A guest blog from our Heads of English in Preparatory and Senior, focusing on the use of AI technologies to improve teaching, learning and outcomes at THS.
Mrs Waters – Head of English (Prep)
In the Preparatory School, we recognise that it is crucial for us as teachers to integrate AI into our classrooms, as it will play an increasingly significant role in society. As AI technology advances, it will become more prevalent in all areas of life, including the workplace. By exposing pupils to AI technology early on, we are preparing them for future jobs and ensure they have the necessary skills and knowledge to succeed in a rapidly changing world. The advancements in AI will undoubtedly impact their lives, and it is crucial that we model safe usage of this technology while creating a protected space for children to engage with it.
The use of AI for the younger students is currently focusing on how it can be used to support their learning more than how they can use it themselves. The technology is still young, and concerns regarding the validity of the information, viewpoints and inappropriate content are of importance to the younger user.
Staff have been using AI to support their pupil’s learning by asking for exemplar texts of specific topics, differentiated texts/questions, art in a certain style, and creating comprehensions on a class text. Teachers are making use of Chat GPT, which allows the quick creation of specific educational resources, hence saving time to concentrate on other tasks.
The apps that the school provides for the children to use, such as ATOM learning and increasingly others, use AI to adapt in real time the questions the pupils receive depending upon their answers.
In Years 5 and 6, AI is being used in a variety of ways in English already, to ensure the curriculum is targeted to the individual needs of every pupil. For instance, if a chapter contains some tricky vocabulary that would ordinarily hold some learners back, AI is able to provide definitions for these words in seconds. AI has also been able to simplify a text to allow it to be more dyslexia friendly so all pupils are able to access the text independently.
For retrieval practice, AI has been used to create quick quizzes recapping previous spelling and grammar learning topics, and to generate summative assessments of the lesson’s learning objectives. AI is able to differentiate the tasks to support and stretch all needs from the teacher’s input of the curriculum objectives they want to be learned.
An area that all pupils find tricky is editing their work and finding errors, so AI has been used to, for example, create a paragraph linked to a latest chapter covered, that was filled with spelling and grammar mistakes that the pupils had to correct. We’re also now looking at using the interactive content that AI can deliver, where the pupils have to ask questions to a character from our text, and AI will write answers in the modelled response of the character.
Differentiated worksheets, flashcards, and activity ideas are generated with ease, which frees up teaching time to concentrate on working with the pupils. The increased 1 on 1 focus, combined with AI support, helps teachers and pupils identify what they have to achieve in their own writing to meet (and exceed) year group expectations. Creative writing is being enhanced as AI is able to create word banks as starting points, filled with specific literary features that pupils normally struggle to compose, and challenges have been set to Year 5 and 6 to correctly include as many similes / metaphors that AI has created linked to their topic or text.
Year 6 have already had the opportunity to visit Adastral Park this year, where they examined how AI is being used in the real world already, and explore the possibilities of how AI will develop in the future.
Later in the year I plan to use the ‘modernise Shakespeare’ function for my Year 6s to help them embrace the language and themes explored in Shakespeare (which is usually a topic pupils find hard to relate to). This will give them a head start in their knowledge and understanding ready for their learning in Year 7.
AI is here to stay and will become more integrated in learning. The balance of its use is where we need to be looking. For all Prep pupils and teachers, becoming critical thinkers will be more important as we use more AI. Questioning its authenticity and validity will become more important than producing content, but for now we are embracing the change and seeing some tremendous gains and benefits for our pupils’ attainment.
Mrs Robinson – Head of English (Senior)
In a rapidly evolving technological world, the THS English Department did not hesitate when asked to research the benefits of using advanced artificial intelligence as an educational tool. Let me stress the word ‘tool’ and not teacher replacement, believe it or not, teachers still have their benefits too!
Initially, some in the team experimented with Canva to produce a bank of visually exciting and engaging presentations for the students. Whereas previously, these presentations could take hours to perfect, Canva produced them in minutes, yes, minutes – a total game-changer. A game-changer not just for us but also for the students as these presentations were aesthetically pleasing and graphically stimulating, and so much better than we had ever produced.
However, we hovered over Chat GTP reticent to engage with this AI, sceptical about the ethical debate around plagiarism and content, and dubious of its actual benefits for the students. Well, plagiarism we realised was not a problem and was easy to spot, much to a Year 9 boy’s chagrin! Yet, this boy’s desire to use and embrace this technology spurred us on to delve a little deeper and stop talking ourselves round and round in circles – English teachers do love to talk and in fact have made a career in talking. Joking aside, we began to explore, and boy, the students were fired up; we were fired up and Mr Duckitt was on fire! Research, not a problem, information in seconds. Macbeth quotes and brief explanations easy peasy. Want to improve writing responses? Type it in and sophistication straight back at you. It was unbelievable and really invigorating. Yet, the most thrilling element of this was watching the students creating prompts to ask Chat GTP the most judicious questions to generate the best outcomes. It was observing Socratic thinking in motion, not with the teacher but with Chat GTP, the teacher’s assistant.
So how do we really feel about AI? I would be lying if I didn’t think it concerned me, but, with the right regulation in the classroom of content and usage, AI tailors tasks to the pace and level of the individual which ensures that no student is left behind, and it is a well-known fact that learning does not only take place within the confines of the classroom walls. So AI, such as Chat GTP, offers 24/7 accessibility to explain concepts and provide grammar and vocabulary assistance. AI also encourages active learning, engaging students in conversations, challenging them with quizzes, and providing real-time feedback. This interaction not only makes learning more engaging but also helps students develop their communication skills in English, which is crucial in today’s globalized world. To quote one Year 10 student: “I loved using Chat GTP because I got immediate results and felt like I was achieving not failing”
AI will most definitely play a part in our development as a team to empower us with tools to offer a more personalized and engaging learning experience, as by integrating this innovative technology into our educational system, we not only enrich our students’ English skills but also empower ourselves to be more exciting and technologically advanced teachers.
Oh, one last thing…..Chat GTP aided me with this article!