Preservice teachers’ experiences navigating “adaptive learning” technology

Abstract

ABSTRACT This hermeneutic-phenomenological study, following the work of van Manen, examines how kindergarten and elementary preservice teachers experienced practicum and student teaching in classrooms affected by the expansion of “adaptive learning” technology designed to assess children and personalize their learning. The researchers conducted in-depth, semi-structured interviews and collected personal drawings from 21 mainly White and female preservice teachers in the Appalachian region of the US. The findings provided preservice teachers’ descriptions of the effects of “adaptive learning” contexts with attention to three subgroups that emerged: children experiencing traumatic stress, working class students, and students labeled as “gifted.” The findings suggested that from the view of preservice teachers, “adaptive learning” technology had a complicated role in classroom learning since it did not only extract data from children but reconstituted relations in the classroom. Although adaptive learning was used in part to ease teacher recruitment and retention challenges, it tended to have a negative effect on preservice teachers’ opportunities for learning. To improve levels of pedagogical thoughtfulness and tact in “adaptive learning” classrooms, the data suggested that new considerations of communication, scheduling, and engaging dialogically with the “adaptive learning” tools are paramount to creating better opportunities for mentoring, learning, and growth.