School of Languages at XJTLU Conference 2024

In the era of AI and technology, increasing interest has been placed on the impacts of AI on education. However, little research has been conducted to explore the relationship between the use of AI feedback and students’ reflective thinking abilities. Thus, this research aims to explore how the use of AI feedback enhances students’ reflective thinking abilities, as well as students’ perceptions of the use of AI-powered speaking practice tools in supporting their reflective thinking process.

The research was conducted over an 8-week period, during which weekly one-to-one reflection meetings were held between the researchers and the students. Gibb’s reflection cycle was used as a guiding tool to conduct the reflective practice, where students reflected on their weekly speaking practice based on feedback generated by the AI-powered speaking tool. To better understand the research questions, at the end of the research period, researchers conducted semi-structured interviews with the participants and also adapted Kember, et al.’s (2000) questionnaire to measure the level of reflective thinking.

During the process, the two researchers experienced various roles a language teacher may take on, ranging from an information provider to a facilitator, an assessor to a consultant, and from an authority to a caring professional. The researchers are eager to share their experiences and research results with a wider audience and call for more research related to AI and reflective, self-regulated, critical, and life-long learning.