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Parents, artificial intelligence is permeating all arenas and spaces of life, including your children’s learning and the classroom. It is here to stay. There is only one correct parent perspective that accepts the value and reality of AI in the classroom, and it is: We don’t want genericness in the classroom, and using AI just for the sake of it. We want streamlined, safe, personalised use of AI by teachers to enhance teaching and learning in the classroom. We want AI to be used in a way that stretches our children’s thinking, not replace it.
This is what you should know in order to question the key stakeholders in your child’s school/classroom: Prompting and Mega prompting are when you input meaningful, precise questions/instructions into an AI platform in order to get the output you are looking for. The more specific your questioning/instructing, the more tailored your answers and the more likely the task is to be completed to your liking.
When you outline one task or question for the platform, it prompts. When you outline a number of specific instructions related to the same overall task, it is mega prompting. Mega prompting can be done once, or it can be done as a conversation as AI generates output for you. You keep talking to it so that it edits its product according to your specifications in various steps. There are five main tasks that prompt engineering can help with in the classroom: Brainstorming, Research, Collaboration, Evaluation, and Reflection.
HALLUCINATIONS
Did you know that AI can be like a charming, assertive, eloquent salesperson who will say anything to make a sale? AI can make mistakes, but sometimes, the errors are so sneaky and small that you miss them, and sometimes the mistakes are so obnoxiously large but presented so confidently that you are duped by them. Two years ago in New York, lawyers relied on ChatGPT to cite precedent for their case. The AI platform concocted fake cases with real-sounding details, names, and dates. AI did a fantastic job of appearing legal without being legitimate. The lawyers were publicly shamed when lawyers on the other end could not find the cited cases and informed the judge.
Questions to Ask About the Teacher’s Role in Front of Your Children
• Regarding hallucinations, what practices/activities do you have in place to teach our children about the outputs that are generated from AI platforms?
• Are you urging/reminding students to question and reflect on where the information is coming from and whether the information is legitimate?
• Are you demonstrating to the students yourself by fact-checking and source-finding to make sure you have not been deceived?
• With primary school children, are you asking them to search “Where AI has gone wrong” independently, followed by a discussion?
• If you are teaching secondary school children, are you highlighting the possibility of opposing viewpoints on a topic? On how various viewpoints may not be represented equally on the Internet, and what AI has access to?
• As an extension, do your lessons involve teaching our children to prompt engineering questions in a way to overcome these possible prejudices and cracks in information?
• Since AI can be used to fulfil a variety of purposes (research, brainstorming, evaluation, reflection, and collaboration), are you incorporating activities that help teach differentiation in questioning for these various tasks to be accomplished?
• Are you teaching children to begin free-associating ideas for a task first before consulting AI, so that AI extends/refines your children’s ideas rather than just spoon-feeds them?
Questions to Ask About the Teacher’s Role Behind-the-Scenes and AI
• Are you, as a teacher, taking the time to fact-check, proofread, and adapt AI outputs to the curriculum/students you are teaching?
• Are you creating the lessons/plans yourself and then using AI to extend or refine those lessons/plans? For example, are you taking your lesson plans and ideas and using AI to find blind spots in your planning (checking to see if your planning would meet the standards of the national curriculum in your country at a Std 5 level), rather than just looking for blind spots with no context?
• Are you trained in/practicing/experimenting with prompt engineering yourself?
• Are you taking the time to receive formal and informal training in AI in education?
• What are some AI apps that you are using in the classroom, and how can I, as a parent, support safe use of these apps at home?
• Are you administering surveys to gather class feedback on certain lessons? For example, asking: What went well during the lesson? What could have been done differently? What specific support do I need to improve outcomes next time?
• Are you journalling with AI on class-management strategies and difficult situations to potentially curb bias in your reactions? This is where you simulate a classroom scenario that possibly occurred or often occurs in your class, tell the platform how you usually handle the situation, get AI to evaluate your management of it (with specific behaviour models or school policies if you want to specify this), give suggested strategies on how to move forward, then reflect back again on what went well, what was difficult, etc. This is an ongoing process that offers third-party and objective perspectives on the disciplinary measures in your classroom.
• Are you conducting assessments and lessons through apps with AI features so that you receive data on class and individual performance in real-time?
• Are you using AI platforms that can change the reading level or alter the difficulty level of a task based on the needs of specific students (i.e., change the reading level of an article to that of a Standard 1 student)?
• When creating report comments for our children, do you make sure it is personalised?
FINAL TASK FOR PARENTS
If your child’s school is in the experimentation phase of AI, and there is no clear-cut way forward with AI, parents have the power and the responsibility to encourage the school to create an AI policy that speaks to the ethos of the school and to integrate it within the school from top down. This means that the leadership team must provide adequate support for teachers to incorporate AI in the classroom for a truly safe and fruitful experience with AI. The future is artificial, it’s intelligent, and it’s here. Two educators from the Thai-Indian community chime in.
TEJALE BELLANI
Teacher at Haileybury, Melbourne, reflects on the pros and cons of using AI in the classroom
One of the biggest pros of using AI in education, especially in early childhood, is how much time it saves behind the scenes. It helps me plan lessons, write reports, and create newsletters so much faster, which means I get to spend more time actually connecting with the kids. It also gives me fresh ideas for songs, stories, and craft activities when I need a bit of inspiration, which is a real bonus during busy weeks.
I’ve also found AI really useful for adapting activities to suit different learning needs in my class, whether it’s simplifying instructions for diverse learning needs or coming up with calming strategies for a child who’s feeling overwhelmed. It’s like having a helpful assistant in the background. At the end of the day, nothing replaces hands-on learning and relationships in early childhood, but when used well, AI can really support the work we do.
There are two sides to every sword, so one of the main downsides of AI is that it can’t replace the human side of teaching, especially in early childhood, where connection, empathy, and play are the forefront of it all. It might help with planning or admin, but it can’t read a child’s emotions, respond to a meltdown, deal with challenging behaviours, or celebrate those little “aha” moments in real life. While it’s a useful tool, it definitely can’t take the place of a real teacher who knows and understands the kids.
Another challenge is that AI still needs to be used carefully. Sometimes it gives suggestions that aren’t age-appropriate, or it might oversimplify or overcomplicate things. I always have to double-check what it gives me and tweak it to suit my classroom. Plus, there’s the risk of becoming too reliant on it and losing that creative aspect that comes from planning with your own experience and instincts. It’s helpful, but it’s not perfect.
RARINTHIP (PRATIBHA) GANDHI
a Year 3 classroom teacher at ELC, reflects on her school’s attitude towards AI
Our school views AI as a tool to enhance teaching, not to replace the human or creative side of it. The conversations are very much about using it responsibly and thoughtfully, making sure it adds to our work rather than dictating it. In the context of the Reggio approach, that means using AI to give us more time for what matters most: listening to children, documenting their learning, and designing rich provocations that respond to their interests. We also talk about how important it is to model ethical use and digital citizenship for our students because they’re growing up in a world where AI will be a normal part of life.
Did You Know?
An AI platform said that it was 99% likely that a student copied-pasted AI-generated work into his submitted paper, and that student had to prove that the short, clear, concise sentences–that AI wanted to take credit for–were actually his own? Apps to be aware of and play around with at home: Wayward, ChatGPT/Genesis, Canva, Brisk, Kahoot!