According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), AI literacy is now a must-have in education as the technology both advances and proliferates quickly throughout organisations worldwide.
LinkedIn’s 2025 Skills on the Rise report revealed that AI literacy is Australia’s most sought-after skill, highlighting a dramatic surge in demand that has reshaped hiring trends nationwide.
With a 240% jump in AI-related hires nationwide since 2016 and soft skills such as communication, strategic thinking, and adaptability becoming indispensable, schools face a pivotal challenge: equipping students with both the technical know-how and human-centric skills necessary to thrive in an AI-driven workforce.
The good news for Australian schools is that our teachers are already among the highest users of AI.
The OECD’s latest Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) shows about two thirds (66%) of Australia’s lower secondary teachers reported using AI in the past year, ranking Australia as the fourth highest country within the OECD, and far above the OECD average of 36%.
How are Australian teachers using AI?
Of Australian teachers who used AI, the most common purposes were brainstorming lesson plans and learning about and summarising content. This was happening for 71% of Australian teachers who used AI.
Australian teachers were unlikely to use AI to review data on student performance (9% of those who use AI, compared to 28% across the OECD) and to assess student work (15%, compared to 30% across the OECD).
In an article published in The Conversation, Professor Robin Shields, who is the Head of the School of Education at the University of Queensland, said teachers are embracing AI but remain cautious due to privacy concerns and the need for professional judgement.
“Australian teachers are global leaders in their use of AI, but much work needs to be done to improve teachers’ wellbeing at work,” Professor Shields wrote.
“Sustaining the teaching profession and the quality of teachers’ work is a key national priority, more careful analysis of these results can help guide this work.”
Can AI improve learning?
In a recent op-ed, Professor Claire Wyatt-Smith, of Wyatt-Smith Education Solutions and Dr Megan Kimber of Australian Catholic University’s Institute for Learning Sciences and Teacher Education, said that for teachers to harness AI, they must be literate, ethical, and creative in how they plan, teach, and assess.
“They need to be data literate, taking advantage of AI tools to monitor student learning over time to better see what they need to teach next,” Professor Wyatt-Smith and Dr Kimber wrote.
“Beyond this, teachers can share valuable learning data through longitudinal monitoring and Individual Digital Learning Histories. Teachers can use AI to improve education, but only when they are AI-literate and human-centredness remains fundamental to schooling.”
How to develop AI skills
While a big focus for schools has been on equipping young people with the skills to thrive in the AI-driven workforce, one expert says students do not need an IT degree to effectively use and understand this technology.
To become AI literate, Macquarie Business School Associate Professor Mauricio Marrone said students and parents need technical understanding (how AI works, its capabilities and limitations), practical skills (the ability to use AI tools) and ethical awareness (an understanding of the societal implications and ethical considerations of AI).
“Students and parents should seek out AI tools such a ChatGPT [Open AI], Gemini [Google] and Copilot [Microsoft] for text generation. Try Midjourney, DALL-E [Open AI] and Stable Diffusion for image creation,” Professor Marrone said.
“Understand them by experimenting with different prompts, reading platform documentation and completely introductory tutorials available on these platforms.”
Professor Marrone said AI literacy should be viewed as a complementary skill that enhances one’s primary discipline, rather than replacing it.
“Students in history, economics, and other disciplines should develop AI literacy skills that are relevant to their fields. AI literacy is becoming fundamental, regardless of one’s specialisation, much like digital literacy.”