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Critical and More-than-human Perspectives on AI in Education
to be held at the Twenty-first European Conference on Technology Enhanced Learning (ECTEL'26)
Valencia, Spain
Day to be confirmed: 14 or 15 September 2026
Half a day
The workshop will be IN PERSON (face-to-face) in Valencia, Spain.
The workshop will be IN PERSON (face-to-face) in Valencia, Spain.
The challenge
The challenge
Artificial intelligence, particularly generative AI, is reshaping education, offering new possibilities for personalised learning, adaptive support, and the design of novel educational experiences. At the same time, its growing presence raises fundamental challenges related to assessment, agency, justice, governance, and environmental sustainability. As AI increasingly mediates how knowledge is produced and engaged with, it can easily intensify longstanding questions about what it means to learn and how educational systems should respond. Human-centred approaches, including Human-Centred AI, have played an important role in aligning AI with pedagogical values and human needs. However, these approaches may not be sufficient to address the broader socio-technical and ecological conditions shaping AI in education.
Aim and Scope
Aim and Scope
This workshop advances a more-than-human perspective that foregrounds the entanglements between humans, technologies, institutions, and environments. It invites critical engagement with the assumptions underpinning current AI practices and explores alternative framings grounded in relationality, responsibility, and sustainability.
This will be a half-day workshop with mixed participation (including selected presenters and interested delegates -- see Call For Participation below).
Call For Participation
Call For Participation
This workshop explores what More-than-Human AI in Education might entail, moving beyond purely human-centred perspectives to examine the complex relationships between learners, technologies, institutions, and environments.
This workshop explores what More-than-Human AI in Education might entail, moving beyond purely human-centred perspectives to examine the complex relationships between learners, technologies, institutions, and environments.
We aim to deepen critical discussions around designing ethical, inclusive, and sustainable futures for AI in education that contribute meaningfully to learning and society.
We aim to deepen critical discussions around designing ethical, inclusive, and sustainable futures for AI in education that contribute meaningfully to learning and society.
Who is this workshop for?
Who is this workshop for?
Who gets to decide what responsible AI in education looks like?
This workshop brings together researchers, educators, designers, and practitioners who are willing to question dominant assumptions about AI and explore alternative futures for learning. We welcome participants from AI in Education, Learning Analytics, TEL, HCI, Critical Data Studies, and related fields who are interested in the ethical, social, political, and ecological dimensions of educational AI.
If you are concerned not only with what AI can do, but also with what it should do, and for whom, this workshop is for you.
Let us know if you'll be attending!
*note you still would need to register to the main conference
Let us know if you'll be attending!
*note you still would need to register to the main conference
Call for Short Papers
Call for Short Papers
Attendees can optionally submit a position workshop paper (see submission details below). The organisers welcome two types of contributions:
short empirical overview paper to showcase work in progress, tools or successful education experiences aligned to a More-than-human-Centred AI perspective; or
short critical argument or perspective papers provoking the audience to think about key issues and problems related to HCLA or HCAI in education and the use of human-centred design to support the LA design process.
Suggested Topics
Suggested Topics
The following can guide the selection of topics for submitted papers:
What assumptions about learning, intelligence, agency, and progress are embedded in current AI systems used in education, and whose interests do these assumptions serve?
Have human-centred approaches reached their limits in addressing the challenges posed by AI in education? What remains invisible when humans are positioned at the centre?
To what extent does anthropocentric thinking constrain how we design, study, and govern AI in education?
What social, political, and environmental costs are hidden within the infrastructures that power AI in education, and how should these shape our research and practice?
What alternative futures for AI in education become possible when we move beyond human-centredness, optimisation, efficiency, and automation as primary goals?
What can Indigenous, Global South, and other non-Western perspectives teach us about rethinking intelligence, agency, and human–technology–environment relationships in AI-enabled education?
📝 NOTE: Papers will be published on the workshop website only.
Important Dates
Important Dates
15th August 2026 - Deadline for all paper submissions ✅
30th August 2026 - Send out notifications of acceptance
5th September 2026 - (LAK25 early bird registration deadline) confirmation of attendance
7th September 2026 - Deadline for submission of final camera-ready papers to be made available to all participants through this website
Proposal Format & Submission Process
Proposal Format & Submission Process
Submissions for short papers should use the following template (Overleaf or Word, please use the 1-single-column template).
All submissions are made via the Registration form, following these steps:
Prepare a submission using the template (above).
Fill the registration form and attach the paper as a PDF.
Reviewing Process
Reviewing Process
Each submission/contribution will be reviewed by one or two reviewers designated by the workshop organisers. The review process is single blind (i.e., reviewers’ identities are not disclosed to those submitting). The paper does not need to be blinded. The comments for each paper will be shared among the reviewers of that paper. Submissions with the highest evaluations will be accepted for presentation in the workshop. Attendees presenting a paper will be prioritised in case the workshop gets full.
During & After the Workshop
During & After the Workshop
The workshop is planned to take place during the pre-conference activities of the main conference and is planned for a half-day format of up to 4 hours.
The workshop is divided into four parts:
It will begin with a brief introduction framing the key ideas and tensions, including a reinterpretation of mindful TEL through more-than-human perspectives, followed by short lightning presentations of participants’ position or empirical overview papers.
Participants will then be organised into small thematic groups based on shared interests, engaging in facilitated discussions to surface assumptions, tensions, and critical questions.
The session will transition into a hands-on collaborative activity where groups map the socio-technical and ecological dimensions of AI in education or develop alternative conceptual and design approaches.
The workshop will conclude with a plenary discussion that synthesises insights across groups, highlighting shared concerns as well as productive disagreements, and supporting collective sense-making.
Workshop Organisers
Workshop Organisers
Patricia Santos
Patricia Santos
Universitat Pompeu Fabra: Barcelona, Spain
Simon Buckingham Shum
Simon Buckingham Shum
University of Technology Sydney, Australia
Yannis Dimitriadis
Yannis Dimitriadis
Universidad de Valladolid, Spain
Roberto Martinez-Maldonado
Roberto Martinez-Maldonado
Monash University, Australia
Example and suggested readings
Example and suggested readings
Related bibliography
Related bibliography
Coulton, P., & Lindley, J. G. (2019). More-Than Human Centred Design: Considering Other Things. The Design Journal, 22(4), 463–481. https://doi.org/10.1080/14606925.2019.1614320
Giaccardi, E., Redström, J., & Nicenboim, I. (2025). The making(s) of more-than-human design: introduction to the special issue on more-than-human design and HCI. Human–Computer Interaction, 40(1–4), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/07370024.2024.2353357
Buckingham Shum, S., Martínez-Maldonado, R., Dimitriadis, Y., & Santos, P. (2024). Human-Centred Learning Analytics: 2019–24. Br. J. Educ. Technol., 55(3), 755–768. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.13442
Alfredo, R., Echeverria, V., Jin, Y., Yan, L., Swiecki, Z., Gašević, D., & Martinez-Maldonado, R. (2024). Human-centred learning analytics and AI in education: A systematic literature review. Computers and Education: Artificial Intelligence, 6, 100215. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.caeai.2024.100215
Topali, P., Ortega-Arranz, A., Rodríguez-Triana, M. J., Er, E., Khalil, M., & Açkapınar, G. (2024). Designing human-centered learning analytics and artificial intelligence in education solutions: A systematic literature review. Behaviour & Information Technology, 0(0), 1–28. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929X.2024.2345295
Capel, T., & Brereton, M. (2023). What is Human-Centered about Human-Centered AI? A Map of the Research Landscape. Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 1–23. https://doi.org/10.1145/3544548.3580959
Looking forward to your participation! 🎉
Looking forward to your participation! 🎉
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