Remember the hesitation many felt when the internet first entered our homes? Dan Fitzpatrick, "The AI Educator," draws fascinating parallels between that pivotal moment and our current relationship with artificial intelligence in education. This conversation cuts through misconceptions to reveal how AI can transform teaching without diminishing human connection.
Dan's journey from classroom teacher to AI integration specialist began with a simple realization: technology could free educators from administrative burdens. When ChatGPT launched in November 2022, he immediately saw its potential to eliminate those unpaid weekend workdays that consume teachers' personal lives. "All that time I spent upstairs in the box room in our house, not seeing family, not seeing friends... I just thought I need to put things out there," he recalls.
The skepticism around AI in education often mirrors concerns from previous technological shifts. Dan shares an illuminating strategy from his presentations where he reveals historical technology fears that sound remarkably similar to modern anxieties. Yet despite this perspective, integration challenges remain formidable. Many schools still treat technology as optional rather than fundamental, creating problematic gaps between tech-savvy and tech-resistant classrooms.
Dan's four-step transformation blueprint from his book "Infinite Education" – scope, shape, influence, and alignment – provides a practical framework for meaningful change. He emphasizes that most organizations master the first two steps but fail at the crucial implementation phase: "It's a bit like being able to draw a car and being able to drive a car... very different skills."
From experimental schools claiming dramatic efficiency improvements to everyday classrooms finding small wins through differentiation tools, the path forward requires balance and patience. As Dan insightfully notes, "AI is a context, not a subject" – it belongs in every classroom, not just computer science.
Join this illuminating conversation to discover how educators can navigate AI's integration challenges while preparing students for a future where this technology is as fundamental as electricity. Subscribe now to hear more conversations about the evolving educational landscape.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Chris Colley (00:12):
All right, welcome everyone.
Another episode of Shift Edpodcast coming to you.
I am reaching across the pond,I am pulling in the AI educator,
dan Fitzpatrick.
What we have so much to talkabout, but AI it's such a hot
topic in schools now and Dan isgoing to help us shed some light
(00:32):
Now.
Dan's an author, high school,ex high school teacher, writes
podcasts every day, speaks, andI think that he's dominated his
focus on AI these days.
Dan, thanks so much for joiningme today and, yeah, we'll AI it
.
Dan Fitzpatrick (00:51):
Yeah, thanks, chris.
I appreciate you having me andfor making this work with the
time difference and everything,it's great to be with you.
Chris Colley (00:59):
Yeah, well, thanks for joining.
It's always a pleasure to talkto insightful people, or you've
spent probably more time thanmost of us focusing, looking and
researching and playing aroundwith AI.
But, dan, before we get there,what were some of your moments
that led you here?
Like, how did you become the AIeducator?
Dan Fitzpatrick (01:20):
Yeah, I guess I remember when I was training to
be a high school teacher, Iremember I went into one we had
like it was called a skitprogram.
I'm not sure if you have themin Canada, but they kind of
train on the job.
So you start with a 60%timetable so I was teaching kind
(01:43):
of from day one and then everyFriday at the school I was at we
would have teacher trainingkind of classes and sessions.
So I remember this one Fridayit was led by one of the tech
teachers and they were talkingabout Google for Education,
essentially like kind of theearly versions of it and cloud
(02:04):
computing, and it just capturedmy imagination from that moment
because I remember thinking whyaren't we just using cloud
computing everywhere?
Like we can put studentresources on there?
Students can access them fromany device from home at any time
.
Surely this just makes senseand I suppose yeah.
So I got very excited about the, the prospect of of technology
(02:27):
enhancing uh learning and theschool experience for students.
So kind of was always anadvocate in my in my teaching
career and I moved intoleadership where I was
responsible for technologyintegration.
Then I moved into collegeeducation where I kind of moved
into a more strategic directorrole around integrating
(02:49):
technology into collegeeducation.
And it was there when I kind ofstarted playing around with
early LLMs and the technologybehind it, like a tool like
ChatGPT and kind of seeing againvery rudimentary versions of it
, but starting to see this couldhave benefits for our teachers,
especially teachers who have togive feedback on large amounts
(03:12):
of writing.
That was kind of my first kindof way in to think, right, well,
how could this help?
And then, of course, historyit's in the history books now
End of November 2022, chat gptwas released kind of changed the
course of the world, I suppose,over the last two years and the
and the.
(03:32):
The world is still kind ofreeling from it and trying to
understand it, and everybusiness is trying to understand
it.
Every school is is trying to,to some degree, understand it.
So, having a bit of knowledgeabout it, having knowledge about
technology integration inschool, I decided to start
writing about it really firstlyon social media, then in my
(03:55):
books, and it kind of allowed meto step aside from the day job
and focus on this full time and,yeah, I suppose I get to travel
the world and help schools,districts, businesses integrate
AI.
Chris Colley (04:09):
That's amazing, amazing.
And for you, like what was yourfirst reaction to when chat,
you know, opened its doors inthat, you know, cold November
day, like what were your firstimpressions when you were just
starting to muck around with ita bit?
Like what was your kind ofreaction to it all?
Yeah, I suppose I'm.
What were your firstimpressions when you were just
starting to muck around?
Dan Fitzpatrick (04:27):
with it a bit.
What was your reaction to itall?
Yeah, I suppose I'm.
I think, when it comes to thistype of thing, I'm naturally an
optimist, and so I could.
When I saw how good that firstor that early version of ChatGPT
was, I kind of thought, well,let's ask it to do some things.
I mean, it's very, very clichenow, but, like back at the end
(04:49):
of November 2022, asking ChatGPTto write a lesson plan for you
was almost monumental.
It was huge.
And just seeing that kind ofresponse from it and seeing how
and I suppose my mind, just mymind went straight to.
I remember when I was, when Iwas teaching full time and and a
(05:11):
lot of my colleagues had thisattitude as well, especially
those with ambition it was kindof like every weekend you would
say, right, one day, one day ofthat weekend's a work day.
You weren't getting paid for it,but you just knew that if you
wanted to stay ahead and at thetop of your game, you're gonna
have to dedicate at least oneday of that weekend yeah to for
(05:33):
the workload, yeah, and, and I,and I did that and I, I, I, I
threw myself into that um,especially um, earlier on in my
career and I kind of my mindstraight away thought, oh my
goodness, all that time I spentum upstairs in the in the box
room in our house, um not seeingfamily, not seeing friends, um
(05:54):
on an evening, like with mylaptop in front of the tv doing
work and getting feedback, and Ijust kind of thought I need to.
At that moment.
Nobody else was really talkingabout it, I felt especially not
in the social circles I was in,and so I just thought I need to,
I need to put things out there.
So like, yeah, it kind ofexcited me, it made me really
(06:15):
positive about, about, first andforemost, that workload element
for sure, for sure.
Chris Colley (06:21):
I I heard this um ratio 80, 20.
Um, okay, yeah, and they weresaying that AI is great at like
80% of your like school tasks,but your professional judgment
still is that 20% right, so youalways are, are kind of like
having it generate things, butat the same time, your
(06:42):
professionalism is still a partof that mix I don't know, I'd
probably flip that on its head.
Dan Fitzpatrick (06:47):
You know, I'd probably say probably your
skills and knowledge andexperience is probably the 80
percent.
Now, don't get me wrong.
I think chachupji can helpmassively.
I suppose probably like admintasks it can be right.
Chris Colley (07:02):
Yeah, more like administrate, you know, like
school is so full of those taskstoo.
Right like all of these, likeadministrative, like monotonous
work it's and there's a lot lessof like working with the kids
and like interacting in thosedevelopmental relationships.
Do you think that that chat hasan ability?
Or?
Or ai, ai I'll say AI, we'llkeep it general that it has the
(07:26):
ability to um help teachers, umum have more focus on on humans
rather than computers, eventhough we're talking about
machine learning I think it hasthat potential.
Dan Fitzpatrick (07:40):
And I use that word potential, um, because I I
see some educators who are doingit um a lot, who want, I think.
I suppose it's kind of like Iand I.
It's becoming a bit of a clichein itself now, but I always
kind of compare this to kind ofthe mid 90s of the internet and
right, um, it was a lot of hype,um, and and a lot of it
(08:03):
rightfully so, to be honest.
And people say, oh, look, whatyou can do, look at this email
thing, look at this browser, Ican search a website.
And it was very unregulated.
It was, but most people didn'tkind of get it.
I remember my parents, and Ithink it was 97, I was 11, and
we, we got a computer in ourdining.
(08:24):
I remember it was in the diningroom on like a trolley and
after a few weeks my parents, Ithink, sent it back because I
never saw it again.
Um, and I think they justcollectively came to the
decision what's the fuss?
Well, why?
And they probably I didn't comefrom a well-off family, so we
probably had it on finance.
So I think they probably justthought, yeah, let's send it
(08:46):
back and save ourselves.
And I think, unless you werereally dedicated to it in those
early days, it wasn't just kindof bit like oh well, what's,
what's, what's?
What value is it going to bring?
I don't think there's a lot ofpeople kind of like that with ai
at the moment.
So I think kind of those earlyadopters, the ones who are
really getting into it, tryingto figure out their own workflow
(09:08):
with it, and it's a bit of ait's a bit you've got to stumble
across it.
You've got to find that workswell.
If I connect, if I do somethingwith that tool and then I bring
this tool in it'll, it'llcreate a presentation deck for
me.
This isn't, and then, but you'vealmost got to kind of discover
that for yourself there's veryfew just kind of one click tools
(09:29):
, um.
So it requires a bit of upfronttime and dedication and that
which obviously not all teachers, probably very few, are going
to actually do that.
So I I can see it offering alot of value and I've heard
research stats like three hoursa week said time saved and so on
, um.
But I think I think we've stillgot a long journey to go with
(09:53):
this technology and to see itsactual potential to successfully
affect education.
I don't think it's going away.
I think it's going to be here.
I don't think we're going toget to the point where we're
like, right, we played aroundwith the AI.
Chris Colley (10:07):
We're done with that.
Now Put it away, show it.
Dan Fitzpatrick (10:12):
I think it has to be, even if some schools do
decide to restrict it and inEngland we do get a lot of
traditional schools who arebanning mobile phones and so on
it's going to be part of theworkflow of a lot of people.
Just like I forget who said itnow.
Might have been Sundar Pichai,the CEO of Google, said it's
(10:34):
more like electricity than a newtechnology, um, and that it's
just going to be part ofeverything.
So I think so.
Chris Colley (10:43):
I think the potential is there, but we've
got a long way to go to torealize that potential, I think
totally yeah, and I mean I'mdoing a lot of presentations too
about ai with with educatorsand consultants, teachers, Um,
and there's always thesemisconceptions I find, Um, and
like you're so right on, likethere's, you'll always have your
early adapters that are goingto be all over it, but that's,
(11:06):
that's a small minority, I find,of the overall kind of, and
oftentimes I get a lot ofmisconceptions about what it is
and what it can do, and it'smore of a fear than an embracing
of right.
But again, your your analogybetween the internet, like it
really reinforces that.
I mean, can you imagine lifewithout the internet right now?
(11:28):
I mean none of this, we'd bedoing none of this right, I'd
never be able to talk with you.
You know we just so.
We're so used to this now,because it's been around for so
long.
Do you think that themisconceptions that teachers
have will fade away eventuallyand blossom in, or do you think
that it's something that willnever be fully integrated within
(11:50):
the educational system?
Dan Fitzpatrick (11:53):
I've got a feeling that linger for for
quite a while.
I think, um, hopefully, as thetechnology develops and
technology companies um come upwith more solutions, especially
around ethics and privacy andand all of that kind of thing,
it'll it'll quell a lot of fears, hopefully.
And again, like I remember, Iused to give a presentation
years ago where the first I wishI could find the slide deck
(12:16):
because I'd love to use it againbut the first few slides were
quotes about technology, and itwas like the first quote was
like something like this newtechnology is invading our homes
and taking our children'sattention, and the whole idea is
you say to the audience, whatis this talking about?
And they normally say somethinglike it's the internet or it's
(12:37):
a cell phone, and and then youreveal that actually they're
talking about the, the telephone, and it's like a quote from 80
years ago or something.
So you find these featurestotally technology throughout
the ages and then it becomeskind of part of life.
But I do think I I mean, look,today we still it's 30 years, I
suppose, since the internetstarted to become very
(13:00):
mainstream and we still have alot of caution around it in
education, not everywhere.
Some schools are one-to-onedevice.
They are doing it in a healthyway and in an impactful way.
But again, I come back to theenglish system where, where I'm
based, and, um, there's stillmany, many schools who are who.
(13:21):
The only technology in aclassroom is is the 10 year old
pc at the front of the roomwhich the teacher does their
register on and and and pulls uptheir powerpoint.
So and that's 30 years later.
So I I still think we're stillgoing to be talking about the
ethics of this, the there'sstill going to be research being
(13:42):
done in 20 years time, and thatmakes us think twice.
But like around social medianow and so on, um, but I suppose
, coming back to what we saidbefore, it isn't going to go
away.
So we we have to find a way tomake sure that our students, um
are living in this world in asafe way and in a way where they
have the skills for it tobenefit them and not harm them.
Chris Colley (14:04):
I guess right, right and in your latest book,
infinite education um, youpresent this four-step blueprint
for educator educationaltransformation.
Could you give us a littleinsight or a little preview into
into what you explore withinthose four steps?
Dan Fitzpatrick (14:22):
yeah, absolutely so.
Um, the the four steps arescope, so it's a very practical.
It could be applied to so manydifferent things, but it's about
how do you?
How do you make change happenwithin an organization?
Essentially and I've kind ofplugged my eye into that okay,
it's a lot of things I learnedwhen I was, um, a director
(14:43):
within college education and alot of things I was taught from,
from my colleagues, on how tokind of make change happen
within a on at an executivelevel.
It was quite a big collegegroup that had an executive team
and so on, so I kind of adapteda lot of that.
So, yeah, it was sort of scope,kind of being able to survey
what's going on within yourschool, what teachers are using
(15:06):
and so on, what's going onoutside the school, what the
trends are.
Then it's shape.
So how do you start to shapethe message, the strategy, the
plan of where you want to gowith this?
Then the next one I think a lotof actually a lot of
organizations kind of stop there.
They look around, they go right, can you write a strategy on
(15:26):
this?
Somebody writes the strategy,they save it as a PDF and it
goes on the website and getssent to parents and governors
Check the box.
Yeah, yeah, and it's referredto every now and then.
But I think that's kind of stepone really.
Well, step one and two withinthis framework, but it's kind of
the first.
It's almost the least importantbit in a way, because for me the
(15:50):
second two bits, which areinfluence and alignment, I think
are so important and that kindof it's a strategy skill that
goes way beyond just being ableto write a strategy.
I suppose it's a bit like andI've just come up with this
analogy off the top of my head,I've never used it before, but
(16:11):
it's coming to my mind it's abit like being able to draw a
car and being able to drive acar like, I suppose every you
could ask it.
You could ask a four-year-oldto draw a car, asking the driver
cause something very, verydifferent.
And I think I think the drivingthe car bit is the how do you,
how do you realize that strategy, how do you manifest it?
(16:32):
And that essentially comes downto what we've kind of
traditionally called changemanagement, being able to
influence the people in ourorganization and then being able
to align them, and I thinkthat's kind of where elite
leadership comes in um, but butI do think that those are skills
that anybody can learn, um, andit's just practicing those
(16:54):
skills.
So the kind of the second halfof the book is goes through each
of those four steps and it Ikind of preface it by saying
right, you've got to get a grouptogether.
I call it an accelerator group,whether that be a group in your
school or a, a regional group,um, or or kind of a
multi-faceted community group soyou can have parents, teachers,
(17:15):
students, local government,whatever it is.
And then I put I've got a lotof tasks.
And it's a bit like a playbookreally, the second half of the
book, where I go right, whatabout this task in terms of um
influence, and I bring inpsychology and um and so on to
try and just give people a bitof a toolkit to get on that road
(17:38):
with who maybe have never doneit before.
Chris Colley (17:42):
Absolutely Well.
I think it's importantinformation for school leaders
to have access to and tounderstand, because the
acceleration of AI is notslowing down at all.
We are seeing almost daily.
I mean, I love your dailypodcast where you kind of
isolate on one little topic, butI mean you have enough to talk
(18:04):
about something every single day, which is amazing.
I love the little clippets.
I encourage listeners to go andlisten to the AI Educator
podcast, to the AI Educatorpodcast.
So with education, we have AItoo, and I know that you've been
asked this question beforeabout the age factor, about
using AI, and we're kind ofbattling with that here in
(18:26):
Quebec, canada, where theplatforms are putting age
restrictions on.
Yet we want to make sure ourkids understand this.
How do you recommend thatteachers in schools, you know
elementary through high school?
I mean I guess some platformsare 13 now 14, 16, they're
around those age range, but weneed to start early right.
(18:50):
Like I always felt that wemissed the train on social media
, you know of training, of nottraining the kids but creating
an awareness of you know,digital citizenship free and all
of that stuff, Kind of likeeveryone was responsible for it
but nobody really touched on it.
Because what does that have todo with English or math or
(19:11):
science, you know, like oursubjects?
Yeah, how do you find thatwe're going to integrate AI with
these age restrictions that arein place?
Dan Fitzpatrick (19:26):
Yeah, I think probably, first of all, I think
it's good to look at it in kindof two categories.
So there's teaching about AIand then there's teaching kind
of with AI, and I suppose weprobably need to do both and I
suppose the first, the firstpart of that, the teaching about
AI, doesn't you don'tnecessarily have to give, give
(19:48):
your elementary children thetools you can demonstrate things
for them, you can do kind ofindirect activities that that
get across the point of howthese things work.
There are some tools out there.
They're quite older tools now,but things like Google have got
a tool called Teachable Machineand what's it called?
(20:12):
Draw, sketch, draw, somethinglike that.
Chris Colley (20:14):
Yeah, sketch it.
Yeah, we played with that withsome kids.
Dan Fitzpatrick (20:18):
Yeah, yeah, where you, we played with that,
with some kids.
Chris Colley (20:19):
Yeah, I find that that's a great platform too,
because it shows you how it, howit learned.
You know how it decides what itmight be.
Dan Fitzpatrick (20:26):
You that, what you're drawing with the model,
like there's tons of data, andyou're like, oh cool yeah, and
it's engaging the way it talkslike a a very kind of um early
voice on their AI voice, whichis quite funny yeah hilarious.
Chris Colley (20:41):
It's a cat, it's a dog, it's a horse, it's a yeah,
so I think things like thatreally help.
Dan Fitzpatrick (20:49):
I think then, the second part of that how do
you use the AI?
Yeah, I suppose it's going todepend on the region, like what
your school policy is, what thepolicy is from local government
and so on.
But we're starting to see I was, I I had, I had the privilege
of being at google hq in sanfrancisco last week and I was
(21:11):
talking with the education teamand, um, I didn't realize this,
but they, they've rolled outgemini for for ages now.
So if you are within GoogleWorkspace and you think you
might have to pay a higher tierfor Gemini, but your students
can use it Not the full array oftools, and maybe not the Gemini
(21:34):
tool within certain apps, butthe raw form of Gemini students
can use it.
So I think we are starting tosee now that that those some
companies, especially the moreestablished companies, the more
giving us the a bit ofconfidence that, um, that, uh,
they can be used.
(21:54):
And also some third party, somethird-party apps um, school AI,
magic, school brisk, kind ofoffering um chat bots that the
teacher can train and and sharethe link with students.
Uh, some of it's still a grayarea, um.
I think that's why you've gotto kind of check just with your
school.
So my team managers are happysome on to kind of because it
(22:18):
goes in in that gray area.
But I think there are ways andI think we're starting to see a
lot of AI um literacycurriculums be be created.
There was one factor my podcastthis morning was all about it
Um, and I can't remember thename of it now Um, but yeah,
check out the podcast.
Uh, but it's a.
(22:38):
It's a.
It's a great kind of overviewof framework of how what the
different parts of ai literacyshould be, um and how it's
called from ai literacy to aifluency, a framework yes, that's
, that's the one.
Yeah, um, and it's good, it'skind of it's, it's a framework
for you to then build kind of acurriculum on top of, like a set
(23:02):
of standards, I guess.
But yeah, I really like it, Ithink it's good.
They've really thought throughthe different elements.
So I think we can do this, andI think we can, and not treating
AI as like a subject, like, oh,we'll just leave it to computer
science.
I think AI is a context, it'snot a subject.
So we need to bring it in intodifferent, I suppose, like we
(23:27):
would.
Um, you might bring careers intoyour lessons.
You might be teaching a classon biology and plant cells, but
I think good teachers can'tcontextualize it.
They talk about the careersthat that are where this might
be useful in the real world andI think, just doing more of that
.
But now the real world is goingto involve AI.
(23:48):
Every, every job, pretty muchevery sector, is going to be
using AI.
So perfect opportunity to bring, like I was.
I was doing a workshop theother day actually using
Google's teachable machine,where you literally just show a
few images, and I think I did afox.
So I did like three images of afox, three images of a badger.
(24:09):
It learned what each one wasand then I showed it a picture
of a badger and it would.
Because it's trained itself, itsays right, that's definitely a
badger or that's definitely afox.
You could use that with plantcells, like different types of
cells, and it could be a way tobring that into the biology
class or whatever class we'redoing.
Chris Colley (24:30):
I mean forget simulations, I mean go deeper,
go higher.
I love that idea.
And, dan, just curiously, whathave been the most effective
integration of AI that you'veseen?
Maybe a couple of examples?
You could share an example ofwhere you see AI kind of heading
(24:50):
in education and supporting itwith an example that you've seen
.
Dan Fitzpatrick (24:55):
Yeah, I see, I think a lot of schools are still
very early, very early days, soit's very difficult to go right
.
There's a school over here whoare kind of like 10 years in the
future.
I just don't think we're goingto get that at the moment,
although we do see someexperimental schools.
(25:15):
So, for example, there's aschool in the United States
called Alpha Schools, and Ithink there's three or four of
them and they are usingartificial intelligence, a
platform, an AI platform forstudents to learn kind of the
core content.
They are claiming and I haven'tseen the research behind it,
(25:36):
but the headlines of theirwebsite claim that students
learn just as much in two hoursas they would in a full day of
regular school.
So it's interesting to seethere are some kind of schools
kind of going out and reallypushing themselves.
They tend to kind of they'renot state schools, they're not
(25:56):
within the system, they tend tobe independent schools.
Chris Colley (25:59):
They're always kind of pushing the limits.
Dan Fitzpatrick (26:01):
Yeah, and they've got that freedom.
They've probably got a bit ofmoney as well from investment
and so on.
Some online schools arestarting to do some really
interesting things aroundcreating AI tutors, again to
teach core content and material.
So I think that's probably kindof the radical end of this and
(26:21):
material, um.
So I think that's probably kindof the radical end of this,
right, but I think, probably onon the ground, within kind of
your regular school, uh, I Ithink it comes down again, going
back to what we were sayingabout leadership and integration
, I think it comes down to whereI see it happening really well
is a head teacher or a principalwho is passionate about giving
(26:42):
their teachers the best toolspossible, and so they get
someone like me or yourself orsomebody into their school and
go, right, can we work with you?
Can you show us how to use thesetools?
Can we work on a strategy, aplan, um, and slowly, over a
period of a year, let's, let'supskill our teachers, upskill
(27:05):
our students.
Let's let's create our policyso everyone knows where we are,
the confidence in, in, in kindof what, what's expected, and
just kind of building those,those skills level, layer by
layer.
Really it's not.
Yeah, I suppose it's not recordrocket science, it's just good
old um, how do we integratesomething?
Chris Colley (27:28):
whether that be sure like an ai competency,
almost.
You know, or you know whereyou're, you're developing skills
, and how do I prompt properly,how do I, you know, get it to go
a bit further?
Like it's, there's tons ofskills involved.
Dan Fitzpatrick (27:42):
I, I, I feel anyway yeah, no, I, I, I, 100
agree with you and I thinkprobably the major hurdle is um
that I think in a lot of schoolsand this is just from my
experience and I talk about, andI'm mainly my own experience of
schools is that ed tech hasalways kind of been treated as
an additional extra.
So it's like, if you find valuein it, use it, but we're not
(28:07):
going to push it on everyone,because we've got a teacher here
who's been teaching for 50years, still gets good grades
and uses a chalkboard, so we'renot going to disrupt them.
So it's kind of like yeah, ifyou want to use it, use it.
We might get a tech coach in toshow you, but you don't, it's
not, you don't have to use it.
And I think that's wheresomething like this starts to
(28:27):
become unstuck, because then youbring ai on top of that and
then the mindset of most peoplein the school is oh well, it's
just, it's just a tech thing,it's for those techie teachers
it's, and then it.
And then I suppose the the thegap becomes even wider in what
teachers are able to do and whatstudents are able to do,
between those who are using thetech, are comfortable with tech
and those who aren't.
(28:47):
So I feel like some schoolshave almost got to reverse back
10 years and go right.
Let's tackle just using adevice in a class first.
Let's tackle those.
Get the foundation in placebefore we start to put AI on top
of it.
Chris Colley (29:02):
Totally, totally.
You know I've been experiencingsmall wins.
I've kind of had that as mymindset, like let's just show
them little things, because mostof the time it's kind of seen
as the kids are going to cheat.
Using it right, it's going tomake their lives easier, they're
not going to critically thinkanymore, it's like.
But one win that I that I hadsuccess with is just
(29:23):
differentiation, because it's areally tough thing for teachers,
mainly in classrooms where youhave such a variety of students
in front of you, and justshowing them how they could
adapt reading levels was kind oflike.
So I find like if I can showone thing that they might be
like oh wow, that, that that wasfast and good and I can help
(29:44):
now jimmy, who can't read what Ihave in class.
You know, like those littlewins I find that slowly start to
, but as in everything, it'sit's like one teacher educator
at a time, right, it's system.
Change in education is, um,it's hard yeah yeah, yeah, and I
(30:06):
think you're right.
Dan Fitzpatrick (30:06):
I think it's like I don't know about yourself
, but when I do workshops, I Isometimes get a lot of people, a
lot of teachers, into thoseworkshops because their head
teacher has kind of said right,this is your, is your slot,
you're going to go along to thisquestion.
And I hear comments a lot ofthe time like, oh, I've heard
people talking about it, butuntil you actually sit that
(30:31):
teacher down in front of acomputer and you show them it,
show them that literally youjust have to type this in and
this is the type of response youstart to get, then they just
can't conceptualize it.
And I suppose it.
Yeah, I suppose, if people aretalking about this ai thing,
what's ai?
Chris Colley (30:46):
what's this new thing?
Dan Fitzpatrick (30:47):
all the time, all these new things, new flavor
of the month, um yeah, and ifworkloads are are crazy, like
they are for most teachers, thenwho's got time to start
exploring something that coulddisrupt and I'm gonna have to
change everything, adapt it allagain and yeah, well, it's an
(31:12):
interesting um, it's aninteresting life in world that
we're in education anyway.
Chris Colley (31:17):
Um, it seems to be evolving and evolving slowly,
but I mean, the stuff's thereand it's it's, it's at our
fingertips.
Now it's just kind of figuringout how can we leverage that
technology in an effectivemanner to help our kids.
I mean, because these kids aregoing to grow up with this, like
you said, everywhere.
Um, ai is not going anywhere,like the internet didn't go
(31:40):
anywhere.
Like tvs, radios, telephones,like these things exist still
today, but at the moment theyyou know when they came in it's
like tipping points, it's likewhoa, um.
Dan Fitzpatrick (31:52):
So I feel yeah, he's doing that, yeah, and I
think we it will get to thepoint.
I mean, eventually that teacherwho was a teacher at that
school for 30 years and didn'tlike tech eventually had to sit
down because the register nowwas on the computer and that's
how they had to access it, sothey had no choice.
(32:14):
I think it will get to thepoint where kind of you're not
going to have any choice but toget to grips with some of this
technology, and whether that'spainful or not is going to come
down to good leadership, I think, and I think it's a patchwork
out there at the moment in termsof good leadership around this,
but again, I don't blame thembecause there's so much buying
(32:39):
for their attention, sure.
Chris Colley (32:40):
Absolutely Totally Well.
There's so much buying fortheir attention.
Sure, absolutely Totally Well,dan, this has been a super
pleasure Like this was so fun.
I would love to have you backon, cause there's so much more.
Yeah, this is just like a partone almost A lot of things.
Dan Fitzpatrick (32:53):
Yeah, I'd love to come back on.
Thanks, chris.
Chris Colley (32:57):
Amazing.
Well, take care of yourself.
And thanks for sharing.
I will link your site and yourbooks on the post and people
check it out.
The AI educator.
Thanks, Dan.
Dan Fitzpatrick (33:11):
Thanks, Chris.
All right, welcome everyone.
Another episode of Shift Edpodcast coming to you.
I am reaching across the pond,I am pulling in the AI educator,
dan Fitzpatrick.
What we have so much to talkabout, but AI it's such a hot
topic in schools now and Dan isgoing to help us shed some light
(00:32):
Now.
Dan's an author, high school,ex high school teacher, writes
podcasts every day, speaks, andI think that he's dominated his
focus on AI these days.
Dan, thanks so much for joiningme today and, yeah, we'll AI it
.
Dan Fitzpatrick (00:51):
Yeah, thanks, chris.
I appreciate you having me andfor making this work with the
time difference and everything,it's great to be with you.
Chris Colley (00:59):
Yeah, well, thanks for joining.
It's always a pleasure to talkto insightful people, or you've
spent probably more time thanmost of us focusing, looking and
researching and playing aroundwith AI.
But, dan, before we get there,what were some of your moments
that led you here?
Like, how did you become the AIeducator?
Dan Fitzpatrick (01:20):
Yeah, I guess I remember when I was training to
be a high school teacher, Iremember I went into one we had
like it was called a skitprogram.
I'm not sure if you have themin Canada, but they kind of
train on the job.
So you start with a 60%timetable so I was teaching kind
(01:43):
of from day one and then everyFriday at the school I was at we
would have teacher trainingkind of classes and sessions.
So I remember this one Fridayit was led by one of the tech
teachers and they were talkingabout Google for Education,
essentially like kind of theearly versions of it and cloud
(02:04):
computing, and it just capturedmy imagination from that moment
because I remember thinking whyaren't we just using cloud
computing everywhere?
Like we can put studentresources on there?
Students can access them fromany device from home at any time
.
Surely this just makes senseand I suppose yeah.
So I got very excited about the, the prospect of of technology
(02:27):
enhancing uh learning and theschool experience for students.
So kind of was always anadvocate in my in my teaching
career and I moved intoleadership where I was
responsible for technologyintegration.
Then I moved into collegeeducation where I kind of moved
into a more strategic directorrole around integrating
(02:49):
technology into collegeeducation.
And it was there when I kind ofstarted playing around with
early LLMs and the technologybehind it, like a tool like
ChatGPT and kind of seeing againvery rudimentary versions of it
, but starting to see this couldhave benefits for our teachers,
especially teachers who have togive feedback on large amounts
(03:12):
of writing.
That was kind of my first kindof way in to think, right, well,
how could this help?
And then, of course, historyit's in the history books now
End of November 2022, chat gptwas released kind of changed the
course of the world, I suppose,over the last two years and the
and the.
(03:32):
The world is still kind ofreeling from it and trying to
understand it, and everybusiness is trying to understand
it.
Every school is is trying to,to some degree, understand it.
So, having a bit of knowledgeabout it, having knowledge about
technology integration inschool, I decided to start
writing about it really firstlyon social media, then in my
(03:55):
books, and it kind of allowed meto step aside from the day job
and focus on this full time and,yeah, I suppose I get to travel
the world and help schools,districts, businesses integrate
AI.
Chris Colley (04:09):
That's amazing, amazing.
And for you, like what was yourfirst reaction to when chat,
you know, opened its doors inthat, you know, cold November
day, like what were your firstimpressions when you were just
starting to muck around with ita bit?
Like what was your kind ofreaction to it all?
Yeah, I suppose I'm.
What were your firstimpressions when you were just
starting to muck around?
Dan Fitzpatrick (04:27):
with it a bit.
What was your reaction to itall?
Yeah, I suppose I'm.
I think, when it comes to thistype of thing, I'm naturally an
optimist, and so I could.
When I saw how good that firstor that early version of ChatGPT
was, I kind of thought, well,let's ask it to do some things.
I mean, it's very, very clichenow, but, like back at the end
(04:49):
of November 2022, asking ChatGPTto write a lesson plan for you
was almost monumental.
It was huge.
And just seeing that kind ofresponse from it and seeing how
and I suppose my mind, just mymind went straight to.
I remember when I was, when Iwas teaching full time and and a
(05:11):
lot of my colleagues had thisattitude as well, especially
those with ambition it was kindof like every weekend you would
say, right, one day, one day ofthat weekend's a work day.
You weren't getting paid for it,but you just knew that if you
wanted to stay ahead and at thetop of your game, you're gonna
have to dedicate at least oneday of that weekend yeah to for
(05:33):
the workload, yeah, and, and I,and I did that and I, I, I, I
threw myself into that um,especially um, earlier on in my
career and I kind of my mindstraight away thought, oh my
goodness, all that time I spentum upstairs in the in the box
room in our house, um not seeingfamily, not seeing friends, um
(05:54):
on an evening, like with mylaptop in front of the tv doing
work and getting feedback, and Ijust kind of thought I need to.
At that moment.
Nobody else was really talkingabout it, I felt especially not
in the social circles I was in,and so I just thought I need to,
I need to put things out there.
So like, yeah, it kind ofexcited me, it made me really
(06:15):
positive about, about, first andforemost, that workload element
for sure, for sure.
Chris Colley (06:21):
I I heard this um ratio 80, 20.
Um, okay, yeah, and they weresaying that AI is great at like
80% of your like school tasks,but your professional judgment
still is that 20% right, so youalways are, are kind of like
having it generate things, butat the same time, your
(06:42):
professionalism is still a partof that mix I don't know, I'd
probably flip that on its head.
Dan Fitzpatrick (06:47):
You know, I'd probably say probably your
skills and knowledge andexperience is probably the 80
percent.
Now, don't get me wrong.
I think chachupji can helpmassively.
I suppose probably like admintasks it can be right.
Chris Colley (07:02):
Yeah, more like administrate, you know, like
school is so full of those taskstoo.
Right like all of these, likeadministrative, like monotonous
work it's and there's a lot lessof like working with the kids
and like interacting in thosedevelopmental relationships.
Do you think that that chat hasan ability?
Or?
Or ai, ai I'll say AI, we'llkeep it general that it has the
(07:26):
ability to um help teachers, umum have more focus on on humans
rather than computers, eventhough we're talking about
machine learning I think it hasthat potential.
Dan Fitzpatrick (07:40):
And I use that word potential, um, because I I
see some educators who are doingit um a lot, who want, I think.
I suppose it's kind of like Iand I.
It's becoming a bit of a clichein itself now, but I always
kind of compare this to kind ofthe mid 90s of the internet and
right, um, it was a lot of hype,um, and and a lot of it
(08:03):
rightfully so, to be honest.
And people say, oh, look, whatyou can do, look at this email
thing, look at this browser, Ican search a website.
And it was very unregulated.
It was, but most people didn'tkind of get it.
I remember my parents, and Ithink it was 97, I was 11, and
we, we got a computer in ourdining.
(08:24):
I remember it was in the diningroom on like a trolley and
after a few weeks my parents, Ithink, sent it back because I
never saw it again.
Um, and I think they justcollectively came to the
decision what's the fuss?
Well, why?
And they probably I didn't comefrom a well-off family, so we
probably had it on finance.
So I think they probably justthought, yeah, let's send it
(08:46):
back and save ourselves.
And I think, unless you werereally dedicated to it in those
early days, it wasn't just kindof bit like oh well, what's,
what's, what's?
What value is it going to bring?
I don't think there's a lot ofpeople kind of like that with ai
at the moment.
So I think kind of those earlyadopters, the ones who are
really getting into it, tryingto figure out their own workflow
(09:08):
with it, and it's a bit of ait's a bit you've got to stumble
across it.
You've got to find that workswell.
If I connect, if I do somethingwith that tool and then I bring
this tool in it'll, it'llcreate a presentation deck for
me.
This isn't, and then, but you'vealmost got to kind of discover
that for yourself there's veryfew just kind of one click tools
(09:29):
, um.
So it requires a bit of upfronttime and dedication and that
which obviously not all teachers, probably very few, are going
to actually do that.
So I I can see it offering alot of value and I've heard
research stats like three hoursa week said time saved and so on
, um.
But I think I think we've stillgot a long journey to go with
(09:53):
this technology and to see itsactual potential to successfully
affect education.
I don't think it's going away.
I think it's going to be here.
I don't think we're going toget to the point where we're
like, right, we played aroundwith the AI.
Chris Colley (10:07):
We're done with that.
Now Put it away, show it.
Dan Fitzpatrick (10:12):
I think it has to be, even if some schools do
decide to restrict it and inEngland we do get a lot of
traditional schools who arebanning mobile phones and so on
it's going to be part of theworkflow of a lot of people.
Just like I forget who said itnow.
Might have been Sundar Pichai,the CEO of Google, said it's
(10:34):
more like electricity than a newtechnology, um, and that it's
just going to be part ofeverything.
So I think so.
Chris Colley (10:43):
I think the potential is there, but we've
got a long way to go to torealize that potential, I think
totally yeah, and I mean I'mdoing a lot of presentations too
about ai with with educatorsand consultants, teachers, Um,
and there's always thesemisconceptions I find, Um, and
like you're so right on, likethere's, you'll always have your
early adapters that are goingto be all over it, but that's,
(11:06):
that's a small minority, I find,of the overall kind of, and
oftentimes I get a lot ofmisconceptions about what it is
and what it can do, and it'smore of a fear than an embracing
of right.
But again, your your analogybetween the internet, like it
really reinforces that.
I mean, can you imagine lifewithout the internet right now?
(11:28):
I mean none of this, we'd bedoing none of this right, I'd
never be able to talk with you.
You know we just so.
We're so used to this now,because it's been around for so
long.
Do you think that themisconceptions that teachers
have will fade away eventuallyand blossom in, or do you think
that it's something that willnever be fully integrated within
(11:50):
the educational system?
Dan Fitzpatrick (11:53):
I've got a feeling that linger for for
quite a while.
I think, um, hopefully, as thetechnology develops and
technology companies um come upwith more solutions, especially
around ethics and privacy andand all of that kind of thing,
it'll it'll quell a lot of fears, hopefully.
And again, like I remember, Iused to give a presentation
years ago where the first I wishI could find the slide deck
(12:16):
because I'd love to use it againbut the first few slides were
quotes about technology, and itwas like the first quote was
like something like this newtechnology is invading our homes
and taking our children'sattention, and the whole idea is
you say to the audience, whatis this talking about?
And they normally say somethinglike it's the internet or it's
(12:37):
a cell phone, and and then youreveal that actually they're
talking about the, the telephone, and it's like a quote from 80
years ago or something.
So you find these featurestotally technology throughout
the ages and then it becomeskind of part of life.
But I do think I I mean, look,today we still it's 30 years, I
suppose, since the internetstarted to become very
(13:00):
mainstream and we still have alot of caution around it in
education, not everywhere.
Some schools are one-to-onedevice.
They are doing it in a healthyway and in an impactful way.
But again, I come back to theenglish system where, where I'm
based, and, um, there's stillmany, many schools who are who.
(13:21):
The only technology in aclassroom is is the 10 year old
pc at the front of the roomwhich the teacher does their
register on and and and pulls uptheir powerpoint.
So and that's 30 years later.
So I I still think we're stillgoing to be talking about the
ethics of this, the there'sstill going to be research being
(13:42):
done in 20 years time, and thatmakes us think twice.
But like around social medianow and so on, um, but I suppose
, coming back to what we saidbefore, it isn't going to go
away.
So we we have to find a way tomake sure that our students, um
are living in this world in asafe way and in a way where they
have the skills for it tobenefit them and not harm them.
Chris Colley (14:04):
I guess right, right and in your latest book,
infinite education um, youpresent this four-step blueprint
for educator educationaltransformation.
Could you give us a littleinsight or a little preview into
into what you explore withinthose four steps?
Dan Fitzpatrick (14:22):
yeah, absolutely so.
Um, the the four steps arescope, so it's a very practical.
It could be applied to so manydifferent things, but it's about
how do you?
How do you make change happenwithin an organization?
Essentially and I've kind ofplugged my eye into that okay,
it's a lot of things I learnedwhen I was, um, a director
(14:43):
within college education and alot of things I was taught from,
from my colleagues, on how tokind of make change happen
within a on at an executivelevel.
It was quite a big collegegroup that had an executive team
and so on, so I kind of adapteda lot of that.
So, yeah, it was sort of scope,kind of being able to survey
what's going on within yourschool, what teachers are using
(15:06):
and so on, what's going onoutside the school, what the
trends are.
Then it's shape.
So how do you start to shapethe message, the strategy, the
plan of where you want to gowith this?
Then the next one I think a lotof actually a lot of
organizations kind of stop there.
They look around, they go right, can you write a strategy on
(15:26):
this?
Somebody writes the strategy,they save it as a PDF and it
goes on the website and getssent to parents and governors
Check the box.
Yeah, yeah, and it's referredto every now and then.
But I think that's kind of stepone really.
Well, step one and two withinthis framework, but it's kind of
the first.
It's almost the least importantbit in a way, because for me the
(15:50):
second two bits, which areinfluence and alignment, I think
are so important and that kindof it's a strategy skill that
goes way beyond just being ableto write a strategy.
I suppose it's a bit like andI've just come up with this
analogy off the top of my head,I've never used it before, but
(16:11):
it's coming to my mind it's abit like being able to draw a
car and being able to drive acar like, I suppose every you
could ask it.
You could ask a four-year-oldto draw a car, asking the driver
cause something very, verydifferent.
And I think I think the drivingthe car bit is the how do you,
how do you realize that strategy, how do you manifest it?
(16:32):
And that essentially comes downto what we've kind of
traditionally called changemanagement, being able to
influence the people in ourorganization and then being able
to align them, and I thinkthat's kind of where elite
leadership comes in um, but butI do think that those are skills
that anybody can learn, um, andit's just practicing those
(16:54):
skills.
So the kind of the second halfof the book is goes through each
of those four steps and it Ikind of preface it by saying
right, you've got to get a grouptogether.
I call it an accelerator group,whether that be a group in your
school or a, a regional group,um, or or kind of a
multi-faceted community group soyou can have parents, teachers,
(17:15):
students, local government,whatever it is.
And then I put I've got a lotof tasks.
And it's a bit like a playbookreally, the second half of the
book, where I go right, whatabout this task in terms of um
influence, and I bring inpsychology and um and so on to
try and just give people a bitof a toolkit to get on that road
(17:38):
with who maybe have never doneit before.
Chris Colley (17:42):
Absolutely Well.
I think it's importantinformation for school leaders
to have access to and tounderstand, because the
acceleration of AI is notslowing down at all.
We are seeing almost daily.
I mean, I love your dailypodcast where you kind of
isolate on one little topic, butI mean you have enough to talk
(18:04):
about something every single day, which is amazing.
I love the little clippets.
I encourage listeners to go andlisten to the AI Educator
podcast, to the AI Educatorpodcast.
So with education, we have AItoo, and I know that you've been
asked this question beforeabout the age factor, about
using AI, and we're kind ofbattling with that here in
(18:26):
Quebec, canada, where theplatforms are putting age
restrictions on.
Yet we want to make sure ourkids understand this.
How do you recommend thatteachers in schools, you know
elementary through high school?
I mean I guess some platformsare 13 now 14, 16, they're
around those age range, but weneed to start early right.
(18:50):
Like I always felt that wemissed the train on social media
, you know of training, of nottraining the kids but creating
an awareness of you know,digital citizenship free and all
of that stuff, Kind of likeeveryone was responsible for it
but nobody really touched on it.
Because what does that have todo with English or math or
(19:11):
science, you know, like oursubjects?
Yeah, how do you find thatwe're going to integrate AI with
these age restrictions that arein place?
Dan Fitzpatrick (19:26):
Yeah, I think probably, first of all, I think
it's good to look at it in kindof two categories.
So there's teaching about AIand then there's teaching kind
of with AI, and I suppose weprobably need to do both and I
suppose the first, the firstpart of that, the teaching about
AI, doesn't you don'tnecessarily have to give, give
(19:48):
your elementary children thetools you can demonstrate things
for them, you can do kind ofindirect activities that that
get across the point of howthese things work.
There are some tools out there.
They're quite older tools now,but things like Google have got
a tool called Teachable Machineand what's it called?
(20:12):
Draw, sketch, draw, somethinglike that.
Chris Colley (20:14):
Yeah, sketch it.
Yeah, we played with that withsome kids.
Dan Fitzpatrick (20:18):
Yeah, yeah, where you, we played with that,
with some kids.
Chris Colley (20:19):
Yeah, I find that that's a great platform too,
because it shows you how it, howit learned.
You know how it decides what itmight be.
Dan Fitzpatrick (20:26):
You that, what you're drawing with the model,
like there's tons of data, andyou're like, oh cool yeah, and
it's engaging the way it talkslike a a very kind of um early
voice on their AI voice, whichis quite funny yeah hilarious.
Chris Colley (20:41):
It's a cat, it's a dog, it's a horse, it's a yeah,
so I think things like thatreally help.
Dan Fitzpatrick (20:49):
I think then, the second part of that how do
you use the AI?
Yeah, I suppose it's going todepend on the region, like what
your school policy is, what thepolicy is from local government
and so on.
But we're starting to see I was, I I had, I had the privilege
of being at google hq in sanfrancisco last week and I was
(21:11):
talking with the education teamand, um, I didn't realize this,
but they, they've rolled outgemini for for ages now.
So if you are within GoogleWorkspace and you think you
might have to pay a higher tierfor Gemini, but your students
can use it Not the full array oftools, and maybe not the Gemini
(21:34):
tool within certain apps, butthe raw form of Gemini students
can use it.
So I think we are starting tosee now that that those some
companies, especially the moreestablished companies, the more
giving us the a bit ofconfidence that, um, that, uh,
they can be used.
(21:54):
And also some third party, somethird-party apps um, school AI,
magic, school brisk, kind ofoffering um chat bots that the
teacher can train and and sharethe link with students.
Uh, some of it's still a grayarea, um.
I think that's why you've gotto kind of check just with your
school.
So my team managers are happysome on to kind of because it
(22:18):
goes in in that gray area.
But I think there are ways andI think we're starting to see a
lot of AI um literacycurriculums be be created.
There was one factor my podcastthis morning was all about it
Um, and I can't remember thename of it now Um, but yeah,
check out the podcast.
Uh, but it's a.
(22:38):
It's a.
It's a great kind of overviewof framework of how what the
different parts of ai literacyshould be, um and how it's
called from ai literacy to aifluency, a framework yes, that's
, that's the one.
Yeah, um, and it's good, it'skind of it's, it's a framework
for you to then build kind of acurriculum on top of, like a set
(23:02):
of standards, I guess.
But yeah, I really like it, Ithink it's good.
They've really thought throughthe different elements.
So I think we can do this, andI think we can, and not treating
AI as like a subject, like, oh,we'll just leave it to computer
science.
I think AI is a context, it'snot a subject.
So we need to bring it in intodifferent, I suppose, like we
(23:27):
would.
Um, you might bring careers intoyour lessons.
You might be teaching a classon biology and plant cells, but
I think good teachers can'tcontextualize it.
They talk about the careersthat that are where this might
be useful in the real world andI think, just doing more of that
.
But now the real world is goingto involve AI.
(23:48):
Every, every job, pretty muchevery sector, is going to be
using AI.
So perfect opportunity to bring, like I was.
I was doing a workshop theother day actually using
Google's teachable machine,where you literally just show a
few images, and I think I did afox.
So I did like three images of afox, three images of a badger.
(24:09):
It learned what each one wasand then I showed it a picture
of a badger and it would.
Because it's trained itself, itsays right, that's definitely a
badger or that's definitely afox.
You could use that with plantcells, like different types of
cells, and it could be a way tobring that into the biology
class or whatever class we'redoing.
Chris Colley (24:30):
I mean forget simulations, I mean go deeper,
go higher.
I love that idea.
And, dan, just curiously, whathave been the most effective
integration of AI that you'veseen?
Maybe a couple of examples?
You could share an example ofwhere you see AI kind of heading
(24:50):
in education and supporting itwith an example that you've seen
.
Dan Fitzpatrick (24:55):
Yeah, I see, I think a lot of schools are still
very early, very early days, soit's very difficult to go right
.
There's a school over here whoare kind of like 10 years in the
future.
I just don't think we're goingto get that at the moment,
although we do see someexperimental schools.
(25:15):
So, for example, there's aschool in the United States
called Alpha Schools, and Ithink there's three or four of
them and they are usingartificial intelligence, a
platform, an AI platform forstudents to learn kind of the
core content.
They are claiming and I haven'tseen the research behind it,
(25:36):
but the headlines of theirwebsite claim that students
learn just as much in two hoursas they would in a full day of
regular school.
So it's interesting to seethere are some kind of schools
kind of going out and reallypushing themselves.
They tend to kind of they'renot state schools, they're not
(25:56):
within the system, they tend tobe independent schools.
Chris Colley (25:59):
They're always kind of pushing the limits.
Dan Fitzpatrick (26:01):
Yeah, and they've got that freedom.
They've probably got a bit ofmoney as well from investment
and so on.
Some online schools arestarting to do some really
interesting things aroundcreating AI tutors, again to
teach core content and material.
So I think that's probably kindof the radical end of this and
(26:21):
material, um.
So I think that's probably kindof the radical end of this,
right, but I think, probably onon the ground, within kind of
your regular school, uh, I Ithink it comes down again, going
back to what we were sayingabout leadership and integration
, I think it comes down to whereI see it happening really well
is a head teacher or a principalwho is passionate about giving
(26:42):
their teachers the best toolspossible, and so they get
someone like me or yourself orsomebody into their school and
go, right, can we work with you?
Can you show us how to use thesetools?
Can we work on a strategy, aplan, um, and slowly, over a
period of a year, let's, let'supskill our teachers, upskill
(27:05):
our students.
Let's let's create our policyso everyone knows where we are,
the confidence in, in, in kindof what, what's expected, and
just kind of building those,those skills level, layer by
layer.
Really it's not.
Yeah, I suppose it's not recordrocket science, it's just good
old um, how do we integratesomething?
Chris Colley (27:28):
whether that be sure like an ai competency,
almost.
You know, or you know whereyou're, you're developing skills
, and how do I prompt properly,how do I, you know, get it to go
a bit further?
Like it's, there's tons ofskills involved.
Dan Fitzpatrick (27:42):
I, I, I feel anyway yeah, no, I, I, I, 100
agree with you and I thinkprobably the major hurdle is um
that I think in a lot of schoolsand this is just from my
experience and I talk about, andI'm mainly my own experience of
schools is that ed tech hasalways kind of been treated as
an additional extra.
So it's like, if you find valuein it, use it, but we're not
(28:07):
going to push it on everyone,because we've got a teacher here
who's been teaching for 50years, still gets good grades
and uses a chalkboard, so we'renot going to disrupt them.
So it's kind of like yeah, ifyou want to use it, use it.
We might get a tech coach in toshow you, but you don't, it's
not, you don't have to use it.
And I think that's wheresomething like this starts to
(28:27):
become unstuck, because then youbring ai on top of that and
then the mindset of most peoplein the school is oh well, it's
just, it's just a tech thing,it's for those techie teachers
it's, and then it.
And then I suppose the the thegap becomes even wider in what
teachers are able to do and whatstudents are able to do,
between those who are using thetech, are comfortable with tech
and those who aren't.
(28:47):
So I feel like some schoolshave almost got to reverse back
10 years and go right.
Let's tackle just using adevice in a class first.
Let's tackle those.
Get the foundation in placebefore we start to put AI on top
of it.
Chris Colley (29:02):
Totally, totally.
You know I've been experiencingsmall wins.
I've kind of had that as mymindset, like let's just show
them little things, because mostof the time it's kind of seen
as the kids are going to cheat.
Using it right, it's going tomake their lives easier, they're
not going to critically thinkanymore, it's like.
But one win that I that I hadsuccess with is just
(29:23):
differentiation, because it's areally tough thing for teachers,
mainly in classrooms where youhave such a variety of students
in front of you, and justshowing them how they could
adapt reading levels was kind oflike.
So I find like if I can showone thing that they might be
like oh wow, that, that that wasfast and good and I can help
(29:44):
now jimmy, who can't read what Ihave in class.
You know, like those littlewins I find that slowly start to
, but as in everything, it'sit's like one teacher educator
at a time, right, it's system.
Change in education is, um,it's hard yeah yeah, yeah, and I
(30:06):
think you're right.
Dan Fitzpatrick (30:06):
I think it's like I don't know about yourself
, but when I do workshops, I Isometimes get a lot of people, a
lot of teachers, into thoseworkshops because their head
teacher has kind of said right,this is your, is your slot,
you're going to go along to thisquestion.
And I hear comments a lot ofthe time like, oh, I've heard
people talking about it, butuntil you actually sit that
(30:31):
teacher down in front of acomputer and you show them it,
show them that literally youjust have to type this in and
this is the type of response youstart to get, then they just
can't conceptualize it.
And I suppose it.
Yeah, I suppose, if people aretalking about this ai thing,
what's ai?
Chris Colley (30:46):
what's this new thing?
Dan Fitzpatrick (30:47):
all the time, all these new things, new flavor
of the month, um yeah, and ifworkloads are are crazy, like
they are for most teachers, thenwho's got time to start
exploring something that coulddisrupt and I'm gonna have to
change everything, adapt it allagain and yeah, well, it's an
(31:12):
interesting um, it's aninteresting life in world that
we're in education anyway.
Chris Colley (31:17):
Um, it seems to be evolving and evolving slowly,
but I mean, the stuff's thereand it's it's, it's at our
fingertips.
Now it's just kind of figuringout how can we leverage that
technology in an effectivemanner to help our kids.
I mean, because these kids aregoing to grow up with this, like
you said, everywhere.
Um, ai is not going anywhere,like the internet didn't go
(31:40):
anywhere.
Like tvs, radios, telephones,like these things exist still
today, but at the moment theyyou know when they came in it's
like tipping points, it's likewhoa, um.
Dan Fitzpatrick (31:52):
So I feel yeah, he's doing that, yeah, and I
think we it will get to thepoint.
I mean, eventually that teacherwho was a teacher at that
school for 30 years and didn'tlike tech eventually had to sit
down because the register nowwas on the computer and that's
how they had to access it, sothey had no choice.
(32:14):
I think it will get to thepoint where kind of you're not
going to have any choice but toget to grips with some of this
technology, and whether that'spainful or not is going to come
down to good leadership, I think, and I think it's a patchwork
out there at the moment in termsof good leadership around this,
but again, I don't blame thembecause there's so much buying
(32:39):
for their attention, sure.
Chris Colley (32:40):
Absolutely Totally Well.
There's so much buying fortheir attention.
Sure, absolutely Totally Well,dan, this has been a super
pleasure Like this was so fun.
I would love to have you backon, cause there's so much more.
Yeah, this is just like a partone almost A lot of things.
Dan Fitzpatrick (32:53):
Yeah, I'd love to come back on.
Thanks, chris.
Chris Colley (32:57):
Amazing.
Well, take care of yourself.
And thanks for sharing.
I will link your site and yourbooks on the post and people
check it out.
The AI educator.
Thanks, Dan.
Dan Fitzpatrick (33:11):
Thanks, Chris.
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