EdTechnical

This season EdTech founder Libby Hills and AI researcher Owen Henkel continue to speak with leading researchers, practitioners and educators on the EdTechnical podcast series about the cutting edge of AI in education. They will break down complex AI concepts into non-technical insights to better understand what the research says and help educators sift the useful insights from the AI hype.
In the first episode of a new season of EdTechnical, Libby and Owen speak with Sam Gilbert, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London. Sam is one of the leading researchers studying ‘cognitive offloading’, the use of tools and technologies to support thinking and memory.
Are tools like ChatGPT making us cognitively weaker?  Humans have been offloading  for thousands of years in ever-advancing ways: supporting memory through written notes, calculators, GPS, and large language models. There is a difference between losing specific information we've offloaded and losing underlying cognitive abilities. The distinction matters for thinking about AI's impact on learning and education. “We need to build up foundational abilities, and then offloading is very useful after we’ve acquired them”, Sam says.
Sam Gilbert
Sam Gilbert is a Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London (UCL), where he leads the Metacognition and Executive Functions Group. His research focuses on memory, cognitive control, metacognition, and cognitive offloading. He is widely recognised for his work on how people use external tools and technologies to support thinking and memory.
Links
Cognitive Offloading (Risko & Gilbert, 2016): Cognitive Offloading - PubMed 
UCL Metacognition & Executive Functions Group: Metacognition & Executive Functions | UCL Faculty of Brain Sciences

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BOLD (@BOLD_insights), Libby Hills (@Libbylhhills) and Owen Henkel (@owen_henkel)
Listen to all episodes of EdTechnical here: https://bold.expert/ed-technical 
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Credits: Sarah Myles for production support; Josie Hills for graphic design; Anabel Altenburg for content production.

In this EdTechnical short, Libby and Owen unpack ‘AI agents’ and what they mean for education. Agents are large language models connected to tools and workflows that are allowed to take actions like searching, summarising, and completing multi-step tasks. Recent progress comes from the combination of stronger models and better systems for connecting agents to external tools, enabling more complex and autonomous outputs.
Applying agents to education brings a tension between flexibility and reliability. Agentic systems can be useful for teachers, who operate across varied contexts and need adaptable support. For students, especially in structured learning, too much flexibility can reduce clarity and introduce inconsistency.
This matters because effective learning depends on structure and progression. The value of agents in education depends on how well they are applied to the specific task and learning goal.
Links:
OpenClaw & Moltbook: The viral story of AI agents building their own Reddit-like social network https://techcrunch.com/2026/01/30/openclaws-ai-assistants-are-now-building-their-own-social-network/ 
Claude Research Mode: Anthropic's explainer on deep research https://www.anthropic.com/news/research 

Join us on social media: 
BOLD (@BOLD_insights), Libby Hills (@Libbylhhills) and Owen Henkel (@owen_henkel)
Listen to all episodes of EdTechnical here: https://bold.expert/ed-technical 
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Stay up to date with all the latest research on child development and learning: https://bold.expert
Credits: Sarah Myles for production support; Josie Hills for graphic design; Anabel Altenburg for content production.

At this year's SXSW EDU, Owen joined a panel on what it takes to make voice AI for assessment work in classrooms.
In this live recording of the session, the panelists untangle how voice AI works, and what testing this technology with kindergartners looks like in rural Georgia. They explain why the distinction between capturing what a student said versus what they meant matters enormously for literacy assessment and why questions of privacy, equity and model bias are not afterthoughts but design requirements.
Where does voice AI genuinely open up new possibilities in education, and where is the evidence still thin? 
The other panelists were Patti Ura, Director of Learning Technology Research at Digital Promise, Amelia Kelly, VP of Data Science at Curriculum Associates and former CTO of Soapbox Labs, and Kristen Hoff, Head of Measurement at Curriculum Associates.
Links:
Soapbox Labs, now part of Curriculum Associates 
Digital Promise 
OpenAI Whisper, the open source speech-to-text model

Join us on social media: 
BOLD (@BOLD_insights), Libby Hills (@Libbylhhills) and Owen Henkel (@owen_henkel)
Listen to all episodes of EdTechnical here: https://bold.expert/ed-technical 
Subscribe to BOLD’s newsletter: https://bold.expert/newsletter 
Stay up to date with all the latest research on child development and learning: https://bold.expert
Credits: Sarah Myles for production support; Josie Hills for graphic design; Anabel Altenburg for content production.

In this EdTechnical short, Libby and Owen test a conversational plush toy to understand more about AI-powered toys designed for young children. Recent research from Cambridge shows that preschool-aged children can form rapid emotional connections with social robots like these, even when the responses from the robot are inconsistent.
Children’s experiences with AI toys are shaped by voice and real-time interaction. Could highly responsive, frictionless AI systems in toys influence children’s expectations of human relationships?
Libby and Owen discuss the difference between shared, supervised play and extended solo interaction with the toy, which may be less advisable. As the technology continues to improve, the key challenge becomes how these tools are introduced and used in early childhood environments.
Links:
BBC Article: AI toys for children misread emotions and respond inappropriately, researchers warn
Cambridge study on AI toys in early childhood
AI chatbots and the “empathy gap” in children

Join us on social media: 
BOLD (@BOLD_insights), Libby Hills (@Libbylhhills) and Owen Henkel (@owen_henkel)
Listen to all episodes of EdTechnical here: https://bold.expert/ed-technical 
Subscribe to BOLD’s newsletter: https://bold.expert/newsletter 
Stay up to date with all the latest research on child development and learning: https://bold.expert
Credits: Sarah Myles for production support; Josie Hills for graphic design; Anabel Altenburg for content production.

In this episode of EdTechnical, Libby and Owen speak with Panos Ipeirotis, Professor at NYU Stern School of Business, about his experiment using AI to run oral exams in university courses. As generative AI makes it easier for students to outsource written assignments, educators are asking whether traditional take-home assessments still measure real understanding.
Panos introduced AI-mediated oral assessments after noticing a mismatch between high-quality written submissions and weak classroom discussion. In the new system, students answer questions from a voice agent that probes their understanding of the material and their own work.
Panos tells Libby and Owen how the exams work, including an AI “council” of language models that evaluates transcripts and produces detailed feedback. What does this approach reveal about the future of assessment? Could AI make oral exams scalable in higher education, and even improve fairness and grading consistency?
Links:
Panos Ipeirotis – NYU Stern Faculty Profile
NYU Professor Uses AI-Run Oral Exams to “Fight Fire with Fire”
Article: The case for oral assessment in the age of AI
Guest Bio
Panos Ipeirotis is a Professor of Information, Operations and Management Sciences at NYU Stern School of Business. His research focuses on data science, AI, and human-AI collaboration. In addition to his academic work, he experiments with practical applications of AI in education, including new models of assessment that combine oral exams with AI-based evaluation.

Join us on social media: 
BOLD (@BOLD_insights), Libby Hills (@Libbylhhills) and Owen Henkel (@owen_henkel)
Listen to all episodes of EdTechnical here: https://bold.expert/ed-technical 
Subscribe to BOLD’s newsletter: https://bold.expert/newsletter 
Stay up to date with all the latest research on child development and learning: https://bold.expert
Credits: Sarah Myles for production support; Josie Hills for graphic design; Anabel Altenburg for content production.