The Ministry of Education is to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) into elementary and middle-school education and expects Taiwan to become a leader in AI education in Asia within two years, Deputy Minister of Education Yeh Ping-cheng (葉丙成) said yesterday.
Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) and his team are dedicated to promoting AI education and have made a breakthrough by establishing the Taiwan AI College Alliance to improve AI education at universities, Yeh said.
High schools would also be offering AI courses, while elementary and junior-high schools would introduce a generative AI learning partner and hold AI competitions, Yeh said.
Photo courtesy of the Taichung City Government
The ministry said it commissioned National Taiwan Normal University’s Department of Technology Application and Human Resource Development associate professor Tsai Yun-cheng (蔡芸琤) and National Taiwan University’s Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering assistant professor Chang Jie-fan (張傑帆) to plan diverse elective AI courses for high-school students.
Yeh thanked Tsai and Chang for developing an online system to review students’ program codes and enhance distance learning, saying that they helped provide equal learning opportunities for high-school and vocational-school students nationwide.
Twenty-three high and vocational schools are participating in the program to offer elective AI courses this semester, including two from remote areas, he said.
The ministry also collaborated with National Cheng Kung University’s Department of Computer Science and Information Engineering professor Su Wen-yu (蘇文鈺) to organize an AI competition for junior-high and elementary-school students starting this year, he said.
The competition encourages students to apply AI models to real world challenges and is expected to expand as an online international competition, Yeh said, adding that an AI learning partner was introduced on the ministry’s Web site this month to narrow the learning gap between urban and rural areas.
The ministry last month also released its Digital Teaching Guidelines 3.0, to facilitate the participation of principals and parents in students’ digital learning process, he said.
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