Time flies when you're using AI

She's reluctant to admit it, but Third Grade Teacher Erin Brown has been one of my advisors since I joined Noblesville Schools in 2017. I can count on her for honest takes on how various digital curricular resources perform in the elementary classroom. Do they work? What are the pain points? Is she seeing results? Do the kids like it?? 

So when Erin tells me about how she's incorporating emerging artificial intelligence (AI) technologies into her classroom -- I want to hear! Here are three ways she is using AI to reclaim her evenings.


Parent Newsletters

Like many Noblesville Schools teachers, Erin switched to ParentSquare in August 2022 for parent newsletters. She is taking things further this school year and using AI tools to craft content. Erin gives an AI tool, such as Google Gemini (formerly Bard), a quick list of what they've been doing in the classroom. AI helps create a synopsis and tips on how families can support students at home. She admits that sometimes the writing is a little campy, but like with any AI tool -- she massages the text to sound more like her voice. 

Side note: Erin and HC teachers rave about the permission slip feature within ParentSquare. Many have also been using ParentSquare to schedule parent conferences. Two more time savers!

Writing Instruction

Erin has been playing with AI as part of whole-group writing instruction. Using her laptop and AppleTV, she has modeled using AI to generate passages written from various points of view. Together with students, they study the passages for grammatical patterns. They have also been using the automated imagery tools within Canva as part of a fairy tale unit. Students use the Canva AI tools to verify whether the auto-generated images match their descriptive writing. It has been a game-changer for this annual unit of study.
3.RC.4 Distinguish personal point of view from that of the narrator or those of the characters.
Student Feedback

Ask any teacher. Reading student feedback and composing thoughtful feedback is massively time-consuming. With an AI tool like Brisk, Erin can paste student writing from a Google Doc or Canvas Assignment to generate a starting narrative for providing student feedback. She then customizes the text to the students. Now instead of twenty minutes per piece of student writing, she is spending closer to five with the assistance of AI.  

Ready to start playing with AI? Here are some of Erin's favorite tools for getting started. The blog post title and graphic below are borrowed from Erin's recent presentation at HC.
Want to Learn More? by Erin Brown by Erin Brown

Kristin Patrick, Blended Learning Coach


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