Research Assistant (Office of Teacher Education & Undergraduate Programmes)

The National Institute of Education invites suitable applications for the position of Research Assistant on an 18-month contract at the Office of Teacher Education & Undergraduate Programmes.

Project Title: Orchestrating AI-enabled Mathematics Lessons: An Exploratory Study

Project Introduction:

The introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into education has potentially ushered in an era of new possibilities for reimagining learning, teaching, and assessment practices. The current developments in machine learning, data analytics, natural language processing, and other adaptive technologies promise to provide students with personalised learning pathways and automated feedback, while supporting teachers to adopt a more discursive teaching stance (Pepin et al., 2025). For instance, ChatGPT and other AI-enabled technologies have been used to support teachers in planning mathematics lessons (Gurl et al., 2024), developing mathematics tasks (Schorcht et al., 2024), and designing learning environments for mathematical problem solving (Liu et al., 2025). These perceived affordances of AI have catalysed interests in developing more responsive and differentiated mathematics instruction through a data-driven approach.

However, it remains unclear how teachers can fully harness the affordances of these AI-enabled technologies, given their limitations in reliability (e.g., hallucinations) and adaptability for use with diverse student groups (Celik et al., 2022; Schorcht et al., 2024). Furthermore, as highlighted by Sinha (2025), what constitutes good AI use in education depends on teachers’ perspectives of learning—do they see learning from an instructivist, constructivist, or embodied perspective? These differing perspectives can influence how teachers think about mathematics task design (Schorcht et al., 2024). More importantly, how AI-generated tasks or AI educational tools are used in classrooms adds to the complexities and nuances of orchestrating learning experiences for students. It is not simply about the design of the task, but also how the task is used in the actual instruction (Smith & Stein, 1998).

Therefore, the main aim of this project is to investigate how two expert teachers think as they orchestrate AL-enabled learning experiences in mathematics classrooms, from planning to implementation.

Requirements:

• Bachelor’s degree in education, social sciences, or a related field
• Minimum of 3 years of experience in research support, research communication or knowledge translation.
• Familiar with Qualitative and Quantitative Research
• Excellent writing skills
• Ability to synthesise diverse literature
• Good communication and presentation skills
• Project management skills
• Proficient in Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, SPSS, and NVivo
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively
• Organised, reliable, patient, and with strong initiative

Responsibilities:

• Conduct data collection and analysis to support research objectives
• Coordinate and manage project timelines and deliverables
• Report writing and contributing to academic publications and presentations
• Collaborate with colleagues to support cross-functional research initiatives
• Other duties as assigned by the Principal Investigator

Application

Applicants (external and internal) will apply via Workday. We regret that only shortlisted candidates will be notified.

Closing Date

Closing date for advertisements will be set to 14 calendar days from the date of posting.

Hiring Institution: NIE