Embodied inquiry with AI as facilitator: an exploratory case study

Generative AI is entering science education at a time when the embodied education community is asking what such systems cannot do.

Rather than asking whether AI can understand the body, this exploratory case study asks where a language-based AI can stand within an inquiry activity without displacing embodied experience.

University students in a Master's course in physics education investigated the statics of fluids following the ISLE approach (Investigative Science Learning Environment) in a two-phase design: students first built the buoyancy model with their own hands, without AI; a purpose-configured AI assistant then facilitated the application of the model to a new phenomenon.

We discuss what a language-based facilitator cannot reach and the value of a design in which AI complements embodied inquiry rather than replacing it.