Teacher Tech Tools: Copilot
Cut hours out of your prep time by using this tool
Summary
This is part of a recurring series where I review/introduce different AI-based tools for teachers
Copilot has a robust set of features the include generating: lesson/unit plans, quizzes, handouts, and more
What is Copilot and what can it do?
Copilot is an AI-driven tool designed to help teachers with everything from lesson planning to worksheet generation. The image below shows all of the current features, with more being added over time. They’ve added multiple new features since I made my free account in March.
What are the use cases?
Copilot functions very similarly to ChatGPT and other generative AI, you type what you want and voila. Just like with ChatGPT, the specificity of prompts will play a large part in determining the quality of the output. Copilot does have some built in features that make it easier to outline what you’re looking for as seen below.
Here are the questions from one slide of the PowerPoint created, always if you’d like to see the entire Powerpoint you can subscribe for free and receive a link to Google Drive with this file and many more.
- What are the potential benefits of voluntourism?
- What are the potential negative impacts of voluntourism?
- How can we ensure that we are participating in voluntourism responsibly?
- How can we ensure that we are making a meaningful contribution to the project?
As you can see the questions aren’t groundbreaking in their depth but they help demonstrate the use case for the current iteration of Copilot— as a starting place to build upon and refine. It’s also worth noting that the PowerPoint isn’t formatted in a visually appealing way, but that’s an easy fix.
One of the best use cases for the site as it stands right now is for outlining a new unit. For example, I’m ending the school year with a research/presentation unit on ethical worldviews which is a topic I haven’t covered before. Copilot has been helpful in providing be the building blocks for the unit. Here are screenshots of the unit outline Copilot generated and a closer look at one of the day plans.
As you can see, Copilot generated a solid outline for a 15 day unit and if you click into individual days you can use the provided tools to create plans and materials.
Closing Thoughts
Copilot is a solid tool for giving you the building blocks to improve upon
The free trial limits you to 5 documents though it’s unclear if it considers the unit plans as documents since I’ve created much more than 5.
Have you used Copilot or similar tools? What did you think about it?