End of Summer AI Round-Up

 

AI does not take the summer off!

While many in education were relaxing at the beach or vegging out to Netflix in their PJs (or was that just me?), AI was plugging away, making developments that made so many of the policies and practices from Spring obsolete. 

Once I finished my Netflix binge, I tackled the mountain of AI updates, tools, and trends that I had been bookmarking since June. Here is a round-up of what's new and worth reporting:

Nolej

Nolej recently released update 1.0. While I fear there may be a requirement to move to a paid plan soon, there is still a free version and it got some new bells and whistles. Most notably, I can now upload a graded quiz to my LMS using SCORM packages:

Nolej still offers teachers the ability to create microlearning packages while limiting the AI to only the knowledge provided by the instructor, thus offering some guardrails that don't exist in AI at large

Conker

Conker has been my go-to for quick, AI quizzes, especially for reteaching when needed. See the previous post. However, Conker got some updates that allow for QR codes to quizzes and mixed question types. See example here. 

MagicSchool.Ai

Perhaps the update I was most excited to try was the promise of AI-proof assignments in MagicSchool AI. 

Magic school offers a variety of AI-assisted tools for teachers, from syllabus generators, lesson plan generators, and rubric generators. However, the appeal of AI-proof assignments caught my eye (and tugged at my conscious, just a bit). Here is what I found.

What I'm actually trying for AI proof assignments: Voice and Choice

See my previous post for a template of a reading choice board I'm adding to courses this fall. To combat AI use in the fall, I will:

• Offer students voice and choice. When assignments have meaning, it is less tempting to use AI.
• Incorporate more personal reflection
• Offer more opportunities for practical and/or live applications and assessments
• Offer more support on pacing. Students often turn to AI when they are behind and feel overwhelmed. 

Leondard AI

When Midjourney went to a paid plan only, it seemed that playing with AI image generation was not feasible. However, Leonardo allows for quick, easy, free plans to generate images using a variety of language models. The free plan has a limited amount of daily tokens. I have used it to generate images such as the cowboy above (The prompt can also be repurposed as Alt Text!). Also, 

Custom coloring pages for my kids:

Artistic images of our family pet for a craft:

What will AI bring in the fall is anyone's guess. 

I'm sure I could not predict it with any more certainty than I can guess the winners of the World Series (though my kids are pulling for the Cincinnati Reds!). I know it will bring helps and headaches to educators as more students develop more savvy in the skills needed to manipulate AI tools. However, I will continue to join them and encourage them to responsibly use new tech for good.

Happy School Year!