“AI can’t teach our kids to be curious and think critically” (Image credit: ABC News, Jason Om)

UNESCO’s ‘Digital Learning Week’, which focused on AI and the future of education, was held earlier this month, and debates about the role of generative artificial intelligence (GAI) in the classroom have taken centre stage in education policy research. Around the world, educators, school administrators, and government officials are grappling with ethical questions surrounding the use of GAI and related technologies, such as commercial Large Language Models (LLMs), in teaching and learning.

The use of GAI in school poses serious and urgent questions: Should GAI be implemented in schools, and do we have sufficient knowledge about its educational merit (if any)?

Despite the hype, there is little positive evidence that this technology can actually improve student outcomes. But there is plenty of negative evidence that is cause for concern: it may lead to the dehumanization of learning. This is not surprising given that, even in commercial settings, the promise of increased productivity is not being fulfilled.

Still, schools are rushing to adopt GAI despite a wealth of evidence showing that the recent uncritical adoption of mobile phones and social media has in fact been harmful to children’s development. As a society, we are trying to pull back from feeding these technologies to our children. Still, even with these precedents, schools are adopting commercial AI technologies in the classroom uncritically, without fully considering their potential harms.

The challenges of GAI use in education are multifaceted and multilayered, ranging from concerns about ethics and academic integrity to privacy issues related to the ‘datafication’ of learning and childhood, to actual physical threats and harm to students. Beyond the psychosocial and physical harms to children, research has shown that “LLMs exacerbate, rather than alleviate, inequality” in learning, given that a few large corporations control the computation infrastructures on which these models run. So, against this background, what does Australian policy state regarding GAI in education?

In Australia, the latest guiding framework for the use of GAI in education is the ‘Australian Framework for Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Schools’ (The Framework). Developed by the Federal Government in partnership with states, territories, and other regulatory bodies such as the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), The Framework aims to define what “safe, ethical and responsible use of generative AI should look like to support better school outcomes” (p. 3).

As a guiding principle, The Framework highlights that critical thinking must be at the forefront of GAI use in schools, and that GAI should not replace or restrict human thought and experience.

However, what does it mean to use GAI “critically”? The research is clear that the regular use of GAI in learning quickly leads to over-reliance, which negatively affects cognitive abilities. Arguing that critically engaging with AI means empowering students to evaluate the machine’s output for themselves is similar to suggesting that we should teach students incorrect content and then ask them to form their own opinions.

The promise of GAI in education is that it will enable personalized learning. Unfortunately, machine-based ‘personalized learning’ forgoes the human-centered approach needed for a successful education. Instead, it relies on the datafication of students through continuous monitoring and surveillance. This shift in educational policy has sparked debate within academic circles about issues such as student privacy and safety, the ‘datafication’ of childhood, and how children’s data harvesting is used to shape their futures, effectively turning students into ‘algorithmic ensembles’.

Despite these real dangers, the latest iteration of the Australian school curriculum has explicitly incorporated GAI into the curriculum, supporting its use for whole school planning and providing teachers with the option of content elaboration using GAI (Australian Government Department of Education, 2025). The incorporation of GAI into the curriculum raises safety and welfare concerns for children, as they could be exposed to harmful materials and dangerous interactions, and a recent tragedy has brought to the surface the dark side of this technology. This heartbreaking case highlights that this technology may not be suitable for children, given their vulnerability to certain features of GAI, such as agreeability and dependence, which are design features aimed at engineering addiction. These technologies are still in their experimental stages, and we know little about the effects they may have on developing brains.

The premature and uncritical adoption of GAI in schools rings a too-familiar note to the uncritical adoption of social media in youth, which many governments around the globe are now trying to reverse, including Australia.

Vague policies that encourage the use of AI in schooling mean that teachers and schools are using the tool without a clear evidence base, in inconsistent ways, and without obtaining full parental consent. In my PhD research, I found that parents often resent the amount of technology schools use for education, and I also discovered that these technologies follow students home, encroaching on their private lives. Schools are taking away the parental prerogative of deciding when and how they introduce technologies such as GAI to their children, forcing them down a path they might prefer their children not to go.

Overall, the “critical” use of GAI in education must mean that rejection of GAI is an option. An option that is increasingly precluded by the headlong rush into the GAI hype.

Related content from our podcast

• Episode 57: The Social Impact of Automating Translation: Tazin Abdullah in conversation with Ester Monzó-Nebot (03/08/2025)
• Episode 55: Improving quality of care for patients with limited English: Brynn Quick in conversation with Leah Karliner (26/06/2025)
• Episode 50: Researching language and digital communication: Brynn Quick in conversation with Christian Ilbury (22/04/2025)
• Episode 46: Intercultural competence in the digital age: Brynn Quick in conversation with Amy McHugh (12/03/2025)
• Episode 41: Why teachers turn to AI: Brynn Quick in conversation with Sue Ollerhead (09/01/2025)

Online and onsite attendees of Ana’s presentation

The 21^st AILA World Conference is in full swing, and Day 2 has brought us some incredibly insightful presentations showcasing the current scholarship of applied linguistics. In this blog post, I share my experience as an online presenter and attendee during day 2.

This year’s conference theme is “Linguistic Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Sustainability,” seeking to understand the pivotal role of applied linguistics in tackling worldwide issues and fostering a more equitable world. The theme could not be a more pertinent topic in the current climate where diverse, inclusive, and sustainable research is becoming increasingly challenging due to the degradation of knowledge stemming from various factors, such as the surge of AI in academic publishing and the loss of the human element in research, as highlighted by Distinguished Professor Piller in her thought-provoking keynote speech “How can we make our research diverse, inclusive, and sustainable?” during the conference’s opening day.

For me, the day kicked off, tuning in to the ‘Language in Society’ track, where several presenters shared their work in a symposium entitled ‘Minority Language Learning for Adult Migrants in Europe’. The symposium shared their findings about the struggles of migrant language learning from Sweden to the Faroe Islands, leading to boundary maintenance among Hungarian diasporic speakers in Catalonia to understand the lived experiences of adult migrants as they pertain to migration and what are considered ‘worthy’ or ‘useful’ languages to learn.

Following, Professor Dr. Catherine Nickerson delivered the third keynote, which delved into the future of applied linguistics in the context of business and professional communication. Dr. Nickerson’s speech was both inspirational and gave an incredible glimpse of where the field is moving and how ‘we can bridge the gap between research and practice’ in ESP.

In the afternoon, it was my turn to present. I was delighted to contribute to a symposium on ‘Language Diversity, Inclusivity and Sustainability’ by sharing my PhD research findings on Family Language Policy and the intersectionality of digital technologies and transnationality in Spanish maintenance. My presentation touched on how private and public language policy domains are interconnected and fed off each other and that technology can be a double-edged sword in heritage language maintenance. However, as voiced by parents, technology also has many positive applications in language learning. I concluded with some suggestions for making heritage languages more visible in schools by using technology and learning from the experiences of the home domain.

My co-presenter during the symposium, Silvia Melo-Pfeifer, a leading member of the Next Generation Literacies Network, presented the findings of her work titled ‘The (pseudo) institutionalisation of language diversity in the internationalisation strategies of universities: a comparative study in Germany and The Netherlands’. Silvia brilliantly discussed new bilingual policies of two universities, one in Germany and one in The Netherlands, explaining the ideologies behind the push for English in the German institution due to internationalisation goals vs the push for Dutch in the latter, which is linked to far-right ideologies. She described this imposition to adopt English in teaching and other university activities at the German institution as ‘academic blackmail’, given that this was imposed from the top down and used as a scholarly success metric.

Thank you, AILA, for this fabulous implementation of a successful hybrid conference. AILA has done a marvellous job of providing live access to streamed symposiums and keynotes while also giving online participants from all corners of the globe access to recorded sessions so AILA delegates can engage with the latest and most innovative research in applied linguistics from any time zone. Spaces like AILA2024 empower us scholars, especially early career researchers like myself, to contemplate how we can strive to produce more ‘diverse, inclusive, and sustainable’ research, as Professor Piller left us reflecting after her keynote speech. The AILA conference, with its focus on these crucial issues, is shaping the future of applied linguistics and inspiring hope for a more equitable world.

Ana Bruzon presenting her PhD research at ECREA conference in Rotterdam

As a third-year PhD candidate in the Linguistics Department at Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia, I recently had the awe-inspiring opportunity to travel to Europe as a visiting researcher at Hamburg University. I presented my research at two international conferences and delivered a seminar. Here, I reflect on a fantastic professional development experience that has enriched my PhD studies and will undoubtedly shape me as an early career researcher.

The Postgraduate Research Fund opportunity at Macquarie University

Higher Degree Research (HDR) students at Macquarie University can apply for an internal grant, the Postgraduate Research Fund (PGRF). PGRF is a generous and competitive award aimed at teaching HDR students grant writing skills whilst allowing us to build an international platform to disseminate our research and promote academic collaboration.

In my application, I had to explain how my planned research visit would enhance my doctoral thesis and align with the University’s strategic objectives. One of Macquarie’s objectives is “to prepare world-ready HDR candidates”. The concept of being ‘world-ready’ deeply resonates with me, and I believe that the best way to embody a world-ready HDR candidate is through connection and collaboration.

Therefore, my goal was to become an internationalised researcher, as Macquarie University envisions for its graduate students, by learning from and with colleagues in Europe. When my grant application was successful, I sought every opportunity to provide an international platform for my research and make new connections for future collaborations. My journey offered me a wealth of opportunities to achiveve that goal.

Conference attendance

The first stop on my journey was Rotterdam in the Netherlands, where I attended the conference of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA). The conference topic was ‘Transnational families and media practices: methods, ethics and critical approaches’. At this interdisciplinary conference with attendees from around the globe, I presented the results of my study about ‘Using technology in transnational bilingual parenting’ in a dedicated PhD workshop and during the main conference. In Rotterdam, I connected with fellow PhD students from different corners of the world and met senior academics who contributed to my critical thinking about ethnographic work.

One of the conference highlights was the opportunity to learn from Dr Tanya Ahlin, a lecturer at the Amsterdam Institute of Social Science, who shared her vision as an anthropologist about ethical challenges when studying transnational families and presented her new book, ‘Calling Family: Digital Technologies and the Making of Transnational Care Collectives’.

Ana Bruzon (r) with Next Generation Literacies colleagues Professor Yongyan Zheng (Fudan U, Shanghai) and Dr Pia Tenedero (U of Santo Tomas, Manila) in Hamburg

Visiting network partners

From Rotterdam I travelled to Hamburg in Germany, where I had the privilege to be a visiting researcher at Hamburg University as a guest of world-renowned Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Ingrid Gogolin. During my stay in Hamburg, I also had the pleasure of representing Macquarie at the Next Generation Literacies (NGL) Network Conference. The NGL network promotes international collaboration in the field of literacy and multilingualism and is a program jointly organised by Fudan, Macquarie, and Hamburg universities.

As Language on the Move readers will know, the theme of the NGL network conference was ‘Social Participation in Linguistically Diverse Societies.’ The exciting program showcased global research on multilingualism and social participation in diverse settings. For me, one of the highlights of the conference was the keynote speech by Professor Piller, where she beautifully explained the legacies of the NGL network.

Also, I had the honour of presenting my study on the same panel as my associate supervisor, Dr Hanna Torsh, who shared her study ‘Ten years on Revisiting family language policy’. Another high point was Associate Professor Tenedero’s reflections on being a network member and how the mentorship program shaped her as an early career researcher. In her reflections at the end of the two-day conference, she proposed the metaphor of research-water. Tenedero clearly explained that ‘water, like research, can look and taste different depending on where I am, who I do it with, and what my purpose is. But, the purpose is always to serve life’. Personally, I also parted this conference and closed my time in Hamburg full of renewed life and new refreshing ideas for the last stretch of my PhD journey.

Seminar presentation

The last stop on my itinerary was London, where I had the privilege of conducting a seminar at the Centre for Applied Linguistics in UCL hosted by Associate Professor Perez-Milans. In this seminar, I had another opportunity to share my findings with an engaged audience and to receive valuable feedback. In London, I also continued to make connections as a Macquarie representative and think about the next steps of my career as a novice researcher.

Building lasting academic connections

For me, the PGRF experience meant building academic relationships that will surely last a lifetime. Being part of Macquarie University, the Language on the Move team, and the Next Generation Literacies network opened the doors to travel to Europe, connect, and build bridges for prospective international collaborations, that is to be ‘world-ready’ and better prepared for the future. As I reflect on how to be successful in academia, one needs to acknowledge that it is always part of something larger and that collaboration forms the foundation for a solid academic career. My PGRF journey has filled me with incredible memories and lessons about connection and collaboration that will accompany me for the remainder of my journey as a PhD student and into my postdoctoral career beyond.