The three-day course named integrating AI in the classroom with critical thinking in Budapest held between the 16th to 18th September gave the time to master the knowledge in this educational area. Firstly, I learned that AI may make the teacher’s paperwork smoother during the lesson-planning phase. However, a teacher would need to be practical, have criteria for using AI, have time to familiarise and practice, know the limitations of using AI and have a growth mindset. I learnt basic AI terms which are used when typing the message/instruction to a chatbot such as ChatGPT to refine what is needed to create according to the lesson’s objectives.
This affects the quality and structure of the output of the chatbot’s reply. I also learnt how flexible AI may be for example when asking it to generate a lesson (text, questions, tasks, activities) with different levels according to the abilities. Another task to use in class is to use Padlet I can’t draw AI tool to generate an image therefore working on sentence writing skills (implementing grammar such as adjectives) and even oral skills to get the learners to talk and communicate. These address learning outcomes across the junior years related to writing for a purpose and audience in some genres and for speaking by using one’s own words to suit different purposes when interacting with others. Another AI tool to encourage the argumentative writing genre, is Debate AI where the students choose a famous person who to debate. This would require planning which questions to ask and how to be constructive and clear in the debate. Another useful tool to develop literacy skills is the TooslADay a Character Generator where the input information about the character they read about, adjust settings such as tone, dialogue and personality and then AI will develop the image. This offers different ways for a lesson to be developed whilst the learner shows evidence of understanding the character and deepening further the knowledge. Another AI tool which provides an alternative for students to present their work is Synthesia.io to generate a video after their produce a creative writing task such as information about a country to promote tourism. Suno is a music AI tool which revolutionises how we interact with audio content. This may be implemented using a flipped classroom approach to enhance learning through a student-centred approach allowing them to create their own work in pairs or groups. It helps with vocabulary retention and expanding vocabulary by inputting words and expressions which would be inserted in the generated song such as new words learnt from a reading comprehension text or to learn traditional Maltese foods.
Pamela Fenech – Head of Department for Primary
2024-1-MT01-KA121-SCH-000201561
