A new kind of teacher: reading and word meanings
A school helper program can give feedback instantly, but it is only a tool. To read this kind of text well, ask three questions: What does the tool do? What went well? What problem or limit appeared? Then choose the answer that the text supports. Look at the new words in context. To customise something means to change it to suit a person: a student can customise a program to show only spelling help. A connection is a link between people or things, such as the link between a class and a teacher. Instantly means at once. If you are confused, you cannot understand or decide; if you notice something, you see it. Feedback tells you what is good and what to improve. AI tools will change some tasks in school, and many of them will be useful, but teachers will still be needed to explain, to encourage and to check. Your book has a story-like text about a robot teacher on page 46: read it after this lesson and decide which of its ideas are helpful and which are only imagination.
| Word | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| customise | change to suit someone | She customised the settings. |
| instantly | at once | The answer appeared instantly. |
| confused | cannot understand | He was confused by the rule. |
| feedback | comments to improve | The teacher gave useful feedback. |
Last term our class tested a writing helper, a computer program that reads an essay and gives feedback. Students could customise it, so it showed only the kind of help each person wanted: spelling, punctuation or sentence length. Hossam liked that the feedback appeared instantly, and he fixed three mistakes in a minute. Then Dalia noticed something strange: the program told her to change “colour” to “color”. She was confused, because her teacher had taught her the British spelling. Mrs Samira explained that the program had learned from many texts and sometimes mixed the two spellings. “It is a useful helper,” she said, “but a person must always check.” After that the class kept the helper, and they also kept a connection with their teacher: any strange suggestion was discussed together.
Helper debate. Hold a two-minute talk with a grown-up: “Will AI tools change school?” One person gives two good points and the other gives two limits. Use at least three future passive sentences, for example: More feedback will be given instantly. Mistakes will still be checked by teachers.