One year of Sora: a classroom reality check
April 21, 2025
A year on from Sora-style video generation entering mainstream conversation, teachers are asking a practical question: what actually works in a classroom, and what still causes problems? This reality check focuses on the shifts you’ll notice most—better coherence, improved text handling, and more usable editing controls—alongside predictable failure modes like continuity glitches, broken physics, biased portrayals, and unsafe outputs. You’ll find low-stakes use cases, a media literacy sequence, safeguarding boundaries, workload-aware workflows, and a 30-day pilot plan with clear “keep/kill” criteria.
KS2 SATs: AI boundaries and revision toolkit
April 17, 2025
AI can genuinely improve Year 6 SATs preparation, but only when the boundaries are crystal clear. This guide sets out what “appropriate AI support” looks like for KS2, alongside non-negotiable integrity rules for pupils at home and teachers in school. You’ll find practical ways to use AI to generate maths retrieval practice, diagnose misconceptions, and scaffold SPaG and reading comprehension without giving answers. It also includes minimum-data safeguarding routines, low-device alternatives, and ready-to-copy prompts, plus a one-page family agreement you can adapt.
Minimum viable inclusion stack: SEND tech update
April 14, 2025
This term-ready update brings together what’s genuinely new (and useful) in built-in accessibility across Google, Microsoft, Apple and Chromebooks, then adds a practical layer: a “minimum viable inclusion stack” you can standardise across classrooms. You’ll also find ten low-effort AI micro-routines that scaffold learning without replacing it, plus guidance on making assistive tech and AI work together rather than clash. Finally, there’s a SEND-specific procurement and safeguarding checklist, and a simple two-week pilot plan with staff briefing points and a one-page parent/carer note.
GPT-5 release day school briefing
April 3, 2025
GPT-5 will arrive with headlines, hot takes and rapid product changes, but schools need a calm, repeatable way to judge what actually matters. This release-day protocol gives you a one-page briefing and a 60–90 minute comparative “bake-off” against your current model and workflows. You’ll test planning, feedback, accessibility, safeguarding and assessment using a minimum-safe environment, then make an adopt/pilot/park decision with clear evidence thresholds. It ends with the smallest policy tweaks leaders should make in week one, plus ready-to-send staff and parent messages that avoid hype.
Easter AI Learning Project Menu
March 24, 2025
This Easter-themed project menu offers short, family-friendly AI learning challenges that work even when devices are limited. Teachers can set clear, bounded outcomes while pupils choose a pathway that suits their age and interests. Each project has printable and offline variants, plus paired-role options for sharing a single device. You’ll also find a simple home–school safety script, minimum-data rules for privacy, and an optional mini showcase rubric that rewards process (planning, prompts, evidence, reflection) over polish.
Claude 4 / 3.5 Opus: claims-to-classroom protocol
March 3, 2025
New flagship AI launches arrive with bold claims: better reasoning, richer multimodal support, safer behaviour, and more “agentic” features that act on your behalf. For schools, the question is not whether the benchmarks look impressive, but whether the model is reliable, privacy-safe, and assessment-responsible in everyday teacher workflows. This article offers a practical “claims-to-classroom” evaluation protocol you can run in 90 minutes with no pupil data, plus evidence thresholds and checklists to decide whether to adopt, pilot, or park Claude’s next flagship.
AI for Student Wellbeing Conversations
January 17, 2025
AI can help staff notice wellbeing patterns earlier and hold more focused, compassionate conversations with students – but only when used with clear safeguarding boundaries. This practical playbook shows how to position AI as a structured prompt and reflection partner, never as a counsellor or decision-maker. You will find age-appropriate check-in scripts, escalation rules and weekly routines that keep humans firmly in charge. We also unpack data protection, consent and communication with families so your approach is transparent, ethical and sustainable.
Festive AI Activities Playbook
December 5, 2024
December can easily become a blur of tired lessons, last-minute cover and sugar-fuelled chaos. This festive AI playbook offers low-prep, holiday-themed projects that blend on-screen creativity with off-screen making, service and reflection. Organised by age band, it gives concrete ideas that build AI literacy and community spirit without adding piles of marking or endless screen time. With planning guardrails, equity-minded variants and quick-start checklists, it is designed to slot straight into your December timetable or act as an engaging homework alternative.
LGR22 and Slöjd: AI micro-tools that protect making
November 14, 2024
Slöjd is one of the best “stress tests” for classroom AI because the learning lives in hands-on decisions, safe tool use, and reflective thinking—not in perfect text. This article offers four practical, teacher-in-the-loop AI micro-tools aligned with LGR22: a making-lesson planner using E/C/A process goals, a bilingual pattern and notation converter (SV↔EN), pupil-friendly documentation prompts that evidence learning, and a safety-first risk assessment workflow for textile, wood and metal. It also sets clear red lines for what AI must never do in Slöjd.
Digital Citizenship and AI
October 24, 2024
As AI tools move into everyday schoolwork, they must become part of digital citizenship, not an optional extra. This article gives teachers age-banded, ready-to-teach mini-units that weave online safety, ethics and academic integrity into practical AI activities. With examples from primary through to upper secondary, and options for low- or no-device classrooms, you can help pupils actually practise responsible AI use rather than simply memorising rules. Includes ideas for classroom routines, pupil agreements and ways to link lessons with school policy and home.
AI in Science Labs: A Practical Playbook
October 15, 2024
AI is already reshaping how we plan, run and review practical science – but many teachers are unsure how to use it safely and effectively with real students, real data and real risks. This lab‑first playbook walks science teachers step‑by‑step through embedding AI into existing practicals, from planning and piloting experiments to analysing student data and enforcing non‑negotiable safety rules. With ready‑to‑copy routines that work in low‑device, mixed‑ability secondary and FE labs, it focuses on scaffolding thinking rather than doing the work for students, and keeps academic integrity and data protection front and centre.
Teaching Hemkunskap Under LGR22: AI Workflow
October 14, 2024
Hem- och konsumentkunskap (HKK) under LGR22 asks pupils to plan, cook, evaluate, and reason about choices—often under tight time, budget, and safety constraints. This article offers a classroom-ready, inspection-friendly AI workflow that treats AI as a documentation and reasoning tool rather than a “teacher replacement”. You’ll get a four-tool pipeline for recipe design, Swedish unit conversion, E/C/A-aligned lesson outcomes, and a written riskbedömning, with one complete Swedish cuisine example plus a US-to-Sweden cookie conversion case.
September AI Readiness Checklist
July 22, 2024
Treating AI like any other major infrastructure change is the safest route to a successful September rollout. This staged, summer-long AI readiness playbook is designed for school and college leaders who want to move beyond experimentation and towards reliable, safe and sustainable AI use. It walks through clarifying use cases, mapping data flows, tightening security, updating governance and acceptable-use policies, and planning targeted staff training. With concrete, week‑by‑week tasks for IT, safeguarding and pedagogy leads, you can arrive in September confident that AI supports teaching and learning – not the other way round.
AI in Summer School Programmes: Engaging Students Over the Break
July 5, 2024
Summer school and holiday programmes can be a powerful time to explore AI in playful, low-pressure ways – without letting screens take over. This practical age-banded playbook offers ready-to-use project ideas for primary, lower secondary and upper secondary learners, along with low-device options to support equity. You will find family communication templates, clear safeguarding guardrails and planning tips for clubs, camps and at-home learning. Ideal for teachers and leaders who want to keep pupils curious, creative and safe with AI over the break.
The Dark Side of AI
May 13, 2024
AI technology, while offering tremendous benefits, also poses significant ethical and moral challenges when misused. This blog post delves into the darker aspects of AI, highlighting issues such as deepfakes, invasive surveillance, automated hacking, financial crimes, biassed decision-making, manipulative marketing, and the weaponisation of AI. These examples underscore the importance of developing robust policies and ethical guidelines to prevent the misuse of AI. By raising public awareness and fostering collaboration among governments, organisations, and individuals, we can ensure AI is used responsibly for the betterment of society.