Hwa Chong Institution among four S’pore schools in new global network on AI in education

SINGAPORE - From generating interactive graphs in economics lessons to giving feedback on students’ General Paper essays, artificial intelligence (AI) has been a part of classroom life at Hwa Chong Institution (HCI) since 2023.

The school has been developing its own AI tools like chatbots, and teachers can opt in for training.

HCI and three other schools here – the School of Science and Technology, Singapore (SST), Nanyang Girls’ High School and Crescent Girls’ School – are part of a new global network of schools studying the use of AI in education.

The Global AI Nexus of Schools (Gains), which was launched on Aug 4 at Hwa Chong Institution in Bukit Timah, aims to drive innovation and research in AI for education. HCI is the founder of Gains.

The inaugural meeting, held to mark the launch of Gains, was attended by participants from partnering schools in person and online. Schools across the globe shared about their journeys and plans for using AI.

Supported by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, a total of 23 schools from seven countries – including China, Japan and Estonia – have joined the network.

HCI principal Lee Peck Ping said in a speech on Aug 4 that the goal is to expand the group to 100 schools across 20 countries by 2027.

Schools in the Gains network will be able to take part in joint projects, exchange teaching tools and resources through an online website, and connect with other educators around the world. The network will also support research and cross-border student projects.

At HCI, teachers are being trained to develop their own AI tools, said Dr Chow Chiu Wai, director of education technology.

Economics teacher Gilbert Ng created an AI-powered tool that lets students interact with graphs to explore how changes in output affect market outcomes, to learn about economic concepts like maximising profit. The AI tool also allows students to build their own interactive economic graphs.

General Paper teacher Avril Tay developed a paragraph writing “coach” that gives students targeted feedback.

The tools used at HCI are trained not to give students the answers wholesale, but instead to give them prompting questions or suggestions. For example, Ms Tay’s bot requires students to submit their own written paragraph before it offers suggestions and feedback.

Said Dr Chow: “We frame AI as something that students should interact with, like a person who is highly knowledgeable, always available, maybe endlessly patient, but at the same time, he’s not all-knowing.”

Teachers have to teach students to be discerning, he added.

Mr Ng used AI to “vibe-code” – combining AI tools with subject expertise to create interactive teaching resources. He tasked students with building their own economic graphs using AI as well, which showed them why understanding the subject and using detailed prompts are important.

“If they don’t prompt it with sufficient detail, the outcome is horrible,” Mr Ng said, explaining how the graph generated will not reflect what the student wants. “Then they realise that the AI cannot do the heavy lifting.”

And as students refine their prompts, their diagrams become more complete. The tool also saves Mr Ng time, letting him pull up different graphs with a click, instead of redrawing them repeatedly.

On Aug 4, other schools also presented their own AI efforts.

SST principal Nick Chan said students learn how computers recognise images or make predictions, through modules on machine learning and computer vision.

The school also organises local and global summits for educators to explore technologies such as virtual and augmented reality.

Crescent Girls’ School principal Cindy Low said teachers are encouraged to experiment with their information and communications technology teams to explore AI tools that personalise learning, such as chatbots.

For Secondary 4 HCI students Li Xiyuan and Rayson Lim, AI is now a regular study companion that helps with note-taking and English comprehension. Both 16-year-olds also use school-developed AI tools for chemistry practice, where a chatbot helps to go through the planning of experiments step by step, and for literature, where they use another chatbot for alternative perspectives on essays they have written.

Still, both students are careful about when to use AI.

Xiyuan said: “What I like to do when writing my literature essays is to write a first draft (on my own) without using AI, so that these ideas are authentic, after which I would use AI to show me different perspectives so I can explore a wider understanding of the task.”

He added that there is a sense of pride in producing work that is truly his, even if it is imperfect.