Artificial intelligence is changing the landscape of teaching in the UAE

Artificial intelligence is changing the landscape of teaching in Dubai, say some of the region's leading experts.

Earlier this week, Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, Crown Prince of Dubai, announced plans to “upskill all teachers in the Emirate in artificial intelligence”.

Educators are already using platforms to plan lessons, give pupils feedback, and take on administrative tasks.

Schools across Dubai are also training teachers in AI to help them plan modules and complete administrative work, allowing teachers more time to focus on pupils.

“Our aim is to create an educational system that equips our students with future-ready tools and provides an optimal learning environment supported by AI technologies,” Sheikh Hamdan wrote on Wednesday.

Heads of schools in the city told that teachers were already undergoing training in the use of AI.

“We're going to continue investing in upskilling our teachers and continue investing in providing courses and content for our pupils because AI is not a one-off workshop, it's got to be continuous,” said Baz Nijjar, principal adviser of education technology at Gems Education.

“For sure, it’s going to support in improving planning or reducing the time consumption for planning.

“It's going to improve administrative tasks of data tracking and analysis and it's going to help personalise activities so teachers can work towards highest standards.

“But, rather than them manually doing that, now they're just having to review content that is being curated and make sure they put their own personal touches.”

One of their programmes is called Teachers Lead Teachers which, as the name suggests, has teachers training peers through best practice.

“When they see a fellow teacher use a certain tool and they are showed an example of how it's used, they then want to learn because they see how it can reduce their workload, or how they can improve pupil-related outcomes or can give support with their planning,” said Mr Nijjar.

“A lot of the administrative tasks and the personalisation is supported by AI, and it's ever evolving. This is just the beginning of the journey.

He said the use of AI, “gives time back to the teachers to focus more on their personal skills, because the skills that AI is not going to replace is what we as humans can offer, which is our personal skills such as collaboration or communication”.

“It's already in our plans to provide training and support for all of our teachers in AI tools and also provide opportunities for our pupils,” he said.