AI Tools for The Classroom: A Review of Artificial Intelligence Tools for Teachers & Students

The newer forms of AI you may be hearing about lately, and what we will focus on in this article, are termed generative AI. This is named because the systems generate output based on the vast amounts of data it takes in. Large amounts of data are fed to the systems to train them, and it can, in turn, generate content based on our requests. For example, the AI System DALL-E™ can create an image based on the text you provide, and a tool called Deep Art™ can take a photo you upload and generate a piece of art in a famous artist’s style.

Undoubtedly, you hear about AI more frequently in the news and identify it in various areas of your everyday life. As technology rapidly advances, AI will become more widespread and mainstream, and institutions that have not relied on advanced computer technologies in the past may find themselves incorporating more AI tools into regular practice. Indeed, AI isn’t going away!

As you can imagine, the possibilities of AI in education are increasing each day and are essentially endless. AI can serve as a time-saving tool, freeing up your time by streamlining basic tasks and allowing you more time to actually teach and work directly with your students.

Let’s examine the benefits of using AI in the classroom, specifically from a teacher’s perspective.

Benefits of AI for Teachers

Perhaps the greatest benefit for teachers of using AI is that it can free up their time to engage in the art of teaching. If you spend less time planning lessons, differentiating activities for a variety of levels, and developing assessments, you have more time for genuine human interactions with your students. You know how daunting and time-consuming planning and lesson creation can be. But imagine if you could use some AI tools to create a slide deck for your lesson on parts of a cell or an assessment based on a reading passage. Teachers also spend a lot of time communicating with families. Imagine if you could use AI to help you generate your monthly newsletter or to help you draft that carefully worded response to a concerned parent email. These are just a few of the ways that AI can save you time as a teacher.

Another advantage for teachers using AI in the classroom is that it can simplify the process of differentiation. Many teachers work in classrooms where students face a myriad of learning challenges and come to school with a wide variety of prior experiences. You are expected to meet the needs of each learner in your classroom, and that often means adapting a lesson or assessment in at least two or more ways. For example, you may want your 8th-grade history students to read a non-fiction passage about the causes of the Civil War, and while the majority of your students read at an 8th-grade level, you also have some students who read at a 5th-grade level, and a few who are reading at a 10th-grade level. Powerful AI tools can instantly take a provided passage and adjust the Lexile reading level for each group of students that you might support in that class.

A third advantage to using AI as a teacher is that it is a never-ending resource for new and creative ideas. Perhaps you enjoy starting each class period with a question of the day to engage your students and build a sense of classroom community. After 2 or 3 weeks of daily questions, you may find yourself in a rut and needing help coming up with new questions your students are eager to answer. AI can quickly generate a lengthy list of suggestions that are sure to engage your class. Whether you are struggling with how to introduce a new topic in an exciting way or if you just want to branch out from the traditional lecture and note-taking instructional strategy, AI can provide you with innovative and fresh ideas.

Benefits of AI for Students

One great benefit of encouraging student use of AI is the amount of personalized, student-paced learning they can accomplish. When used properly, the amount of information available through AI tools is endless. Students can use AI to generate content on topics they choose, and this content can be easily adapted to their specific reading level or converted to their native reading language. Additionally, students can use specifically tailored AI tools for learning new math skills, improving their writing through personalized feedback, or completing online interactive simulations to experience things they would not otherwise experience in a classroom setting.

A second benefit is that AI can serve as a motivational tool by increasing student engagement. Because our students have grown up with technology integrated into their lives, they often respond favorably to digital interactions, regardless of whether those digital interactions are actually beneficial to them or not! But, these interactions can lead to students wanting to learn all they can from the various AI tools. This desire to learn all they can stimulates their creativity as they seek new ways to interact with and get the most from AI tools. AI can be a great tool to get students excited about learning and start to think outside the box if you introduce those tools in the correct manner!

Finally, AI can teach students valuable digital literacy skills to help prepare them for life beyond school. What exactly is digital literacy? It is defined as “the ability to use information and communication technologies to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information, requiring both cognitive and technical skills,” according to a task force established by the American Library Association. By learning how to search for and, most importantly, evaluate information generated, our students today are preparing to thrive as tomorrow’s adults in a digital world.

Potential Drawbacks of Students Using Artificial Intelligence

Along with the benefits of vast amounts of learning potential, there is a risk that students can become too dependent on AI tools. If students spend all of their learning time only interacting with online tools and chatbots, there is a chance that their social skills will decrease. Additionally, the lure of thinking, “Oh, I can just look it up online,” may be too great and cause students to stop committing facts to memory. Students have to be taught how to use AI in moderation so that they do not become 100% dependent.

A second risk that comes with students using AI for their learning is that not all information out there is accurate. Some AI tools, like chatbots, have been known to occasionally present inaccurate facts or leave out important details in their response outputs. What’s more, as with any human-designed tool, some AI-generated content may also contain bias. This is because all AI content is generated based on vast amounts of data that have been accumulated over the years, and unfortunately, this data can sometimes be based on opinions, general biases, stereotypes, or incomplete and inaccurate data. For example, if a student asked ChatGPT™ to give examples of famous scientists, and the chatbot responded with only a list of male scientists, it could potentially be argued that it was demonstrating a gender bias, with the omission of female scientists potentially promoting the conclusion that they do not exist or are insignificant.

Perhaps the biggest drawback of students using AI is the opportunity for academic dishonesty or cheating. For example, with the PhotoMath™ tool, students can take a photo of a math equation, and the answer will be displayed automatically. However, in order to get a step-by-step explanation of how to solve the problem, students must have a paid subscription. A lot of students will just use the free version and simply copy the answer onto their homework, learning nothing in the process. Another common cheating technique is asking ChatGPT™ to write an essay or composition and submitting the entire generated text as their own work. The drawbacks of this are likely obvious to you: an over-reliance on AI tools for academic content can lead students to simply search for an answer rather than learn content.

Even if you choose not to introduce AI tools into your classroom for student support, you still must be mindful of both the benefits students will see from using AI tools as well as the drawbacks. The reality is that if they can, students will find ways to use AI to help them with their school work, and it will be your job to ensure that you can still teach students and accurately assess their learning.  Being mindful of these AI tools can, at the very least, ensure that you are planning lessons and assessments with the availability of AI tools in mind to ensure that students have every chance to learn and grow in your classroom.

*For educational purposes only. Model Teaching is not affiliated with and does not specifically endorse any of the AI tools presented in this training. The information provided is accurate as of the publication date of this course and may be subject to change. Visit the AI tool site for the most up-to-date information.

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Use the statements below to reflect on how you can use AI tools, and to set clear implementation goals, to save time in your classroom. Some examples have been included in the tables to give you some starting ideas.

Use this action plan to briefly outline how you will introduce the concepts of AI to your students.