Research Study Repository
A comprehensive collection of academic research on generative AI in preK12 education organized into three categories:
- Descriptive - Research that describes how generative AI is being used in classrooms, schools, or districts or how products are designed and built.
- Impact (includes RCT + Quasi-Experimental) - Studies that test how well something works including but not limited to randomly dividing people into groups and comparing the results.
- Review - Studies that combine and summarize all the research on a specific genAI topic to find patterns and answers.
We aim to include all research in the above categories on generative AI in preK12 education in the US. As research diverges from genAI for preK12 in the US - such as machine learning, education systems beyond preK12, or studies conducted outside the US - inclusion in the repository is based on relevance to our target audiences:
- Superintendents, state, and federal K12 leaders
- Education support organizations (unions, parent groups, etc.)
- Leadership and product teams at technology companies
- Academic researchers
- Global education leaders
The Research Repository includes pre-published works but does not include journalism on AI for education.
Research synthesis is AI-generated, human reviewed. Updated 03/2025.
Showing 1 - 30 of 417 results
How AI and Human Behaviors Shape Psychosocial Effects of Chatbot Use: A Longitudinal Randomized Controlled Study
Cathy Mengying Fang, Auren R. Liu, Valdemar Danry, Eunhae Lee, Samantha W.T. Chan, Pat Pataranutaporn, Pattie Maes, Jason Phang, Michael Lampe, Lama Ahmad, Sandhini Agarwal. (03/2025). MIT Media Lab.
What is the application? Analyzing
Who is the user? Student
Which age? Adult
Why use AI? Outcomes – Social Emotional
Study design: Impact – Randomized Controlled TrialPAD: Personalized Alignment of LLMs at Decoding-Time
Ruizhe Chen, Xiaotian Zhang, Meng Luo, Wenhao Chai, Zuozhu Liu. (03/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Others
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentUse Me Wisely: Al-Driven Assessment for LLM Prompting Skills Development
Dimitri Ognibene, Gregor Donabauer, Emily Theophilou, Cansu Koyuturk, Mona Yavari, Sathya Bursic, Alessia Telari, Alessia Testa, Raffaele Boiano, Davide Taibi, Davinia Hernandez-Leo, Udo Kruschwitz and Martin Ruskov. (03/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Outcomes – Durable Skills
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentLLMs as Educational Analysts: Transforming Multimodal Data Traces into Actionable Reading Assessment Reports
Eduardo Davalos, Yike Zhang, Namrata Srivastaval, Jorge Alberto Salas, Sara McFadden, Sun-Joo Cho, Gautam Biswas, Amanda Goodwin. (03/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Analyzing
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5)
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and UseHow Do Teachers Create Pedagogical Chatbots?: Current Practices and Challenges
Minju Yoo, Hyoungwook Jin, Juho Kim. (03/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Descriptive – Product DevelopmentEducator Attention: How computational tools can systematically identify the distribution of a key resource for students
Qingyang Zhang, Rose E. Wang, Ana T. Ribeiro, Dora Demszky, Susanna Loeb. (03/2025). EdWorkingPapers.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Analyzing
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5)
Why use AI? Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Impact – Randomized Controlled TrialSocratiQ: A Generative AI-Powered Learning Companion for Personalized Education and Broader Accessibility
Jason Jabbour, Kai Kleinbard, Olivia Miller, Robert Haussman, Vijay Janapa Reddi. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Durable Skills
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Descriptive – Product DevelopmentEdgeAIGuard: Agentic LLMs for Minor Protection in Digital Spaces
Ghulam Mujtaba, Sunder Ali Khowaja, Kapal Dev. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Communicating / Social Tools
Who is the user? Others
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
Why use AI? Outcomes – Social Emotional
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentEvent Segmentation Applications in Large Language Model Enabled Automated Recall Assessments
Ryan A. Panela, Alexander J. Barnett, Morgan D. Barense, Björn Herrmann. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Analyzing
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Other Academic
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentProtecting Human Cognition in the Age of AI
Anjali Singh, Karan Taneja, Zhitong Guan, Avijit Ghosh. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Durable Skills, Reimagined Schooling
Study design: Systematic ReviewAutograding Mathematical Induction Proofs with Natural Language Processing
Chenyan Zhao, Mariana Silva, Seth Poulsen. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Numeracy
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Impact – Quasi–experimentalThe Art of Storytelling: Multi-Agent Generative AI for Dynamic Multimodal Narratives
Samee Arif, Taimoor Arif, Muhammad Saad Haroon, Aamina Jamal Khan, Agha Ali Raza, Awais Athar. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student
Which age? Elementary (PK5)
Why use AI? Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentPosition: LLMs Can be Good Tutors in Foreign Language Education
Jingheng Ye, Shen Wang, Deqing Zhou, Yibo Yan, Kun Wang, Hai-Tao Zheng, Zenglin Xu, Irwin King, Philip S. Yu, Qingsong Wen. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary, Adult
Why use AI? Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Differentiation, Reimagined Schooling
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Descriptive – Product Development, Systematic ReviewImprove LLM-based Automatic Essay Scoring with Linguistic Features
Zhaoyi Joey Hou, Alejandro Ciuba, Xiang Lorraine Li. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Literacy
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and UseThe Advancement of Personalized Learning Potentially Accelerated by Generative AI
Yuang Wei, Yuan-Hao Jiang, Jiayi Liu, Changyong Qi, Linzhao Jia, Rui Jia. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Teaching – Professional Learning, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary, Adult
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Other Academic, Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Durable Skills
Study design: Systematic ReviewSET-PAIRED: Designing for Parental Involvement in Learning with an Al-Assisted Educational Robot
Hui-Ru Ho, Nitigya Kargeti, Ziqi Liu, Bilge Mutlu. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Learning – Student Support, Communicating / Social Tools
Who is the user? Parent/Caregiver
Which age? 0-3 years, Elementary (PK5)
Why use AI? Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Social Emotional
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Descriptive – Product DevelopmentTowards Adaptive Feedback with AI: Comparing the Feedback Quality of LLMs and Teachers on Experimentation Protocols
Kathrin Seßler, Arne Bewersdorff, Claudia Nerdel, Enkelejda Kasneci. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Other Academic, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Impact – Quasi–experimentalCo-designing Large Language Model Tools for Project-Based Learning with K-12 Educators
Prerna Ravi, John Masla, Gisella Kakoti, Grace C. Lin, Emma Anderson, Matt Taylor, Anastasia K. Ostrowski, Cynthia Breazeal, Eric Klopfer, Hal Abelson. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Teaching – Professional Learning
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Differentiation, Reimagined Schooling
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentThe Responsible Development of Automated Student Feedback with Generative AI
Euan D Lindsay, Mike Zhang, Aditya Johri, and Johannes Bjerva. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Descriptive – Product DevelopmentMindCraft: Revolutionizing Education through AI-Powered Personalized Learning and Mentorship for Rural India
Arihant Bardia, Aayush Agrawal. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support, Communicating / Social Tools
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Other Academic, Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Social Emotional, Outcomes – Durable Skills
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and Use, Descriptive – Product DevelopmentThe Imitation Game for Educational AI
Shashank Sonkar, Naiming Liu, Xinghe Chen, Richard G. Baraniuk. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Social Emotional, Outcomes – Durable Skills
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentExploring the Potential of Large Language Models for Estimating the Reading Comprehension Question Difficulty
Yoshee Jain, John Hollander, Amber He, Sunny Tang, Liang Zhang, John Sabatini. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support, Analyzing
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary, Adult
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentFrom Correctness to Comprehension: AI Agents for Personalized Error Diagnosis in Education
Yi-Fan Zhang, Hang Li, Dingjie Song, Lichao Sun, Tianlong Xu, Qingsong Wen. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5)
Why use AI? Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentVTutor: An Open-Source SDK for Generative AI-Powered Animated Pedagogical Agents with Multi-Media Output
Eason Chen, Chenyu Lin, Xinyi Tang, Aprille Xi, Canwen Wang, Jionghao Lin, Kenneth R. Koedinger. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12), Post-Secondary, Adult
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Literacy, Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Other Academic, Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Social Emotional
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentUnveiling Scoring Processes: Dissecting the Differences between LLMs and Human Graders in Automatic Scoring
Xuansheng Wu, Padmaja Pravin Saraf, Gyeonggeon Lee, Ehsan Latif, Ninghao Liu, Xiaoming Zhai. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Middle School (6-8)
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Other Academic
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and UseUnderstanding Generative AI Risks for Youth: A Taxonomy Based on Empirical Data
Yaman Yu, Yiren Liu, Jacky Zhang, Yun Huang, Yang Wang. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application?
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Elementary (PK5), Middle School (6-8), High School (9-12)
Why use AI?
Study design: Descriptive – Implementation and UseOne Size doesn't Fit All: A Personalized Conversational Tutoring Agent for Mathematics Instruction
Ben Liu, Jihai Zhang, Fangquan Lin, Xu Jia, Min Peng. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Student
Which age? Elementary (PK5)
Why use AI? Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Differentiation, Outcomes – Durable Skills
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentEssayJudge: A Multi-Granular Benchmark for Assessing Automated Essay Scoring Capabilities of Multimodal Large Language Models
Jiamin Su, Yibo Yan, Fangteng Fu, Han Zhang, Jingheng Ye, Xiang Liu, Jiahao Huo, Huiyu Zhou, Xuming Hu. (02/2025). arXiv.
What is the application? Teaching – Assessment and Feedback, Learning – Student Support
Who is the user? Others
Which age? High School (9-12), Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Outcomes – Literacy
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentScaffolding Middle-School Mathematics Curricula With Large Language Models
Rizwaan Malik, Dorna Abdi, Rose Wang, Dorottya Demszky. (02/2025). British Journal of Educational Technology.
What is the application? Teaching – Instructional Materials
Who is the user? Educator
Which age? Middle School (6-8)
Why use AI? Efficiency, Outcomes – Numeracy, Outcomes – Differentiation
Study design: Descriptive – Product DevelopmentGenAI-101: What Undergraduate Students Need to Know and Actually Know About Generative AI
Sina Rismanchian, Eesha Tur Razia Babar, Shayan Doroudi. (01/2025). EdWorkingPapers.com.
What is the application? Communicating / Social Tools, Organizing, Analyzing
Who is the user? Student, Educator
Which age? Post-Secondary
Why use AI? Outcomes – Other Academic, Reimagined Schooling
Study design: Systematic Review
