Abstract
This paper explores how generative AI is reshaping educational engagement by acting as a reflective partner in knowledge creation. Moving beyond content delivery, AI now enables learners to rehearse, test, and refine their ideas in psychologically safe, reputation-free environments. This emerging interaction supports not only cognitive development but also personal wellbeing through increased confidence, self-efficacy, and epistemic resilience. Drawing on Schön’s (1983) concept of reflection-in-action, this paper argues that AI can scaffold critical thinking and cultivate what is here termed epistemic openness—the willingness to engage with critique and to revise one’s assumptions. The practice of dialoguing with AI becomes a form of metacognitive training that strengthens both intellectual agency and emotional safety, particularly for learners in vulnerable or under-resourced contexts. Grounded in constructivist, dialogic, and post-phenomenological paradigms, and engaging the work of Bakhtin, Latour, and Schön, this paper positions AI not as a threat to human learning, but as a co-agent in educational transformation. It further explores the implications for inclusive, ethical, and socially responsible education in an era of cognitive augmentation. By reframing AI as a dialogical tool for learner wellbeing and agency, this research contributes to broader debates about how human–machine interactions can promote meaningful learning and democratic knowledge practices in increasingly digitized societies.
Presenters
Sam Van DammeResearcher, Safety and Wellbeing, AP University of Applied Sciences (Antwerp), Belgium
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Learner Agency, Epistemic Openness, Critical Thinking, Cognitive Augmentation
