HOW educators can use GenAI - where to start and how to progress
Part of 3 of my series: Teaching and Learning in the AI Age
While headlines buzz about AI revolutionizing education, the impact and fallout of DeepSeek, or the inevitability of AGI, the reality for educators worldwide is more nuanced. A large number of teachers have never tried generative AI. And many educators who have, still hesitate to incorporate AI tools into their practice - some by choice, others due to limited exposure or training. Meanwhile, others are already transforming their workflows through thoughtful AI integration.
Like many of you, I started my AI journey with a mixture of curiosity and caution. My first experiment was simply asking for worksheet exercise ideas - and I was both impressed yet critical - not blindly accepting the AI suggestions; only taking what I liked. That balance of optimism and careful evaluation still guides my approach today.
This article, part 3 in my series on Teaching and Learning in the AI Age, presents 10 practical use cases for educators to leverage AI effectively. Building on earlier discussions of AI literacy for educators (Part 1) and student needs (Part 2), we'll explore how to build an AI-enhanced teaching practice that serves both immediate needs and long-term educational goals.
What teachers do
First, I want to delineate the full scope of a teacher's tasks. We don’t just spend time in classrooms instructing or spending time correcting. What do teachers spend time doing?
1. Creating and adapting lesson materials for different difficulty levels
2. Translating learning materials for multilingual students
3. Generating practice problems with step-by-step solutions
4. Writing differentiated worksheets and handouts
5. Creating vocabulary lists and study guides
6. Writing prompts and discussion questions
7. Developing guided note-taking templates
8. Creating tests and quizzes
9. Writing detailed rubrics with descriptors
10. Writing recommendation letters
11. Writing personalized student feedback
12. Developing self-assessment materials
13. Creating calibration materials and example responses
14. Writing parent emails and communications
15. Creating newsletters and announcements
16. Writing progress reports and updates
17. Inputting assignment instructions into learning platforms
18. Creating FAQ documents and guides
19. Writing constructive feedback comments
20. Creating step-by-step tutorials
21. Developing graphic organizers and mind maps
22. Writing classroom procedure guides
23. Creating lesson plan templates
24. Writing exemplar responses
25. Creating revision guides
26. Writing professional development reflections
27. Creating detailed substitute teacher plans
28. Writing meeting minutes and agendas
29. Drafting grant proposals
30. Writing documentation for excursions
31. Creating lesson observations
32. Creating peer review guidelines
33. Summarizing educational articles
34. Converting lecture notes to study guides
35. Creating quick formative assessments
36. Developing project timelines
37. Designing materials for students with special needs
38. Creating presentation materials
39. Writing training materials and handouts
40. Drafting proposals for conferences
41. Creating mentoring guidelines
42. Writing individualized student feedback
43. Creating progress reports with observations
44. Writing portfolio assessments
45. Developing evaluations
46. Creating substitute plans
47. Writing emergency lesson plans
48. Creating technology guides
49. Writing detailed answer keys
50. Creating classroom management guidelines
51. Writing yearly curriculum maps
52. Developing unit plans with timelines
53. Creating assessment calendars
54. Writing yearly learning objectives
55. Developing cross-curricular plans
56. Writing resource allocation plans
57. Creating digital learning media
58. Developing project-based learning materials
59. Developing assessment frameworks
60. Creating student information sheets
61. Writing behaviour incident reports
64. Writing laboratory instructions
65. Adapting materials to curriculum changes
66. Creating visuals and charts for lessons
(List generated with the aid of claude.ai, 2025) Did Claude miss anything?
Looking at this extensive list, you might wonder where to start. The use cases I'm about to share specifically address many of these tasks, with a focus on the most time-consuming ones. I've chosen these particular areas because they represent opportunities for significant time savings while maintaining pedagogical quality.
10 use cases for teachers
As the above list demonstrates, teachers are extensive content creators who work across multiple media formats. Their work involves three major categories: First, they engage in extensive written content creation, producing instructional materials that break down complex concepts into digestible formats for different learning levels. Second, they develop visual materials such as charts, diagrams, infographics, and presentation slides to illustrate concepts and organize information. Third, they create and curate audiovisual content like recorded explanations, video tutorials, and interactive multimedia materials. This multi-modal nature of teaching involves not just producing content, but strategically organizing and presenting information to serve different audiences - from visual learners and auditory learners to students with different accessibility needs, parents, and colleagues. As you read through these use cases, you'll notice that each one addresses multiple tasks from our list above.
1. Researching a topic for a lesson
Even though educators have been extensively trained in their subject, there are always things we need to look up in order to extend our knowledge - either to get updated details or to research facts about a theme. In my case, when preparing for a debate unit, I realized I needed a refresh on formal debate structures. I looked up the structure of debates and how best to conduct them.
Teacher Tip: Start with a topic you're already familiar with - this helps you better evaluate the AI's suggestions against your existing knowledge.
Quick Start: Ask AI to summarize the latest teaching approaches for any upcoming topic in your curriculum.
2. Creating Tasks For Practice
Creating tasks and exercises is part of our daily routine to have students practice skills and check for understanding. One of my biggest time-savers has been generating differentiated practice exercises - something that used to take hours to create manually. While AI is amazingly quick, there is still a need to check the accuracy of the output.
Teacher Tip: Always generate exercises in sets of three difficulty levels - it's no extra work for the AI but gives you built-in differentiation options.
Quick Start: Take an existing worksheet and ask AI to create three variations at different difficulty levels.
3. Creating Sample Answers
AI tools can help generate answer keys for us or for students at self-study stations. What I find particularly valuable is the ability to quickly create multiple correct response variations - something that helps students understand there isn't always just one "right" answer.
Teacher Tip: Use AI-generated sample answers as discussion starters - ask students to evaluate which responses are stronger and why.
Quick Start: Take your next reading comprehension text and ask for three different ways to answer each question.
4. Generating Ideas
This is something that generative AI does very well, brainstorming ideas for anything and any topic, or ways to deliver material in a unique way or engage learners. When I'm feeling stuck in a creative rut, I often use AI as a springboard for fresh perspectives. In these examples, I asked for ways to approach bullying in my classroom and ideas for project deliverables.
Teacher Tip: Frame your prompts as "How might I..." questions to get more creative and actionable suggestions.
Quick Start: Pick an upcoming topic and ask for five unconventional ways to introduce it to your students.
5. Designing Lesson Plans
In this use case, the AI suggests structure and input according to specifications, which we can tweak in the conversation. What I particularly appreciate is how AI can help align lessons with multiple learning objectives while maintaining engagement - something that often requires juggling various elements. Another variation would be to upload standards or a curriculum to the AI and have it generate yearly lesson plans
Teacher Tip: Share your favorite engagement strategies with the AI and ask it to incorporate them into lesson plans - this helps maintain your teaching style.
Quick Start: Take your next lesson topic and ask AI to structure it using your favorite teaching framework.
6. Creating Tests
This is something I do regularly now, use AI to assist me in drawing up tests by simply inputting the test material and asking for tasks in certain formats. What's particularly valuable is the ability to quickly generate multiple versions of the same test while maintaining consistent difficulty levels - perfect for reducing cheating opportunities. The full chat thread can be viewed here.
Teacher Tip: Ask AI to explain the reasoning behind each question's inclusion - this helps ensure your assessment aligns with your learning objectives.
Quick Start: Take your next quiz and ask AI to create three parallel versions with different questions testing the same concepts.
7. Using AI in Virtual Classrooms
Many teacher AI portals allow educators to create virtual learning spaces where we can invite students to participate and use AI under our supervision. I've found this particularly valuable for maintaining a controlled environment where students can explore AI safely. This is particularly useful for those who want to use AI WITH students without them having to log in to user accounts with their personal data. My favourite is magicschool.ai which has quite a sophisticated suite of tools available for students and a detailed teacher dashboard where you can see the activities done in the room. In my experience, starting with simple, structured activities helps both you and your students build confidence. For my English class, I gave the task to use a character chatbot inventor to find out what the person invented and why. The goal was for the students to practice asking questions and then fact-check the answers.
Teacher Tip: Create a simple AI use guide with your class - let students contribute their discoveries and best practices.
Quick Start: Create a simple "AI exploration room" where students can practice asking questions about your current unit of study - start with just 15 minutes of guided exploration.
8. Creating Images
I use AI all the time to create images for teaching and have trained my students to become experts as well. What started as a simple experiment has become one of our most engaging classroom tools. In this example, they were asked to create posters on the theme of “friendship” using English and descriptive prompts.
Here I generated images for a story in a test. Creating a series of images with consistent characters is still not easy, but the tools are getting better at it.
Teacher Tip: Keep a prompt library of successful image generations - good prompts are worth their weight in gold!
Quick Start: Try creating a simple mascot for your next unit - students love having a character guide them through the material.
9. Creating worksheets
Tools like magicschool.ai make creating worksheets a quick and easy task. What I've found most valuable is how quickly we can adapt and modify worksheets based on student needs - something that used to take hours can now be done in minutes. Here is an example on the topic of financial literacy for beginners.
Teacher Tip: Keep a master template of your favorite worksheet formats - AI can then fill these templates with content for any topic.
Quick Start: Take your most-used worksheet format and ask AI to recreate it for your next topic.
10. Correcting and Feedback
Finally, something all educators do - we give feedback or correct work. AI excels at this as well - we can for example upload images of student work and have it analysed. We can also copy text into a tool and get feedback suggestions based on an uploaded rubric we provide. This is perhaps the most nuanced use case, as it requires careful balance between efficiency and maintaining personal connection.
I understand why a lot of teachers request this kind of feature - marking, grading, and giving feedback is time-consuming, but essential for students to know how to progress and for us to gauge how to adjust our plan. Yet, I am firmly in the camp of those educators who prefer to survey all student work myself so I can get a personal feel of their capabilities.
Teacher Tip: Use AI to generate feedback templates, but always add personal observations - students can tell the difference.
Quick Start: Try using AI to create a feedback phrase bank for your most common comments - then personalize these as you use them.
Special Focus: Language Teaching Tools
Creating listening comprehensions
As a language teacher, being able to create custom audio is a dream. The ability to generate audio in different accents and speeds has transformed how I can differentiate listening exercises. And most tools like https://elevenlabs.io or naturalreaders.com are already quite capable. Here an example with fobizz.com.
Creating transcripts from audio
Language teachers work with audio in the other direction - creating transcripts from audio can also be done with AI and this is a game changer. Gone are the days of spending hours transcribing audio materials! Where we once had to listen and transcribe manually, the AI can perform this task in seconds.
Teacher Tip: Create a library of varied-speed recordings of the same text - perfect for differentiated listening practice.
Quick Start: Take a short text from your next lesson and create audio versions at three different speeds.
Transforming workflows one use case at a time
The ten use cases presented here demonstrate that AI tools can meaningfully support educators in their content creation, lesson planning, and administrative tasks - without replacing the essential human elements of teaching. From generating practice materials to creating customized visual aids, AI can help streamline many of the time-intensive aspects of our profession, allowing us to focus more energy on what matters most: meaningful interactions with our students. In my own journey, I've found that these tools have given me back approximately 5-7 hours per week - time I now spend on more meaningful one-on-one interactions with students.
While these tools would be even more powerful if they could produce consistently error-free output, the current need to verify and refine AI-generated content actually helps us develop crucial digital literacy skills. Think of it as built-in professional development - every time we evaluate AI output, we're strengthening our own expertise. By thoughtfully reviewing and correcting AI outputs, we model the kind of critical thinking our students need in an AI-enabled world.
Ready to Start? Here's Your Week 1 Plan:
Day 1-2: Choose just ONE use case that addresses your biggest time drain
Day 3-4: Experiment with a free tool in that area for 15 minutes
Day 5: Try applying what you learned to a small, low-stakes task
Weekend: Reflect on what worked and what didn't
The key to successful AI integration lies in thoughtful implementation: start small by choosing one or two use cases that align with your immediate needs, experiment with different tools, and gradually build your AI-enhanced teaching practice. Remember, you don't need to become an AI expert overnight - even implementing one of these use cases can make a significant difference in your workflow. Share your experiences with colleagues, learn from their insights, and stay curious about emerging possibilities. The future of education isn't about AI replacing teachers - it's about educators skillfully wielding these tools to enhance their practice while maintaining the irreplaceable human connection at the heart of teaching.
Coming up next in Part 4: Teaching and Learning in the AI Age - How students can successfully use AI, we'll explore practical strategies for guiding students in their AI use, from developing critical evaluation skills to understanding appropriate use cases. Whether you're just starting to allow AI tools in your classroom or looking to create comprehensive AI guidelines, you'll find actionable approaches for your context. Subscribe to stay updated!
Thanks for reading!
Title image produced using canva.com
Any use of AI in creating teaching materials is plagiarism -- unless each source used by AI is properly quoted, cited, documented.
Good insight 😌 Can i translate part of this article into Spanish with links to you and a description of your newsletter?