Past Events
Pedagogical Innovation for CET Courses
Seminar
Reclaiming the Writing Process: How AI Interfaces Shape Student Agency and Knowledge Transformation.
Speaker:
Dr. Hari Subramonyam, Assistant Professor, Graduate School of Education and Computer Science (by courtesy) at Stanford University.
Abstract:
As generative AI becomes embedded in student writing tools, concerns have surfaced around diminished writer agency, superficial engagement, and the erosion of critical thinking. In this talk, I present findings from two studies examining how interface design mediates the role of AI in student writing. I introduce Script&Shift, a layered writing environment that integrates large language models (LLMs) not as co-authors, but as process-aware collaborators across brainstorming, elaboration, structuring, and revision. Across a mixed-methods deployment study and a controlled experiment with 90 undergraduates, we find that Script&Shift significantly outperforms both chat-based and standard writing tools in fostering knowledge transformation and preserving students’ ownership over their writing. I discuss how interface paradigms—such as modular scripting, rhetorical layering, and semantic scaffolding—restructure the cognitive experience of writing, and outline design principles for building AI systems that augment rather than automate students’ intellectual labor.