How some schools are embracing AI to help students learn French, edit papers, and more

In his French class, Gateway Regional High School freshman Spencer Barrett put on a headset to practice his speaking skills.

Barrett and his classmates rotated through five learning stations, several facilitated by a chatbot. With his Chromebook connected to his headset, Barrett responded to questions programmed by teacher Kim Karwoski about grocery shopping.

“Où vas tu pour achèter du pain?” (Where do you go to buy bread?) the chatbot asks.

“Je vais au supermarché” (I go to the supermarket), Barrett replied.

Gateway is among a growing number of New Jersey school districts that are exploring how to use artificial intelligence in the classroom. Karwoski said having her students practice with a chatbot has streamlined her workload and allows her to work more effectively to reach students who need extra help.

“It’s an exciting time,” said Karwoski, a 15-year teaching veteran. “It’s only going to make our profession stronger.”

The New Jersey Department of Education has encouraged districts to embrace AI, and Commissioner Kevin Dehmer declared it “the forefront of the future of education.”

Earlier this year, the state awarded $1.5 million in AI grants to Gateway and nine other districts, including Burlington City, Eastern Regional, Delsea Regional, and Woodstown-Pilesgrove. Each was awarded $75,000.

The grants come as schools are exploring how to incorporate artificial intelligence into teaching — and how to avoid pitfalls such as plagiarism and cheating and the spread of misinformation.

With proper guidelines and procedures to protect student privacy and ensure safe usage, artificial intelligence is changing teaching, said Jennifer Garner, senior director of innovative learning at the International Society for Technology in Education. Students are using it, whether they admit it or not, she said.

“AI is here. I don’t think it’s going anywhere,” Garner said. “How do we work with it instead of working against it?”

Other South Jersey districts, like Cherry Hill, are in the beginning stages of exploring more incorporation of AI. Cherry Hill said it recognized potential as well as possible risks.

The Philadelphia School District announced a pilot program in January with the University of Pennsylvania to train teachers and administrators on how best to use artificial intelligence in city schools.

It’s an issue schools are confronting across the country. New York City schools last year banned ChatGPT, the AI-powered tool, from school devices and networks but later said it would embrace the technology.

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Gateway school officials began exploring the possibility of integrating AI into the curriculum about a year ago, after noticing more students using it, said Amy Mount, director of curriculum and instruction.

To address concerns, Mount said, Gateway established detailed guidelines for students and teachers for using AI. The guidelines are posted around the school and reinforced in class, she said. There are also ethics lessons, she said.

Under the guidelines, students may use SchoolAI, the district’s generative AI platform, in class only with a teacher’s supervision. They do not have personal logins.

Mount said students may use AI tools to brainstorm and help organize their thoughts, and get editing help and feedback. They must cite AI as a reference, she said.

“We don’t want kids to think it’s this magic genie in a bottle,” she said.

In language arts lessons, teachers have used AI to create reading samples to assess students performing at different comprehension levels, Mount said. That allows teachers to customize instruction to meet personal needs, she said.

Some teachers were cautious about using the technology, while others embraced it, she said. Gateway expects teachers to eventually use AI across all content areas. Currently, about 65% percent of Gateway’s teachers have embedded AI into lesson plans or learning experiences, she said.

“It’s a tool, and it’s a powerful one,” said William Grillo, the director of secondary education. “We need to live in both worlds.“

The number of U.S. teens who admit using ChatGPT for their schoolwork increased in 2024 to 26%, double from the previous year, according to a recent study by the Pew Research Center. The majority of teens said they had not used a chatbot for schoolwork.

Karwoski said using AI has been a game-changer in her French classes, allowing her to tailor lesson plans and generate worksheets and quizzes.

She can generate exercises within minutes that would have taken much longer to do manually.

Karwoski said she has no worries about AI replacing her in the classroom. Students can apply the technology only after she has taught them vocabulary lessons, she said.

“They need the human touch. If you stick students in a room with a chatbot, they’re not going to do it,” she said.

Students love using the technology, especially the chatbot tool to reinforce the lessons. They liken it to working with a one-on-one tutor while Karwoski is busy helping another student.

“I feel like it actually helps me learn better,” Barrett said. “It helps me better understand French and how to use it in a conversational setting.”

Walking around the room, Karwoski checked on Barrett as he interacted with the chatbot. She can also generate a summary that shows how students perform on AI exercises and flag anything inappropriate.

“His French is excellent,” she said of Barrett.

That same day during Karwoski’s 80-minute class, the second-year French students moved around learning stations. There was a mixture of AI stations and traditional stations with paper worksheets.

“I think it’s a good thing,” Jasmine Velez said. “I feel like it makes us want to learn because there are so many different things we can do.

One group matched items to a shopping list generated by AI. The AI tool checked their responses to see how many were correct.

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English language arts students in the media center used AI to make personal vision boards. They used ChatGPT to fine-tune their list of goals for life after high school.

They were warned about pitfalls in the technology, including possible biases in the data and fake images. Mekhi Foster, 17, was surprised by the outcome from his prompt to create an image in his likeness.

“It actually looks like my dad,” he said.

The district wants students to recognize the shortfalls in the technology and work on becoming critical thinkers, said Gateway principal Jeff Pierro.

“We’re not going to replace paper and pencils,” Pierro said. “We don’t want them to blurt out AI answers.”