What I’m learning, what I’m teaching, and what I’m learning about teaching
ChatGPT for Teachers: The Risk of Off-Loading Pedagogical Reasoning
I have concerns about the accelerating roll-out of generative AI systems in education. Many of these concerns relate to uncritical student use of AI tools, but I’m also skeptical about the implications of these tools for teachers.
This week, Open AI released ChatGPT for Teachers. According to Open AI, ChatGPT for Teachers is built upon ChatGPT 5.1 (the version available publicly through paid subscription), but specifically with teachers and school leaders in mind. It’s designed to work seamlessly with tools and software that teachers already use, facilitate collaboration with colleagues, and provide examples from other teachers. Supposedly, it’s built with teacher-specific tasks in mind, and is data privacy compliant with US FERPA rules for student data. I must confess upfront that I have not used it. It’s currently only available to verified K-12 teachers in the US (Open AI has rolled it out free for US-based K-12 teachers through June 2027). I will note that my paid subscription to ChatGPT has given me access to version 5.1 since it was released on Nov. 12 (and to version 5.0 before that). I will also note that I recently spent some time playing with Khanmigo’s AI teaching assistant for teachers, which is built upon the 4.0 version of the ChatGPT LLM system.
Example Sequence of Teacher PD Workshop Sessions
I recently had a couple of discussions with schools here in Rwanda regarding how I might be able to support teacher professional learning (aka. professional development) in the coming school-year. I feel strongly that effective teacher professional learning needs to consider the context of the teachers, school, students, curriculum, etc. However, for the sake of discussion, I put together a rough example sequence of workshop sessions. These are based on my personal teaching experience, and my experience working and observing in schools. The below sequence reflects some of the topics and concepts that I believe are high impact for teacher professional growth and student learning. Again, though, this is just an example.
The Teacher’s Job is to Explain— To “Make Plain”
I have made the claim before that a teacher is essentially an “explainer.” I’ve sometimes felt some resistance from others to that claim, and I think I know why. When I state that a teacher is an “explainer,” for some it conjurers up an image of a dry, boring lecture such as the case of the economics teacher (played by Ben Stein) in Ferris Bueller's Day Off (“anyone, anyone…”). This is not my idea of an “explainer,” so let me try to “explain” my claim below.
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