On Wednesday 15th May 2024, the Barker Digital Learning Team ran a professional learning afternoon exploring how Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Assistive Technologies could enhance teaching and get the most from students during lessons. Practical strategies were presented ready for teachers to implement to engage students, more efficiently plan lesson activities, and assist with teaching and learning adjustments to meet National Consistent Collection of Data (NCCD) regulations.

The session focused on the use of Copilot. Copilot is the preferred AI at Barker in 2024 tool due to the ability to protect personal and company data when using a large language model. Different ways to use and prompt Copilot were discussed, with a focus on encouraging staff to try it themselves. Live demonstrations were also run including looking at school-specific Bing search, re-writing content for different reading levels to allow greater differentiation, creating questions to gage student comprehension or spark debate in the classroom, updating statistics from older texts, and reformatting documents for editing - all completed using Copilot.

The second aspect of the session was looking at the use of AI within Microsoft Stream and Teams. The screen capture tool in Stream was demonstrated, highlighting the ability to include annotations, read from a transcript during the recording, create written summaries of the content, and embed a Microsoft Form into specific parts of the video. Also investigated was the use of Learning Accelerators and the reading coach in the Assignments Module in Microsoft Teams. This included how AI could be used within Teams assignments to automatically generate comprehension questions and create marking rubrics. More information about Microsoft Stream and Teams can be found in the links below.

Introducing Copilot in Microsoft Stream - Microsoft Community Hub

Learning Accelerators: Tools for Students | Microsoft Education

Overall, the session was designed to encourage staff to try different aspects of AI and find ways that it could work for them to improve their workflow. There was a combination of options for beginners to interact with AI for the first time, through to more complex and specific scenarios for its use. There has been a lot of positive feedback from the session, and we are excited to hear about how teachers start to use these tools to improve their teaching and learning outcomes, and increase their efficiency for administrative tasks.

Gabi Corderoy

Gabi Corderoy is part of the Digital Learning Team and a PDHPE teacher. She is the current sports coordinator for both cricket and fencing, and prior to her digital learning role, she was the assistant coordinator of PDHPE. Having worked in various roles within the School, she has developed a keen interest in enhancing teachers’ capabilities and efficiency in managing administrative tasks and preparing content. Gabi is committed to providing students with a positive and consistent learning experience throughout their schooling, which motivates her to promote the seamless integration of technologies across the school.