Can AI make me a better Teacher?

In this short paper we will try to give you a few ideas about how you might use AI tools to ease your workload.

In what seems to be a very short time AI appears to be everywhere, but what does this mean for educators?

AI has been called the third wave, the first wave being the introduction of computers, the second wave the internet and now AI.

Interestingly we used to teach students about how computers and the internet worked but didn’t see them as the seamless adjunct to their learning that they have become. The same doesn’t seem to hold true for AI in education.  Many students are already completely comfortable using sites like ChatGPT and many are using it more than their teachers. It’s probably worthwhile quizzing your students on AI and how they’re using or interacting with it and you’ll quickly find it’s not all about ChatGPT, students are very aware they can create PowerPoints, essays, images, videos, code and a great deal more.

We’re all aware that schools are struggling due to teacher shortages and the continuing impact of the COVID years.

By reducing workload AI tools for teachers can help improve some of these issues by freeing teachers from some repetitive tasks.

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So how can AI ease teacher workload and in doing so enhance learning

 

We think the best approach to this is to think about the tasks teachers perform and then see if there is a way AI can assist by doing targeted internet searches. This can be a worthwhile exercise at a staff meeting or on a curriculum day.

While we’re on this topic another item to discuss at a staff meeting or curriculum day might be the recently released Australian Framework for Generative Artificial Intelligence in Schools. It has been produced very quickly partly in response to the worry schools expressed about students using AI tools to generate assessment tasks.  It can be downloaded from The Australian Government’s Department of Education website.

 

 

So how to move forward with AI as a teacher?

 

We have provided some brief examples below to get you thinking, and the approach can be tailored to suit your personal needs.

Simple internet searches like “AI lesson planner” or “AI PowerPoint generator” will quickly point you in the right direction there’s lots out there for teachers and many places are providing services to teachers for free.

So, what do teachers do?

Here are few simple tasks teachers do where AI can help.

  • Presenting and explaining information

There are many AI PowerPoint generators some are free to use and also AI diagram and picture makers. Microsoft Google Meta all now have their own versions of ChatGPT and embedded AI productivity tools.

One interesting way to use these is to interrogate them on a topic you are teaching for example you might ask ChatGPT or Microsoft’s Copilot to give you an explanation of climate change for a year eleven student. You then might ask for the same topic but for a grade six student.  Using tools like these you can create a dialogue which can help guide your thinking as a teacher.

There are also packages which allow teachers to create interactive video lessons by adding questions, quizzes, and comments to videos. Shortly this will be done in the teacher’s voice.

  • Lesson plan

You can use ChatGPT or Baird to generate lesson plans however if you do a quick search you’ll see there are some sites which are specifically designed  for this task and have more prompts to help you plan and some create associated rubrics.

  • Correcting assessments

There are a few AI tools to help you here. We feel this will be a developing area for teachers as AI becomes more prevalent. Most however won’t pick up if a student has used AI to create a piece of work. There are tools which claim they can do this but from the reviews we’ve seen presently they appear to have limited success.

  • Meetings and minutes

Teachers attend a lot of meetings and usually there are minutes taken. In some virtual meetings you can now simply invite an AI minute taker and it will provide you with a transcript of the meeting by turning voice into text. For in person meetings you might need a recording device to achieve this. Again, a simple search for AI minute taking or AI meeting assistant should point you in the right direction.

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We hope this approach and our little tasters help you as you transition to more AI tools which should help with your ever-increasing workload.

*To delve deeper into this we would recommend you have a look at Leon Furze’s website https://leonfurze.com/ and his recent Book, Practical AI strategies. Engaging with Generative AI in Education

About The Author

Written By Daryl English and Kevin Daly

Both have worked in many leadership positions in schools. Daryl was recently with DET’s Digital Leaning Branch and Kevin was the CEO of Digital Learning and Teaching Victoria. Kevin and Daryl will be presenting at several conferences on this topic later in the year. They can be contacted by email at dalykev@optusnet.com.au

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