Don’t Miss Out! The AI Revolution is Transforming Education
Great News: Joining the revolution is simple
Where are you at with AI?
You have heard about AI but only see it as a tool for kids to cheat in your class.
You have had one or two professional development sessions on AI in education, but the session(s) were so rushed, confusing, and/or overwhelming that you need help figuring out where to start.
You might have even tried using AI, but you needed to learn how to write an effective prompt, so you got mixed results from your initial investigation.
Do any of these describe you? If so, you are not alone. Most educators are stuck when it comes to AI because they don’t understand its uses, value, and power to unlock the future for their students.
The Problem
The problem is that AI is advancing while you are stuck in neutral, and those who use it will advance with it. Everyone else will be left behind.
Forbes summarizes it well by arguing, “Artificial intelligence (AI) isn’t going to replace people — but people who use AI are going to replace people who don’t.”
That includes your students! That includes you!
Maybe you are a bit like me, and if things are too big and overwhelming at the start, I won’t even try it.
Brian Cain, one of my favorite motivational speakers and writers, says, “It’s the start that stops most people.”
Let’s start ridiculously small instead of overwhelming ourselves with everything AI can do. Let’s start with one aspect of just one AI tool, Twee.com.
What I love about Twee is that it can take any video on YouTube and turn it into a dynamic lesson. Let me give an example.
On my second day back at school after winter break, I am teaching Dontello’s David statue. My students have learned about it before, and I could do a boring presentation that covers the cultural and artistic reasons why the work is special and important, but that is boring and uninspiring. I am wondering if I can spice up the lesson with AI!
How To Get Started
The first feature of Twee.com is transcribing a YouTube video so that you have the text of what the speakers have discussed. To use this feature, click the Convert Audio & Video to Text link. You then copy the Video URL into Twee. The full transcript is available in less than one minute (5 minutes max for the free version).
Once you have the transcript, what can you do with it? I have three suggestions:
Use the Audio & Video Question Creator to have Twee generate open-ended questions.
You can use them as a video question guide as students watch the video. This keeps them accountable for paying attention during the video and identifying important points. I suggest using the basic questions for this activity.
You can use the questions to foster class discussion. Twee offers three levels of questions (basic, intermediate, and advanced); you can use the intermediate or advanced questions to get students to discuss the answers to the questions. You can use think-write-pair-share or other discussion strategies to make this work.
You can use the questions as the starting point for a playful debate between students on one of the questions. Some options include a SPAR debate between two or four students in the class (having the other students write cross-examination questions for the debaters).
Split the class into two groups (opposite sides of the room) and have them take each side of the controversial issue. You can use the question to facilitate a four-corners activity where students give their opinion about the question from strongly agree to disagree strongly.
You can fully plan your lesson in under 15 minutes and have your students begging for more.
Final Thoughts
“Inch by inch — it’s a cinch, and yard by yard it’s hard.” — Brian Cain
Using Twee in this way moves you one inch down the path of using AI in lesson planning, but it can make a dramatic difference in your teaching.
What if you did this for just the lesson you have coming up in the next two weeks?
Could it give a great break in your routine that you and your students will enjoy?
Could it breathe some life into a classroom as you return from a break?
Could it be a great way to facilitate classroom discussion when you are being evaluated?
Take this small step toward improving your lessons today, and you will be amazed at how much more enjoyable you and your students will find your classes.
You don’t need to master every existing AI tool (you will never keep up). But if you take one small step down the path, it can open up interesting possibilities for your teaching and the impact you have on your students.
Remember the quote from Forbes, “Artificial intelligence (AI) isn’t going to replace people — but people who use AI are going to replace people who don’t.”
Don’t let that be you!
Don’t let that be your students!
Make a small investment of time today and watch it pay off over and over again in your teaching practice and the lives of your students.
Get started today!
