voice intelligence powered by empathic AI
- Play.AI- AI speech models and voice agent platforms for businesses and developers
Prompts used during the webinar
This document contains some of the input and prompts used during the webinar if you would like to try these out yourself. There is also an additional document called 'Homeostasis lecture transcript' you can download and use to test with various AI tools if you would like.
(December 2024)
ADCET is hosted by the University of Tasmania