About Yi Lu – Designing new learning routines through AI-mediated filmmaking.
Academic Bio
Yi Lu is an IB Film educator and former journalist with more than a decade of experience in long-form storytelling. She previously worked as a TV host and producer covering education and community issues, before joining CBS News as a producer assistant—where her team received two Daytime Emmy Awards.
Yi holds a dual master’s degree from Columbia University (Journalism + SIPA) and now researches how low-code generative AI tools can make students’ thinking visible across subjects. Her current work focuses on designing AI-mediated learning routines, classroom-based inquiry, and multimodal assessment.
She welcomes collaboration with educators, researchers, and students exploring new forms of learning, authorship, and cognition in the age of AI.
What I Study
01 — Generative AI as a Cognitive Partner
How AI externalizes early-stage thinking.
I study how low-code generative tools—such as AI storyboards, character drafts, and scene variations—serve as cognitive partners that make students’ invisible reasoning visible. My work examines how cinematic choices (framing, mood, contrast) reveal emerging ideas, misconceptions, and identity-driven interpretations.
02 — Designing Low-Code Learning Routines
Practical frameworks teachers can use tomorrow.
I design classroom-tested protocols that integrate AI filmmaking into everyday learning—not as a shortcut, but as structured routines for inquiry, reflection, and multimodal expression. These routines aim to support students across subjects, including multilingual learners and those who struggle with traditional writing-dominant tasks.
03 — Multimodal Evidence of Learning
Beyond essays: storyboards, clips, traces, revisions.
My research investigates how filmic artifacts—revision histories, contrast drafts, voiceover reasoning, and cinematic annotations—can function as valid learning evidence. I explore new forms of multimodal assessment that capture thinking more authentically than conventional text-only measures.
Why This Matters
AI is changing how students express ideas, reason visually, and construct identity.
My work aims to build classroom-tested ways of using AI filmmaking not as a shortcut—but as a thinking partner that makes learning visible.
Story Behind the Project