This week I wanted to research and expand my knowledge of different AI tools and resources that educators might use in the classroom or for planning that in the future might develop to take over educator roles altogether. I’m looking into meaningfulness, effectiveness and mindfulness in their contributions. Another core reason I believe these specifics are crucial to analyzing its “human like” abilities in relation to classroom use and connections is due to the BC curriculums emphasize of personalization and learner agency throughout also aligning with Universal Design for Learning (UDL) guidelines relations to inclusion, flexibility and providing choice within education. These foundational resources and frameworks to BC schooling and my experience in the education program so far have proven personalization to be oftentimes more than just simple adaptations. Personalization means effectively designing lessons and environments for diverse learning needs and providing human-centered approaches which could mean a major barrier to AI being able to accommodate these. 

AI Tools & Resources Used for Education Purposes:

With a deeper focus on teaching or teacher based tools these were the top five that stood out to me and seemed the most practical for enhancing a classroom experience and student engagement. This process was quite overwhelming as it turns out there is a massive variety of education oriented AI platforms.

1. Magic School AI: MagicSchool is Used by educators in a wide variety of ways including, to generate lesson plans, question generation, support grading processes, create entire rubrics and communication outlines. The program is recognized as compliant with the US FERPA law to do with safeguarding privacy of student records. However this is not recognized by Canada. The platform also denies non-education related requests for use.
2. Brisk: This is a chrome extension advertised to be “student-safe” and help educators integrate curriculum in instructional materials, provide effective feedback, and differentiation within the classroom and activities. It connects with the use of “Google Classroom, Docs, Slides, YouTube, Canvas, Schoology, and now Microsoft tools” according to Ditch That Textbook,  50 Al tools for teachers, educators and classrooms (free and paid)
3. Curipod: Curipod is used to generate all sorts of interactive lessons with the integration of engaging polls, word clouds, discussion prompts into individual activities. It’s often used by educators to help encourage participation and assist with building formative assessment especially in online spaces.
4. Khanmigo: This is the AI program connected to Khan Academy which acts as an “AI-powered tutor”. It can be used by students to provide assistance in a variety of subjects while providing the educator with progress and a tracking of learning. This program is known to work as an adaptive AI system working to provide personalization to learning.
5. Google Gemini for Education: This is a wider known program directly associated with Google. It connects with applications including Docs, Slides, Google Classroom and Gmail to enhance teacher and student drafting, brainstorming, Quiz generation, personalized supports, general organization and planning. It has built in privacy protections certified with Common Sense Media (also not recognized by the Canadian Government) and allows for admin management to ensure safe and age appropriate usage.

Honorable Mentions: Gradescope, Canva, Prezi AI, TeachAid, Padlet TA, Diffit, and Eduaide.AI

List curated with the help of the blog, Ditch That Textbook,  50 Al tools for teachers, educators and classrooms (free and paid) and Eklavvya, Top 31 Al EdTech Tools That Are Changing Education in 2025, with a wide range of education related AI programs.

“The most effective educators of 2025 aren’t just teachers, they’re AI-powered learning architects who can personalize education for every student, create engaging content in minutes, and provide instant feedback that actually helps students grow.” – Eklavvya, Top 31 AI EdTech Tools That Are Changing Education in 2025

Human-Centred AI Systems

Once again it seems I have underestimated AI technology as I have just discovered human centered AI systems. An article by Interaction Design Foundation, Human-Centered AI (HCAI) describes this developing advanced AI system and the considerations that should be made when designing and implementing these into varied environments and purposes. Novak Sheikh, a product design lead for Netflix highlights the fact that everyone may have different ideas of what this means and could look like so there are some crucial frameworks that should be followed or implemented. She describes the expectations of what’s to come once these human centered AI systems develop further, as shown below.

She breaks down the fact that AI is dynamic. As it is changing its ethical frameworks must follow to remain as accurate and at pace with the constantly developing technologies connected to it. This means developing and monitoring outputs to be as fair and equitable as possible. I have had conversations with peers on AI systems not having accurate or advanced information and alphabet representation for example to represent local Indigenous communities. This could pose another challenge to its abilities to take over a classroom, as much of this knowledge isn’t readily available online and rooted in deep human-based experience, intricate pedagogical approaches, emotion and intergenerational stories that for many reasons are not publicly online.

Sheikh also highlights what ethical AI should look like in the idea of privacy and data use. She describes that users should be provided a clear and accessible understanding of privacy considerations and data usage within ethical AI programs to allow the user a transparent view of how and why this data is being used in a safe way. Designers of educational AI programs should actively engage with and consider the topics above around providing transparency, fairness, accountability and privacy to create well rounded programs that advance education in a truly ethical way. Yet, many of the programs listed above did not yet incorporate each or even any of these pieces. I believe that having strong and clear principles/guidelines within trusted AI programs meant for an educational setting should be established and followed to accurately integrate these and actively address ethical, equitable use along with downfalls or needed additions as again these systems are dynamic and ever changing.