AI In School – Topical Tuesdays Activities from First News

Pupils, teachers and school leaders recently took part in an AI hackathon to explore how AI could supercharge the way we learn in school. Secondary school pupils shared their knowledge of AI, while teachers looked at how AI could cut the time they spent on things like planning lessons and marking work.

Oracy

You don’t need to know much about AI (artificial intelligence) to realise that it’s a big issue that will affect us all. So, aren’t you concerned about its potential power? Do you worry that we will let it get out of control? Wouldn’t you rather that we halted its development until we have gained a better idea of what it could mean for us all, good or bad? Or do you think we’re getting worried about nothing? Aren’t we smart enough to put limits on it before it gets out of hand? In any case, haven’t people always been anxious about new technology? What do you think?

Writing skills

Now that AI can do our schoolwork for us, write a humorous version of the classic homework task What I did on my holidays from the viewpoint of a computer. Where would a laptop go? What would it choose to do over the long summer break? Try to be as imaginative and creative as possible but make sure you use the first person perspective.

Or Write a descriptive list about the things you can do but a computer can’t – even one that has AI. For an extra challenge, why not turn it into a poem, perhaps one with a repeated last line of every verse that says something like ‘I bet you wish you could, AI’.

Investigate

Research Bletchley Park. Briefly summarise its role in our history and suggest why you think it was used as the location for the big international meeting about AI.

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To find out more about how First News could help your school unlock the power of news-based learning, through high quality, weekly resources alongside the print and digital newspaper, visit the First News Education website.

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