The 10 Most Significant Education Studies of 2024

It was a big year for tech. Cell phones had their moment in the sun, and then just as suddenly fell from grace and began disappearing from classrooms nationwide. In their stead, a revolutionary new tool powered by large-language models arose in the West—Silicon Valley, to be precise—and began to write in fluid, human-sounding paragraphs.

In reading through hundreds of studies, we found a few good and bad things to say about the future of ChatGPT and AI in classrooms (Hint: the tools are still not ready to teach).

We also looked at whether there’s any truth to reports that “pandemic babies” lack basic skills like grasping a pencil or getting along with other kids; how to make your classroom management impervious to “inattention contagion”; and the price students pay when outdoor spaces are deemed “too risky” to learn in.