Saving Time and Learning About AI

As a classroom teacher with almost six years of experience integrating AI into my teaching practice and training other educators, I have enjoyed exploring the possibilities through AI and engaging in conversations with students and teachers. Every educator needs to learn about AI and how we can leverage this technology to benefit our students and enhance our work. To best provide for our students, we need to understand how this technology will impact them and us. What better way than to explore new tools via AI in our teaching practice.

Especially as we see the increase in technology in education, it is essential that we embrace and understand emerging technologies such as AI and how it can impact not only our work but the benefits for student learning. In my work as a classroom teacher and consultant, I enjoy helping other educators get started with AI.

Why Educators Need to Understand the AI Tools Available

Our roles as educators have continued to change over the years. Not only do we teach the content, but we serve as mentors, facilitators of learning, and co-learners with our students, especially as we embrace these emerging technologies. Because of the rapid increase of AI in education, it is important that we explore the benefits and how it can help us to “work smarter, not harder,” so that we have more time for working with students and focusing on supporting them in their learning journey.

AI, ChatGPT, and other generative AI have become some of the most talked about topics in education this year. But with technology comes a bit of hesitancy, especially with something as powerful as AI. In our schools, we have to provide opportunities for students to learn about changing technology because of the impact it may have on their future. Not only can AI tools enhance creativity and productivity, they can also provide educators with valuable insights into student learning and assist with some of the time-consuming tasks that educators have. AI offers many benefits for educators, especially when it comes to productivity and providing us with ways to personalize learning for our students. We can explore the AI tools available and decide how to best leverage this transformative technology into our teaching practices.

How to leverage some tools with benefits

I like to think of three key areas where AI can make an impact for educators and for students.

1. Personalized Learning: Through AI, educators can provide tailored learning experiences based on AI-driven analytics that provide valuable insights into student performance and learning trends. Using this data, it can adapt student learning materials instantly. Teachers can then use this information to provide personalized learning experiences, adapting to each student’s strengths, weaknesses, and learning pace.

2. Productivity and Efficiency: Another benefit is greater efficiency that comes with AI. Educators are responsible for a variety of clerical tasks such as communicating with students and their families, grading assessments, and providing feedback. Educators may find they spend more time on these clerical tasks rather than on teaching and working directly with students. The right AI tools can help to automate or streamline these tasks, such as grading assignments or providing feedback, which allows teachers to have additional time with their students.

3. Creating and supplementing the content: Through AI-powered platforms, teachers can curate a range of educational resources for their students and their own professional learning. With generative AI in particular, being able to create lessons, activities, assessments, prompts for discussion and presentations simply by providing a short prompt with keywords, educators can create engaging lessons for students in far less time.

But how do we know where to begin?

Tools to Explore

With so many different tools becoming available or integrating artificial intelligence into them, it can be hard to keep up. Knowing which one will provide the most versatile options is quite helpful. My recommendation is to select one or two to start with. Explore how they work, and the content that is created and be sure to take time to evaluate the accuracy of the information and involve students in discussions about the benefits for their learning.

Here are seven AI-powered tools that will help teachers with personalized learning, become more efficient, and save time that can then be spent with students. These tools also enhance the materials that teachers are using in their classrooms. I have created and experimented with a lot of these and my students’ responses have always been positive. Embracing these tools also sparks curiosity for learning. Creating and sharing these resources with our students leads to really rich conversations about the benefits of AI and the proper use of this technology for creating and learning.

• AudioPen AI: An AI-powered web app that you can use on your computer or on your phone, that takes your voice and enhances it as it generates the text. For years, I have been using voice-to-text to write blogs, books, emails, and lesson plans, for just a few examples. After you finish speaking, it generates an improved result. Think about times when you are brainstorming ideas or trying to write a project description and you just want to think out loud without worrying about grammar initially. AudioPen can create something for you which you can then decide to use or adjust as needed.
• Curipod: Enables teachers to create interactive lessons in minutes using AI. Students can explore various topics, and the AI functionality helps generate customized lessons tailored to their learning needs. Teachers simply type in a topic and a ready-to-run lesson is generated with text, images and activities such as polls, open-ended responses, word clouds, and more. There are even activities to build in that focus on SEL check-ins.
• Eduaide.Ai: An AI-assisted lesson development tool that provides educators with more than 100 resource types to choose from. It offers the ability to translate the generated content into more than 15 languages instantly. Educators can generate a syllabus, and discussion prompts, use the Teaching Assistant to help with creating IEP plans, write emails, or even create a list of accommodations for students in addition to many other options.
• OpenAI: Has recently released a Teaching with AI Guide for teachers to help them use ChatGPT in their classroom. The guide comes with several suggested prompts and includes explanations that clarify exactly how ChatGPT works, and what any of its limitations are, and provides reminders of the importance of verifying information and checking for bias.
• Quizizz: With Quizizz, teachers can design quizzes that will then create a personalized learning path in response to each student’s responses and based on their needs. Teachers can also create lessons with Quizizz, which now has an AI enhancement that can adjust question difficulty, check grammar, redesign questions to reflect real-world scenarios and more features on the way.
• Slidesgo: Provides access to free templates via Google Slides and now has the AI Presentation Maker. With this new functionality, presentations can be created within minutes. Start by simply choosing a topic, selecting a tone such as casual, creative, or professional, making changes, and downloading your presentation. A time saver for sure!

There are many more tools available for teachers to explore that can help with each of the key areas that I mentioned. The most important is selecting a tool to start with and reflecting on how it impacted your practice.

About Rachelle

Follow Rachelle on Twitter @Rdene915 and on Instagram @Rdene915. Rachelle has a podcast, ThriveinEDU available at https://anchor.fm/rdene915.

Looking for PD for your school or keynotes for your conference? I provide in-person and virtual training on the following topics. If you want to learn more about and explore AI and ChatGPT, contact me to schedule! Rdene915@gmail.com or use the Book Me form on my website.

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Originally published at http://rdene915.com on October 24, 2023.