The Future of Social Studies: How AI & Technology Are Changing the Way We Teach

Kirsten 0:00

This is the social studies teacher podcast, a show for busy elementary teachers looking for fun and engaging ways to easily add social studies into their classroom schedule without feeling overwhelmed or pressed for time. I'm Kirsten at the southern teach, an educator and mom who is passionate about all things social studies. I love sharing ideas and strategies that are low prep and easy to implement. So let's dive in together.

Kirsten 0:46

Hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of the social studies teacher podcast. Today, we are going to be diving into a very fascinating topic that has shaped the future of education, and that is AI - Artificial Intelligence and technology in the classroom, in elementary school, social studies, all the subjects, it revolutionized how we are teaching today and how we may be teaching in the future. With advancements in artificial intelligence and ed tech tools, the way we plan and teach social studies is evolving faster than ever. Whether you're looking for ways to streamline lesson planning or you're looking for ways to engage students with interactive resources, bring history to life in different ways, today's episode will introduce you to the power of AI and technology in the social studies classroom. So in this episode, I'm going to explain what AI is, how it has evolved, just even within the last few years, and then I'm going to be walking you through the incredible tools that I totally recommend that you can use to enhance your teaching for social studies and really, just any subject in general. So let's jump in.

Kirsten 1:59

Before we get into the practical ways to use AI in social studies, let's talk a little bit about what AI actually is. So AI, also known as artificial intelligence, refers to technology that can perform tasks that are typically requiring human intelligences, such as analyzing information, problem solving, and even generating texts, images, or speech. In everyday life, AI powers tools like Google search and Alexa and Siri and even Netflix recommendations. And in education, AI is evolving to help teachers personalize learning, automate tasks, and create engaging content with less time. That's the crazy part, but it's so cool and so helpful.

Kirsten 2:51

Now let's talk a little bit about how AI has evolved in the classroom. If you remember a decade ago, back feels like in the Stone Age, technology in education mainly involved smart boards, that was a really big thing, digital textbooks, basic online quizzes. But you also had, you know, maybe in a classroom there might be one device or one computer, two computers, or maybe an iPad, and you can utilize websites with applications, ed tech there. But now we've got aI powered lesson planning, chat bots that can tutor students, and even virtual reality field trips that'll take students back in time. So the key takeaway about this is that AI is not here to replace teachers or educators. It is here to support us by making tasks easier, and it frees up time, and it also can enhance student learning experiences.

Kirsten 3:50

So I am going to share with you eight different AI tools that can make social studies planning easier for you and more dynamic. So you may or may not have heard of these, some are very commonly known, some may not be commonly known. I know there were a couple of these that are on the list that I previously heard of at a PD for teachers, and I thought that, like I tried it out, and I'm like this is amazing, this is really cool. And a few of them I've researched on my own and have kind of played around with it, but not 100% familiar with it, but it definitely has a lot of potential. But I'm going to start with the two that I use a lot and I love. I've used it for at least a couple of years.

Kirsten 4:36

So the first one is Chat GPT, this is the like, you know, the big honcho. This is a platform where you can generate lesson ideas and brainstorm lesson ideas, discussion questions, or even full lesson plans or units based on a topic. So for example, you can say something like create a five day unit on the American Revolution with engaging activities. You could even specify, I want this for fifth grade students living in Texas. You could copy and paste your standards related to the different lessons you want to teach, and it will come up with a pretty good suggested five day lesson plan. Now it's not perfect, that's why it's always, kind of always brainstorming part. It's great at helping me with that and giving you some ideas. And you are always, always, always encouraged to tweak and make it your own and then use it with your students, and if you want to even ask it to generate some example questions or guided questions that you want to ask your students during a group led discussion, you could always do that as well. There are free and paid versions of Chat GPT, free is a little bit more limited in the amount of input you can put in. There's like, a set amount that it'll stop at. It's like, oh, we're capped. We need to wait until tomorrow. But paid versions, you can get away with a good amount of input and output. And it, I feel like, because it's saving your information, especially if you have an account, it has better models, and it just does better as far as output, it kind of really thinks about, you know, your tone and what you've already prompted chat GPT, because it'll remember a lot of the things you tell it. So that's always just something to keep in mind. Definitely make an account. I recommend that so that it can remember what you are putting in, and you know, you'll get better output as time goes on.

Kirsten 6:38

The second AI tool I recommend is eduaid.ai so this is specifically education focused. Chat GPT is kind of like the Wild West. You can put in anything. You can ask it, please write me a Easter greeting or please write me a nice Mother's Day letter, or whatever it is. It's basically very broad in that you can literally ask it anything. You could ask it about what you want to plan for dinner. You have a list of ingredients, and you can basically tell it to make you a meal plan, recipe suggestions for your picky eaters, or whatever it might be. I digress. Eduaid is specifically focused on teaching education. This is something where you can generate a variety of lesson plans and activities and projects based on a specific topic or standard. I love that it's kind of bucketed in. You can specify the subject that you're teaching. You can specify the grade level you're teaching, and they give you all kinds of ideas. They give you, you know, essential questions and quizzes and even like scripts for direct instruction. There's all kinds of tools you can use throughout the process, whether it's the planning processm or the actual lesson that you're teaching to students, or what they do after the lesson, for guided or independent practices, and then for checking for understanding or assessments. So definitely check that out. I think there is a free version, or at least a free trial, that you can explore, and I think you can even customize parent letters. So it's all specifically related to education. It does use chat GPT models. So chat GPT is kind of embedded in there, but they kind of have their own little formula that specifically will output focused education related information.

Kirsten 8:37

All right. Number three is kind of related to eduaid.ai and you might have heard of this, I think more teachers have used this more is Magic School AI. This is similar because it's specifically education based, and this is just another great tool that you can use to help generate your lesson plans and rubrics and parent emails as well. So you could even test it out. Try both eduaid and magic school. See which one you like better. I think I like magic school because of their cute little icons, but I mean, Eduaid is like, really my favorite out of the two, and you can always decide which one is best for you based on what you are looking for and wanting to get out of it.

Kirsten 9:18

All right, number four quizzizz, and Kahoot now have AI generated quizzes. So both of these have been around before we really gotten into AI, and they've been super useful. I've used quizziz. We used to do wordly wise vocabulary quizzes, and they always had flash cards and all of that good stuff. And then, of course, Kahoot, I have a blog post written all about it from five years ago, so it's something that we really enjoyed, but now these platforms allow you to auto generate quizzes on any social studies topic, or really any topic, in seconds. So it kind of makes review sessions more interactive. I think some of them might be in beta mode, but a lot of ed tech companies have started to add an AI component to what they already have to kind of beef it up. So you'll see a common website might have some type of like powered by AI component into what they are already offering. So that's always really exciting to see. So I'm excited to explore more about that.

All right, the fifth one EdPuzzle. I think this was super cool when I tested this out, EdPuzzle. You may have heard of this as well, but this is something super cool as far as what they do with AI. What you could do is you can upload a video from, you know, on any social studies topic, or, you know, paste a link from YouTube, and it can be maybe about a biography, like of a person or a specific holiday that you're teaching, such as upcoming holidays that I mentioned earlier, like Easter or Mother's Day. And AI can auto generate comprehension questions for students to answer while they're watching it. It'll stop at certain points, and then students would answer the question whether you decide it to be open ended or multiple choice before continuing on. So they have to answer the question before the video unpauses and continues until the end. So I think that's a really great way to kind of have them, you know, stop at certain checkpoints and just to kind of make sure that they're engaged during the video.

All right, the sixth different AI tool I have for you is called Google Arts and Culture. And this is a free online platform related to Google. So it is a Google application that features art and history and culture from around the world. They include videos and images and other media from museums and cultural organizations and archives. And I think it's really cool, because there's tons of artwork, millions of artwork that you can look up, and exhibitions and landmarks and stories about cultural heritage, such as the women's suffragette movement. So there's a lot to explore here. With Google Arts and Culture, you can type in maybe something that you've talked about earlier in the year, or something you are talking about right now, and you might be able to find it.

All right. Number seven, Google Earth. So we are kind of getting into Google stuff, because I think Google is, of course, you know, kind of a powerhouse in a lot of ways. And I wanted to mention just a few things that they've powered with, AI. So the Google Arts and Culture is one, and then there's also Google Earth. So they use this tool as far as Google Earth. They use it to improve imagery. They use it to help users analyze data and provide some type of historical context. And you can actually explore historical imagery from almost 80 years ago, just based off of what it looked like before. So you can kind of go back in time to see how it's changed. And Google Earth has AI powered cloud removal technology, which is something I had never heard of before I researched this, but it basically improves satellite imagery by removing clouds and haze. So this is great to explore when you're talking about regions of the United States or regions of the world or regions of your state. You can take students on virtual field trips to different historical sites, ancient civilizations, or important landmarks. So I highly recommend checking out Google Earth. It's a really great tool to utilize.

And the last AI tool I wanted to mention is Google Gemini. So this is similar to chat GPT, the chat style format that I think could be really great for students who are already familiar with Google tools, and it could be used as far as researching information. So maybe you could try having students, let's say they have to research information about the 13 Colonies. And you type that in, like I need to research about information about the 13 Colonies, it'll output a summary of facts with links to reliable sources to explore more. And the even the cooler part is that the facts outputted are not word for word, so this is a great way for students to see how to paraphrase facts. And this is different from just specifically typing into Google itself, because typically, as we know it, Google pulls based on your search terms. It pulls different resources, different sources, and it gives you a list of all those sources where students have to click on those sources to find more. Google Gemini is giving you the facts in itself. So it is actually like telling you the information. It's summarizing it in its own words, but it's also linking to those specific sources where they got that sentence or phrase. So that's just something that could be interesting to look into.

Now, I know some teachers out there, maybe this is you. You might be hesitant about using AI, and you're a little bit scared, and that is totally understandable, I think, not really knowing what the implications are. It's just something that's really new and unfamiliar, right? Now, and I wanted to kind of address a few common things I know teachers have talked about online in Facebook groups, or might have been thinking. The first one, will AI replace teachers? Definitely not. AI is a tool and not a replacement. It helps with lesson planning and differentiation and engagement, but human teachers bring connection, guidance, and adaptability that technology never can. And I actually read a news article not too long ago about a school in the area I live in that - they don't have any teachers. It's like, they're all self paced, and they're it's all powered by AI, and just like for me, I'm just like, I don't know how I feel about that. I don't really like the idea that there aren't any certified teachers actually being able to work one on one, or however it is with students. And so I just think that AI is really great tool that we can use to work with our students, but not replace who we are, because I think there's always going to need be a need for teachers, and I don't think AI is one of those jobs that are going to be replaced by them.

The second concern might be, how do I make sure students use AI ethically? So this could be a really great thing to think about. It is definitely important to teach students how to use AI responsibly and not to kind of use AI to replace their minds in general, like they still need to be able to independently think and conclude things. But it can be a tool to utilize for research or to summarize, to generate ideas, but not to replace their own thinking. Another concern, what if AI generated content is biased? So this could definitely be the case. AI models are pulling from existing sources, which means biases in historical narratives could still be there. And this could be a really great teachable moment where you are really thinking like, Hmm, what do I know about this? Can I take this at face value? Or do I need to do some additional research?

So while AI isn't a powerful tool, it is still important to use it responsibly, whether or not you're using it for lesson planning or to generate different lesson ideas or activity ideas. Here are a few best practices. Number one, fact checking AI content. That's what I continuously do if I use AI because AI can definitely make mistakes. Always verify any historical facts before you're using AI generated materials. And a second best practice would be to encourage critical thinking. AI shouldn't replace student thinking. Use it as a tool to support deeper analysis and discussions. And the third thing is to be transparent with students. Teach students about how AI works and its potential biases, and it's important to let them explore AI tools if you're able to more critically in those ways.

So I hope you enjoyed this episode. It's a little long, but I think it's very informative and useful as you're exploring the new technology that's out there for students and for teachers. I hope you have a great rest of your day, and I'll talk to you next week.

Thanks for listening to the social studies teacher podcast. If you enjoyed listening to this episode, hit that subscribe button and leave a review. I would love to hear your thoughts. You can also find me on Instagram at the southern teach. I can't wait for you to join me in the next episode for more teacher tips and strategies.