In writing about artificial intelligence (AI) here I have decided to describe its existence as if it were one entity, rather than recognise the existence of and name several different entities. This has been done both for convenience and because I do not wish this article to serve as a review nor endorsement of any ‘product’, especially as I will be discussing one in particular.
Introduction
The debate about the use and usefulness of AI seems to now be a daily topic, and is one which appears to be in no danger of disappearing as it becomes ever more part of our lives in ways that we may not even be aware. It was inevitable that its use within education would be explored, from current directions on its implementation to allegedly reduce teachers’ workloads, to considering how it can assist in the education of others (including being a ‘copilot’ in the classroom), to vilification in its use by students for homework or coursework completion purposes. I suspect it is not an outrageous prediction that there will eventually be, to much attention, a widespread trial of it as a classroom teacher with additional adult(s) in the room, who may not be teachers let alone subject specialists, there only to support classroom management.
I have more than once experimented with its use for planning lessons, and these experiences have been frustrating. Following detailed prompts on what I wanted, what was produced initially appeared to pass my quality judgments only for me to quickly discover that there were deep issues with what was suggested, that if followed could lead to problems or bemusement within the classroom. Even worse, in some cases, the mathematics presented has simply been incorrect. I did not find it reduced workload, if we equate this with time spent; earlier this year when the school for which I was working provided developmental time for teachers to explore AI use in planning an upcoming lesson, I decided to set it the task of planning a series of lessons on the transformation of functions and their representative graphs. Very quickly there was a need for me to teach it or correct the necessary mathematics, at which point I decided that my time was better spent planning the lessons for myself rather than teach an artificial entity how to do it.1
In these instances, the expertise of the AI was in doubt. How trusted, therefore, can its use be in the development of teachers?
My experience of the approach to the development of non-early career teachers at the school previously mentioned was almost entirely based around short half-termly ‘drop-ins’ by a member of the school’s leadership team at some point in a calendared week, where the observer’s focus would typically be non-subject specific and based upon the school’s teaching and learning model of routines. There would then be a conversation based upon this observation, which based upon logistics would usually be both short and take place many days after the observed lesson, and then a developmental target would be set based on the model. The school, not wishing to stand still in its practices and in considering the effectiveness of this current approach, decided to trial the use of AI for this purpose. I was thus one of a group of teachers who was invited to take part in a pilot scheme in the use of a particular package during the final term of the academic year.
Given my misgivings, I doubt that it is surprising when I share I was incredibly sceptical about the use of AI for developing teaching practice. As a result, I readily accepted the invitation to be part of this group.
Next: practicalities of, and qualms about, the usage of artificial intelligence to provide feedback
1I suspect it is inevitable that I return to the use of AI in planning in future writing, especially given I have had several conversations regarding its use by trainee teachers.
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