Teaching History with AI, Reflection and Editorial

In a world of increasing automation, teachers must equip students with critical thinking
skills that enable them to do what AI cannot.

AI is a disruptive technology that can shed light on important societal issues, such as where knowledge comes from, how it impacts thoughts, attitudes and behaviours, and how we can trust it.

Like the internet before it, artificial intelligence is already an omnipresent force that educators must embrace to ensure that their students remain active learners who don’t relinquish their voice to automation.

Generative AI poses ethical, legal and social risks that need to be addressed and managed by school leaders, teachers and students.

Teaching and learning through AI individualises learning processes and streamlines workflow from lesson planning to grading.

Several AI tools can help History teachers reduce their administrative loads, adapt content for different learning needs and increase student agency and engagement.

Since the internet has some questionable biases related to gender, ethnicity and social class, students need to interrogate how these are reflected by AI outputs generated.

It is integral to consider the ways in which generative artificial intelligence replicates settler-colonial violence by perpetuating misinformation and disinformation about Indigenous peoples.

A six-week program can teach History students how to identify where AI-generated responses to essay questions fall short, and critique their own work as well.

Generative AI has changed the world, and with it our expectation of when and where summative essays can be completed, as well as when new AI-powered assessment methods should be used instead.

History teachers can use generative AI in many creative ways, including brainstorming ways to make History classes more engaging.

Well-written prompts, customised ChatGPT settings and graphical reconstructions of open access data can unleash the full potential of AI in the History classroom.

A simple acronym and checklist can help teachers develop prompt engineering skills to create differentiated learning tasks.

Tools like Almanack and MagicSchool can streamline lesson planning and differentiation, while Quizizz can quickly create interactive quizzes that reinforce key concepts in an engaging way.

Inworld enables students to create AI-generated characters based on historical figures, making it easier for students to connect and empathise with people of the past.

New source analysis techniques are needed to determine which online images are real and to what extent AI-generated images accurately portray the past.

The gold rush devastated the western Victorian landscape and ravaged a traditional way of life that had remained unbroken for millennia. A new digital heritage project allows people to explore the sheer enormity of that environmental and cultural transformation.

History teachers can employ some simple activities that address the four capabilities outlined in the curriculum. Here are some you can use in your class.

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