Design of Learning Environments (301-0-20)

Topic

AI, Learning and Creativity

Instructors

Sepehr Vakil

Meeting Info

Annenberg Hall 303: Tues, Thurs 11:00AM - 12:20PM

Overview of class

Education and the arts stand at the forefront of the transformations sparked by generative AI. Over the past few years, we have been inundated with the hype, excitement, curiosity, and concern surrounding these technologies and their implications for how humans learn, imagine, and create. Will AI redefine the future of artistic and intellectual work? In what ways might it reshape schools, universities, and creative practice? What are the societal, political, and environmental costs of these changes, and how do we hold the harms of AI alongside its potential to deepen or expand human creativity?

This course explores the intertwined histories of artificial intelligence, creativity, and education. We will examine how early efforts to model human intelligence continue to shape the design of AI systems that now mediate creative and intellectual life—from the arts and writing to design and scientific discovery. By situating contemporary AI tools, such as ChatGPT and DALL·E, in historical, ethical, and cultural contexts, students will consider how AI both challenges and extends our understanding of learning and creative expression.
Throughout the quarter, we will ask: How can educators, artists, and technologists design learning environments that cultivate imagination, curiosity, and creative agency in an age increasingly mediated by algorithms? And how might we envision futures where AI supports, rather than constrains, the human capacity to learn, dream, and make?