AI Tools for Teachers: Empowering Educators and Revolutionizing Classrooms

Artificial intelligence (AI) tools for teachers can improve teaching and learning experiences and outcomes—with your expertise at the helm, of course. From helping students achieve by adapting and differentiating lessons to finding new ways to enable learners to save time on administrative duties, AI tools for teachers offer various benefits. Explore the advantages of familiarizing yourself with some of the many AI tools for teachers available to better understand the possibilities.

What are AI tools for teachers?

Many of the AI tools for teachers use generative AI, a specific type of AI made up of large language models and other creative-based AI models that use prediction to create new content. These types of AI undergo a training process that analyzes language use and helps the AI learn to make predictions based on the data it encounters during its training. 

You could choose to use any of the well-known AI chatbots allowed by your institution—ChatGPT, Google Gemini, or Perplexity, for instance—in your classroom. But, you may want a platform designed specifically for teachers and students using educational terminology and teaching and learning best practices. These tools offer functions like quiz and lesson plan generation, personalized guidance and progress monitoring, language translation, reading level adjustment, premade or teacher-created digital classrooms for collaboration, assignments, idea generation, and much more.

AI use by teachers

Teachers' use of AI falls into four broad categories: enhancing teaching and learning, simplifying differentiation, saving time, and making lesson planning and classwork creation more efficient. Within each of these categories you can find AI tools that meet a variety of needs of both you and your students. 

Enhanced teaching and learning experience

AI tools for teachers may expand access to quality learning experiences. For instance, AI assistive technology and adaptive learning tools like speech recognition software can better support students with disabilities. 

You can also use AI to provide interactive and experiential learning opportunities beyond those that are accessible through traditional methods of education. For example, students can conduct experiments and participate in virtual labs replicating real-life scenarios. You might use AI for virtual field trips, online events, or guest lectures, thereby exposing your students to unique experiences and experts they may not normally encounter. 

AI’s ability to generate simulations, challenges, and virtual worlds and adapt games and activities for individual learners based on their interactions with the programs may positively affect student engagement and content retention. 

Personalization

Many of today’s AI-driven learning platforms offer content specific to each learner’s performance and learning style. These tools can use AI tools to analyze how your students interact with content and design and adapt learning activities to meet their unique needs in real time. You can even use some AI programs to alter text to whichever language or reading level you might need. 

Teachers can also use AI to offer personalized tutoring and guidance to students through the use of chatbots and virtual assistants. These specially designed platforms provide feedback to students, answer questions about the topics you are studying in the classroom, and break complex content into more easily understandable pieces. 

Teaching tool creation

Many AI programs for teachers tout their capability of generating quizzes, lesson plans, rubrics, presentations, worksheets, reading materials, and other tools for you and your students.

For instance, if you enter a grade level, subject area, or topic into many of the existing AI learning platforms, you could get exit tickets, polls, writing prompts, rubrics, and other standards-aligned content and activities. AI can also assist you in creating assessments, from interactive game-based quizzes to scenario-based questions to word problems. The possibilities seem almost endless. 

Some platforms allow you to create focused, student-centered classrooms, sometimes called "spaces," where your students can interact with each other and the content and materials you choose. By designing your own space or using a premade one, these rooms can guide your students in accomplishing all kinds of relevant goals. 

Time-saving

In a recent survey from Merrimack College, teachers reported working 54 hours per week, with 25 of those hours (46 percent) spent on instruction and 17 (31 percent) spent on a combination of general administrative work, grading and feedback, nonteaching learner interactions, communication with guardians, and other work tasks [1]. With the right AI tools, you may be able to automate or streamline many of these administrative tasks, freeing up time for individualized lesson planning and instruction.

AI tools for teachers can not only create assessments but also evaluate and document students’ progress. For instance, you can use AI systems to grade tests using standard formats like multiple-choice questions. You may even want to take advantage of grading assistants that look over learner writing and generate appropriate feedback that you review and alter based on your needs rather than spending hours poring over every bit of an essay.

The ability of AI to oversee, monitor, and authenticate online exams can free up teachers' time to create quality lessons and assessments. 

Tools for analyzing patterns in your data—from grades to attendance—can quickly provide you with useful insights into learner performance. You may even be able to use AI to help brainstorm goals and create templates for time-consuming individualized education plans (IEPs).

Additionally, AI tools can save you time planning field trips, integrating standards into your lessons, and creating engaging presentations. You can even find AI tools for teachers to generate parent emails or create classroom newsletters for you to edit and send out in a timely manner. 

Considerations for integrating AI tools for teachers

AI can offer many benefits to teachers. Specially designed AI tools for teachers can be time-saving and can help teachers create an engaging, accessible learning environment made up of creative teaching tools and personalized learning experiences. However, it’s essential to also keep the following considerations in mind.

Ethical considerations

AI tools don’t always cite their sources. They can also promote bias depending on the data used during their training. Plus, you need to be cognizant of how learner data is collected and used. However, procedures such as user authentication and data encryption—often managed at the school or district level—can help mitigate privacy concerns. You could use the challenges you find through these programs to help teach learners to critically evaluate AI-provided information for biased or inaccurate "facts."

Human interaction

Even the best AI tools for teachers can not replace the face-to-face interactions with classmates and teachers that are essential for developing socioemotional skills. While the tools students use can be helpful, consider relying more heavily on AI for administrative tasks, brainstorming, or building on your own thoughts. Creating a balance between AI-assisted learning and traditional methods may provide your students with a well-rounded experience. 

Reliance on technology

In spite of the benefits, an overreliance on technology can negatively affect learners’ critical thinking and problem-solving skills. Consider continuing with the types of assignments and projects you've always done—the kinds that don't use AI or, perhaps, any technology—in addition to those that use digital tools for balance. 

Best practices for integrating AI tools for teaching

Understanding how to begin using these tools and implementing them into your classroom can help smooth the path forward. To prevent the integration of AI tools into your daily routine from becoming too overwhelming, consider the following steps:

• Start small: Try small-scale projects that test how different AI tools work in your specific educational setting. Give yourself the freedom and grace to explore and make mistakes.

• Collaborate: Talk with your colleagues to see how they use AI in their classrooms. Share how you are also implementing the technology so you can learn from and collaborate with one another. 

• Keep learning: Take advantage of workshops or professional development on AI tools for teachers. Stay informed of advancements and new applications that may further enhance the technology's usefulness.

• Embrace change: Your students are probably very aware of (and probably experimenting with) current AI technologies. Because AI will likely impact learners in and out of the classroom, teachers can help them become more savvy with the technology by providing opportunities for them to interact with the tool responsibly. 

Hone your AI skills on Coursera

The modern classroom has many options for technological integration, including specially designed AI tools for teachers. These programs can help you save time and create engaging, personalized learning experiences to meet your students' needs. 

Explore the many options for learning more about AI on Coursera. With Generative AI for Everyone, a course from DeepLearning.AI, you can learn the basics of generative AI and its potential opportunities and risks. If you are already using AI, you may want to take Google Prompting Essentials to practice writing more effective prompts. Or, gain in-depth knowledge of the power of generative AI with IBM’s Generative AI Fundamentals Specialization. Find all of these courses and more on Coursera.