A recent analysis from Stanford University looked at more than 150,000 prompts from more than 4,400 K-12 teachers interacting with AI. The research provides a rare look at how teachers are actually using AI in practice, and most of these uses are fairly positive.
Teachers, the research suggests, are generally using the tool to help them build curriculum content and as a sounding board, all with an eye toward better helping students.
The research was conducted in partnership with SchoolAI, an AI-powered educational platform. Though it was based on data from Fall 2024, it still provides a compelling snapshot of how, where, and when many students are turning to AI.
Cynthia Chiong, Principal Research Scientist at SchoolAI, recently shared some of the highlights of the research with me.
1. Ways Teachers Are Using AI: More Than 40% of Teacher Prompts Focus On Curriculum
Chiong says this is a good sign, as it suggests teachers are using the tool to explain learning and not just automate tasks. In separate conversations with educators, she has found that many of these efforts are geared toward personalizing learning for students.
“For example, these three students here really want to focus on the sun,” she says. “While these other students are struggling with something else or are interested in another topic.”
Chiong says that for a lot of teachers, being able to meet all these students where they are is the biggest draw of using AI.
2. AI As A Sounding Board
The research found that about 1 in 7 prompts involved a teacher reflecting or processing without making a specific request. This includes sharing a frustration, thinking through a challenge, or working something out.
Chiong says that these types of conversations and others teachers had with AI show that it’s an active process for educators. They might start with a question such as, “’How might I assess this math project that we’ve been working on?’ but then they immediately go to a next thread of, ‘Okay, now, how do I put this back into a lesson to teach?’” she says.
Chiong adds, “So it’s not like a one-and-done, but they’re really thinking through the trajectory of learning for their students, and that was really cool to see.”
3. More Than 50% of Prompts Ask It To Generate Materials Such as Lesson Plans, Assessments, or Feedback
Teachers obviously find AI helpful when it comes to generating class material, but Chiong suggests that the data also shows teachers are not just plugging in a prompt and settling for the first output.
“The teachers are really driving the content,” she says. “It’s not that the AI is like, ‘Oh, here is a lesson, this is how you should teach it.’ But rather a teacher is saying, ‘Hey, I really want to teach something about evolution or whatever,’ and that idea of how to teach it is still coming from that teacher entering that prompt.”
4. Half of Teacher AI conversations Include Fewer Than 10 Prompts
Teachers, by and large, are keeping their conversations with AI short, sweet, and to the point.
“They have a good sense of what they want to teach, and they have the curriculum already,” Chiong says. “So it’s more a matter of translating what they already do into this new AI platform, and so it shouldn’t take all that much time, and it is meant as more of a time saver and not a time taker.”