Virtual Colleague: Reflecting on AI Avatars in Education

Nives Torresi on My Virtual Colleague: Reflecting on AI Avatars in Education Moving beyond administrative AI tools, this session reflects on the future possibilities and essential human limits of lifelike talking avatars in education. We explore how a responsive digital colleague can serve as a reflective sounding board for teachers, while keeping human educators at the heart of learning. *Resources for MMVC26 15th Annual International Event* Opening with the Bios of the Presenters and Certificates: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AuYhcwVRIUQoyKafxILOyh_EPGvv6FPeTQXyC3o3Hvo/edit?usp=sharing Recordings and information about the sessions: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SocrzOj_RfIQGO1kKMEfHhRZ013KDF5QRyKvh02mbj4/edit?usp=sharing 00:00 - Introduction & The Teacher's Journey 01:21: A Background in Learning 01:22 Identifying the Classroom Gap 02:41 The Core Problem & Solution 02:41 Education on Demand 05:04 Moving Beyond the Chatbot 06:13 Simple Bot vs. Reasoning Engine 06:13 The Quest for Free, Open Tools 08:22 Feeding the Bot Knowledge 11:31 The Reasoning Engine Defined 14:10 Deep Dive 14:10 Connecting the Facts 17:32 The AI Course Assistant Interface 19:32 Development Story & The "Personal" AI 19:32 From Google Cloud to ChatGPT 22:55 Real-Time Evolution 25:57 Future Vision & Beta Testing 25:57 Evolving to Knowledge 28:58 Live Demo & Community Feedback 34:46 Privacy, Features, & Closing #teachertraining #ELT #virtualcolleague #aiavatar #professionaldevelopment #teacher #aiineducation #innovativelearning