Education is at an interesting (and terrifying) inflection point. Roughly two-thirds of U.S. teachers were using AI last year (up from 51% the year prior) and 70% of high school students said they used AI in that same window. Unfortunately, despite these rising usage rates, only 35% of district tech leaders report an active AI initiative.
Luckily, our educators are eager to learn. As of fall 2024, 48% of U.S. districts have trained teachers on AI, with intent to reach 74% by this fall. While you may assume that teachers and educators are outright rejecting the promise of AI systems, data as early as 2023 indicated that a massive 88% of teachers said ChatGPT has an overall positive impact.
Despite these datapoints and promises, getting in the groove of using AI in your work day can be challenging and feel overwhelming. This week, we’re starting off easy with an extensive look into how teachers and educators can (and should) be using ChatGPT. Next week, we’ll look at some more advanced workspace setups with programs like Cursor.
Everyday AI workspace: ChatGPT for education
It doesn’t take an AI expert to get the benefits of ChatGPT in your classroom or admin office. OpenAI built the bot for ease-of-use, and the platform since inception has added a crazy amount of additional functionality that’s perfect for educators.
If you’re using ChatGPT’s free mode, consider upgrading. The 20 bucks a month will give you access to more intelligent models that have more reliable and detailed responses, and will open up access to power user features like Deep Research and Agent Mode (more on that later).
ChatGPT for teachers
Instead of spending hours crafting differentiated content, they can now generate personalized learning paths and custom practice materials in minutes. Here’s some ideas to get started.
1. Lesson planning and brainstorming
Instead of asking "help me plan a lesson on photosynthesis," try something a bit more involved like:
I'm teaching 7th grade photosynthesis to a class of 28 students with mixed abilities. Three students are English learners, five have reading difficulties, and several are advanced. I need a 45-minute lesson plan that includes:
- A visual demonstration they can do at home
- Three differentiated activity options
- An assessment that works for all learning levels
- Connection to their prior unit on cellular respiration
Make it engaging and hands-on.
This specific prompt gives ChatGPT the context it needs to generate genuinely useful content rather than generic suggestions. Consider adding in specific challenges or expectations that you have with your class. Any specifics will help guide the model towards a more tailored and useful response.
2. Creating assessments and rubrics
AI can be excellent at generating varied question types and assessment criteria. For example:
Create a formative assessment for 9th grade students learning about the causes of World War I. Include:
- 5 multiple choice questions with common misconceptions as distractors
- 3 short answer questions requiring analysis
- One document-based question using a primary source
- A rubric that measures both historical thinking and content knowledge
Format this so I can easily import it into Google Forms.Tweak the last bit depending on what software or platform you’re using to generate your docs.
3. Student communication and feedback
Use AI to help craft clear, constructive feedback or parent communications:
Help me write feedback for a student's persuasive essay. The essay argues for longer lunch periods. Strengths: clear thesis, good use of evidence from a survey they conducted. Areas for improvement: weak counterargument section, several grammar issues, conclusion doesn't fully connect back to introduction.
Tone should be encouraging but specific about next steps. Student is generally hardworking but struggles with confidence in writing.If you’re dissatisfied with the tone of the writing, consider providing a sample of your language and instruct it to write the content in “your voice”. If you’re still not liking what you’re seeing, try the prompt in Anthropic’s Claude (typically heralded for its more natural-sounding copy).
Note: Your students can and will be using ChatGPT (whether its sneaking it in the classroom or logging on at home). Try not to think of this inevitability as a problem that needs eliminating. Instead, take note of AI’s ability to compliment your efforts and help provided furth individualized attention. Students now have access to AI tutors that never tire, provide instant feedback, and adjust difficulty in real time. AI-powered tools like Khanmigo and ChatGPT’s upcoming “study together” mode even allow interactive tutoring sessions that adapt to each student’s pace.
ChatGPT for administrators
AI-driven analytics dashboards help superintendents and principals turn raw student performance data into actionable insights, identifying trends or predicting at-risk students before issues escalate.
1. Data analysis and reporting
Modern school leaders are drowning in data. ChatGPT can help synthesize patterns:
I have attendance data showing:
- Overall district attendance: 91% (down from 93% last year)
- Highest absence rates: Mondays (15%) and Fridays (12%)
- Elementary: 94%, Middle: 89%, High: 88%
- Free/reduced lunch students: 87% attendance
- October-November saw biggest decline
Help me identify key issues and write a brief for the school board with 3 specific intervention recommendations.
Keep in mind: you can throw just about any type of file at ChatGPT. Spreadsheets, documents, whatever. You can even link your Google Drive to the platform (though, consult your friendly neighborhood IT folks before doing so) and feed in all sorts of data.
2. Policy development
AI can help draft policies that balance innovation with safety:
Draft a social media policy for our K-8 school district that addresses:
- Student use during school hours
- Teacher-student connections on platforms
- Cyberbullying prevention and response
- Educational use of social platforms
- COPPA compliance for under-13 students
Make it clear but not overly restrictive. Include a one-page parent summary.Make sure you’re communicating the relevant context for your school to ChatGPT. Attach documents or data that you feel may be helpful, to ensure that the response is fully tailored to the needs of your student body.
3. Professional development planning
AI can design targeted training based on teacher needs:
Design a 3-session professional development series on differentiated instruction for 15 middle school teachers. Background: recent classroom observations show 60% use minimal differentiation, teachers want practical strategies not theory, 45-minute sessions during prep periods.
Include: session objectives, hands-on activities, take-away resources, and follow-up coaching components.
ChatGPT will sometimes output tables that you can export into spreadsheets, and sometimes entire documents that are exportable to Word, Google Docs, and others.
ChatGPT power tools
While ChatGPT boasts various advanced tools (that you can, and should, learn and take advantage of), the two most useful for educators and administrators are Deep Research and Agent Mode.
Deep Research
Deep Research is a (underrated) mode in ChatGPT for educators and administrators serious about deep, citation-backed insights. When enabled, Deep Research mode spins off multiple ChatGPT requests; functionally you’re getting a mini research team of AI agents, who search the web and collaborate on full, fact-checked reports.
What it does
Works with the user to properly scope a request, then autonomously browses and synthesizes scholarly papers, articles, and digital sources into a coherent report, often with clear citations and structured findings (completing in around 10 minutes what might take hours manually).
Embed analysis on text, PDFs, images, spreadsheets, practical for data-driven projects and curriculum design.
Offer a summary of its reasoning and sourced data via a sidebar, which is very helpful to track how conclusions were reached.
Classroom applications
Curriculum design & literature reviews. Quickly build overviews of teaching methods, assess evidence-based strategies, and chart emerging pedagogical trends.
Grant prep & policy whitepapers. Compile authoritative summaries with citations (no more chasing down sources manually).
Custom research prompts. Ask Deep Research to identify gaps in learning theory or track the latest AI-education studies (handy for PD or faculty workshops).
It’s important to not that Deep Research is, of course, not foolproof. Occasionally a less reliable source may slip in, so you should make sure to review the report before sending it out to peers or students. It also can’t produce original scholarship (yet), so further refinement is needed. Use the mode to accelerate, not replace, real research; a perfect teaching opportunity with your students around validating sources, cross-checking findings, and applying pedagogy-informed critque.
Here’s what Deep Research looks like in practice:
Run Deep Research on “AI literacy frameworks in K‑12 education.” Include peer-reviewed studies, recent district guidelines, and implementation outcomes. Summarize top 5 frameworks in a comparative table with references.After prompting ChatGPT with the above (with the Deep Research toggle enabled), it’ll ask a few follow-up questions to make sure it understands the request. Use this to get even more specific, or to clarify things you don’t want.
After researching for 10 minutes or so, ChatGPT will provide you with an extensive, cited report (that can be exported to PDF!).
Note: You may start to notice that your students’ reports are starting to look like Deep Research outputs. This is an inevitability. Instead of limiting the use of ChatGPT or banning it outright, use this as an opportunity to engage them further. Encourage them to build skills around prompting the bot in higher detail, to watch the agent sidebar as its working and analyze its research patterns, and to engage critically with the output to further refine it in their voice and structure.
Agent Mode
The new agent mode transforms ChatGPT from a chatbot into an active assistant, capable of taking actions on a virtual computer. Instead of manually gathering information (for yet another professional development session on "AI in Education"), you can prompt:
Research current best practices for AI literacy in K-12 education. Find recent studies on learning outcomes, examples of successful district implementations, and age-appropriate curriculum frameworks. Create a 20-slide presentation for teachers covering benefits, challenges, and practical next steps. Include clickable links to additional resources.Check out this video of this prompt in action:
What it does
Combines Deep Research with Operator’s browsing and action capabilities, plus code interpretation and connector access (all via a sandboxed virtual computer, protecting your privacy). This gives ChatGPT the ability to do basically anything you can do on a computer.
Can browse websites visually or textually, run code, fill forms, click through checkout flows, sign into accounts when needed, and build deliverables like spreadsheets, databases, or slide decks.
Pauses and requests confirmation for sensitive actions (like purchases, account access, or messaging Jenny in HR). You can interrupt, override, or take control at any time.
Classroom applications
Research and action in one. Ask it to “analyze K‑12 AI literacy studies, upload findings to a presentation, then email me the slides.” It’ll browse, interpret studies, generate a deck, and even send it (with your approval, of course).
Streamline routine operations. Delegate tasks like drafting grant proposals, filling out forms, generating policy docs, or building data dashboards.
Integrated workflow. It can pull from Google Calendar, Drive, Gmail, or websites via connectors, so you can ask it to “scan attendance trends and summarize absences by demographic.”
Tips for Agent Mode prompting
Be explicit. State input sources (e.g. “my Drive folder ‘FY24 data’”), deliverable format (“slides + spreadsheet”), and endpoints (“email to admin@example.com”).
Use confirmation checkpoints. Agent Mode lets you pause and clarify mid‑task.
Leverage scheduling. After task completion, hit the clock icon to run reports weekly or monthly automatically.
Combine tools. Start a task with Agent Mode, then ask it to apply its findings within ChatGPT for narrative context or follow‑up.
The urgent need for AI literacy
Both educators and students need AI literacy. This point in time is critical for both students and educators to understand how AI works, its limitations, and how to engage critically with AI-generated information and content.
California became the first state to require AI literacy in its curriculum frameworks, and 28 state education departments have released AI guidance for schools. The message is clear: AI literacy is becoming as essential as traditional literacy. Let’s fill that need further.