Reinventing Education: An Experience of Emotional Measurement with Artificial Intelligence and Playful Strategies in the Classroom

Abstract

This article reports on an educational innovation experience carried out at Unidad Educativa Liceo Cristiano de Cuenca and Unidad Educativa Particular Carlos Crespi II, within the framework of the project “Reinventing Education.” The intervention was conducted by master’s students, who designed and implemented ludic strategies for School Projects, Religion, and Mathematics (logical-mathematical relations), with the aim of energizing learning and observing its emotional effects. An action research design was adopted, and a multimethod assessment was implemented: self-report through the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire (AEQ), administered before and after the sessions, and automatic emotion recognition with Emolive, recording emotions in the phases before, during, and after through a tripod-mounted camera. Data analysis was conducted in Python, integrating data processing and visualization, and triangulating results from both sources. The findings show a consistent increase in positive emotions (motivation, enjoyment, confidence) and a reduction of negative emotions (boredom, frustration, anger) after the intervention. Emolive allowed the observation of in-session dynamics, with a progressive decrease of negative states during the activity and predominance of positive emotions at the end, while the AEQ captured significant changes between the beginning and the end. These results suggest that the combination of ludic strategies with AI-supported emotional measurement contributes to a more favorable socio-emotional climate and supports informed teacher decision-making. Implications for formative assessment and future research lines integrating multimodal measurement and larger samples are discussed.