Dear Editor,

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the centre of attention these days. As an educator I must confess that this tool has earned a place in my sacred bookmarks folder.

I even took advantage of an opportunity to pursue an online certificate course, Introduction to AI for IT and non-IT professionals, offered by the Virtual University for Small States of the Commonwealth (VUSSC). With mental health concerns on the rise and the never-ending demands on the 21st-century teachers who take their jobs seriously, the risk of burnout is high. Therefore, I will be sharing seven strategies using AI that can help ease the burden in the regular day-to-day life of the average Jamaican public school teacher.

1) Draft 5E lesson plans: AI tools are user-friendly platforms on which you can create and organise your lesson plans. With its intuitive interface, you can easily add objectives, resources, and activities to ensure a well-structured and engaging lesson. It can even plan multiple days or weeks ahead!

2) YouTube video summariser: Provided the captions are there, with Magic School you can get the summary of YouTube videos. This is especially important for those content-heavy areas. You can even take it a bit further by using the AI tool to create questions from the YouTube video.

3) Vocabulary list generator: Is there a passage, topic, or theme you are working on in the class? Let the AI tool create a vocabulary list for you. You can print these words, reuse them in assessments, and create activities testing the correct usage of the desired words.

4) Lesson plan reviews: With appraisals coming up, why not use the tools to give you additional feedback. Do you want to use more technology? Link to a social problem? Develop other intelligences? It’s all about asking the right questions to get the right answers.

5) Ice-breakers/team-building activities: Stuck on a difficult topic or just running low on creative juices? You can spice up your classes/meetings with these suggestions. It can also use yours and provide feedback on how to make it more interesting. The possibilities are endless.

6) Practice tests: You can bulk the notes you’ve provided onto the platform and create closed and open-ended questions just for your class. These tests can be summative or formative. You can also upload your previous ones and make minor adjustments as needed.

7) Create presentations/worksheets: Especially with
Canva, you can create a beautiful layout in less than a minute for a visually stimulating presentation/worksheet. I have even taught students to use this to create them for class presentations.

Let AI do the heavy lifting while you do the fine-tuning. But it’s important to note lose your personal flair in these tools.

I recommend the following online tools: Magic School AI, Canva, and Brisk, all accessible for free. Your school can invest in the paid version that unlocks even more useful components. Who knows, maybe the Ministry of Education will soon upgrade its package and seal the deal for educators with AI. Stay tuned for more tips and tricks as we aim to work smarter, not harder.

Kenloy Smith

English language and literature teacher

kenloysmith@gmail.com