AI Tools for Teaching and Learning

EDSS 265: Advanced Fundamentals of Teaching - Formative Assessment, Engagement, Feedback

Reflection on Instructional Change:

One practice from the AI Tools course I chose to implement was modifying an existing assignment to include generative AI. I first identified the course as the Advanced Fundamentals of Teaching, this course is for future High School and Middle School Teachers. I know that in the profession of K-12 teaching, AI is having an impact and I want these future teachers to have some idea of ways AI can be helpful in their teaching practice. Then I identified the particular assignment I wanted to modify - Creating a Formative Assessment. Prior to this FLC, I did not have students intentionally use AI to create a formative assessment for their own class, they had to do it individually. I was curious as to which platform they would use and their reflections on the process.

Implementing this practice has impacted my teaching by keeping me current on trends in education - both at the higher ed. level and within K-12 level. I have learned ways AI generated content can be useful and ways it can be exploited. I believe the impact on student learning was positive as I read in their reflections to the assignment (see below). One particularly illustrative quote I could include here was from a future HS English teacher:

"Using AI made the creation process both quick and organized. By tailoring the prompt, I received a straightforward assessment framework: clear instructions, a rubric, and administration steps. This allowed me to spend more time thinking about how my specific group of students would interact with the activity, rather than starting from scratch. I appreciated how the AI kept the structure concise and focused on immediate demonstration of understanding—exactly what a formative assessment should do. Overall, the experience exemplified how AI tools can jumpstart the lesson-planning process, particularly by providing a solid template that educators can then refine based on classroom context and student needs."

Of the FLC activities, the activity that most influenced changes in my instruction was AI Generated Content: Discussion and Reflection. Through this activity, I was able to use different generative platforms to explore ways to create content with AI assistance. This gave me ideas of how I can use AI to both modify assignments, and to assist in assessing such assignments formatively. As you can see in my image below, I decided to use ChatGPT (link to data submitted to ChatGPT) to generate an infographic summarizing the future teachers reflections on using AI to create a formative assessment.

I especially found the CTL "Observe and Analyze" Zoom session with colleagues to be impactful as it gave me an opportunity to go in depth with the impact of the FLC on my practice. I appreciated the structure of the session where we were each given time to share a video that was then discussed for both 'warm' and 'cool' feedback. One thing I learned from this session was ways assignments can be adjusted 'real-time' during instruction and ways we may be able to use AI to provide feedback to our students.

Evidence of Instructional Change

Evidence of Instructional Change
Example 1	Example 2
Assignment modified to include generative AI: (summarized instructions for assignment) Part 1: Discuss in breakout room; Part 2: Use AI (Chat GPT, Claude, Magic School, etc.) to create a formative assessment for an upcoming lesson. In your submission, include a) the prompt you used, b) which AI site, and c) a short (250 word max) reflection on the experience.	Infographic of student responses to AI Assignment, this image also illustrates my AI FLC accomplishments: Themes included in the graphic are: Time Efficiency & Ease of Use, Need for Customization, Prompting Skills Matter, AI as a Brainstorming Took, Limitations of AI, Assessment Accuracy & Appropriateness, Comparison of AI Tools, and Increased Confidence & Future Use.

Practice and Reflect Teaching and Learning with AI:

My experiences in the faculty learning community have given me a deeper perspective on how AI tools can afford both opportunities and challenges to teaching and learning. One way I see AI being used as an opportunity is to streamline more routine tasks, it can be used to enhance both our work as teachers and the work of our students - when used ethically.

One takeaway is the importance of teaching ethical use of AI. As I work with graduate students, as future educators themselves, they should understand how they can leverage AI as a support tool while maintaining integrity and originality in their work. For example, encouraging students to use AI for idea generation or to analyze existing lesson plans can foster critical thinking and innovation without allowing the AI to take the place of their own contributions.

Another takeaway I had was the concern of students (and professors) over-relying on AI in a way that may potentially undermine their confidence in creativity and problem-solving. One way to avoid this is to emphasize clear boundaries on the use of AI, possibly requiring students to produce first drafts and then using AI to refine or expand their work.

Ways that I foresee taking what I have learned into my future practice include: 1) incorporating an AI policy statement in my syllabi, 2) having reflective discussions with students and colleagues about both AI’s strengths and limitations, and 3) modeling transparency in exploring and refining AI responses- like sharing real-world examples like the varying quality of AI-generated citations, can help graduate students in their use of AI.

Course Syllabus EDSS-265-01-Ives, Sarah.pdf

**Faculty Biography**
Faculty Picture	Faculty Professional Background
	I have been a Mathematics Teacher Educator at Sacramento State since 2014. My current research interests include professional learning for math teachers including action research and connections between emotion and cognition within learning and teaching mathematics. I recently added 'mama' to my identity and am loving the life change.

Funding Source
	This work was supported by: US Department of Education P031S230256 and P031C210012 *Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation or the US Department of Education.