Best 5 AI Tools for Schools: Practical Ideas for Teachers and Students
Many schools rely on classroom AI policies that prohibit students from using AI to complete assignments. But this doesn’t always work: students still use AI, forcing educators into a cat-and-mouse game where they try to catch students using it, all while dealing with a greater volume of machine-generated student submissions.
Instead of preventing students from using AI altogether, some leading universities are moving towards a regulation-of-use framework. This framework lets students use AI as a learning support rather than a shortcut.
By going over and making use of the best AI tools for schools - tools that support verification, accessibility, and active recall - schools can enhance their student’s learning while protecting the academic standards they depend upon.
1. AI Detection: Pangram
Pangram - AI Detector for Schools
Pangram is an AI detection tool that can identify human- and AI-written text within a document. Being able to perform this verification allows Pangram to serve as a diagnostic layer for AI usage in schools and the academic integrity of its usage.
Pangram can detect:
- Original writing.
- Original writing that has been supplemented with AI-assisted edits.
- Fully AI-generated text.
Here is one example: if you think a student wrote most of an essay, but used AI to write one large part of it, you can put it into Pangram. This will let you see which parts were AI-generated/edited, and which parts the student wrote.
Pangram was developed by researchers from Stanford, Tesla, and Google, and built on millions of documents in order to pick up on subtle linguistic nuances.
Pangram’s key features:
- An industry-leading 99.98% accuracy rate when it comes to detecting AI content.
- The ability to catch all major LLMs, including ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, etc
- A near-zero false positive AI detection rate of 0.01% (1 in 10,000).
You can use Pangram with Canvas and Google Classroom, on account of their native integration. This way, instead of putting content into Pangram to view AI likelihood scores, you can view these scores within Canvas or Google Classroom.
2. Audio Companion: Speechify
Speechify - Enhance Study Materials
Speechify is an audio companion that takes dense educational text and turns it into high-quality audio that students can listen to instead of reading.
If some of your students have difficulties engaging with written text, Speechify can make it much easier for them to engage with a particular text in a format that works for them.
Educators can use Speechify to review written material on the go, in an audio format. This can help them present written material to the class and address complex ideas within it.
Many of the uses of AI for those working in education center on student learning. Speechify can help parents, too, by turning school policies and newsletters into audio content they can listen to.
Speechify encourages multimodal support by letting students generate and process content in a multitude of text-based forms. This lets them engage with this content in a way that suits their learning style.
3. Multi-Format Learning: NotebookLM
NotebookLM - Understand Anything
NotebookLM lets users compile complex topics into a single digital notebook that, when interacted with, can generate companion audio, mind maps, and video overviews.
By generating content from complex topics, students can synthesize information in a way that resonates with their unique learning style.
To help their students, a teacher can upload a semester’s worth of reading materials into NotebookLM and have it create a custom AI “team member” - or chatbot - that students can query for evidence-based answers.
Using NotebookLM allows students to organize their thoughts before they begin drafting an assignment. This supports the “try-first” principle and can help students produce better-quality work.
4. Gamified Recall: StudyAnything
StudyAnything - Interactive Quizzes
StudyAnything is a free application that can turn dense study materials - complex essays or textbooks, for example - into gamified quizzes that feel a lot like video games. By engaging with these quizzes, your students can leverage active recall and, in doing so, retain what they are learning with greater ease.
Teachers, professors, and administrators can use StudyAnything’s generative AI in education. Examples of this include encouraging students to use StudyAnything to create their own practice tests for a specific topic they are learning about. This can turn a passive reading assignment into an interactive challenge that your students help create, enjoy going through, and learn from.
Instead of using AI purely for generation - writing the answer - students can use AI for reflection - testing their understanding. This upends the pedagogical conceit of most AI tools and can help students retain the information they are learning.
5. Personal Tutor: Ask Sia
AskSia - AI Study Copilot
Ask Sia acts as a comprehensive study companion that lets students transcribe lectures and, for further engagement with a topic, upload reading assignments. Uploading assignments lets students create structured notes tailored to their needs and allows them to produce an overview of the key takeaways from those assignments.
Here is one example of the above: students can “Ask Sia” about their class notes in order to find specific themes within those notes. Finding these themes can help them prepare for exams, all while keeping their unique perspective on those themes at the center of their research.
In direct contrast to a number of other student study tools that rely on AI, Ask Sia facilitates metacognitive reflections that prompt students to be more self-aware about their writing and research processes, as opposed to just giving students the answer to their queries.
AI Can Enhance Learning Instead of Replacing It
The features found in the five best AI tools for schools serve as AI for teachers and administrators, as well as the students they support. AI is about more than generating a final product; it can help students absorb and recall information.
These days, AI in the classroom is no longer a question of “If,” but “How.” By combining robust verification tools, such as Pangram, with the active learning assistants listed earlier, schools can foster a success mindset in their students that helps them learn, grow, and achieve their educational goals.
To ensure that your students use AI in a way that facilitates learning, instead of just “completing the assignment to get the grade,” you can develop a well-structured policy that is paired with the right tools. This helps ensure that AI remains a learning support, as opposed to a shortcut to a final grade.
Set clear boundaries and protect academic integrity with the market’s most accurate AI detector.
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