Then I saw it's face...

I never thought I'd write this post.

I was a sceptic. Just last year, I was playing with AI functionality and was often unimpressed by the results - dubious solutions and unsound judgements in assessing pupil work.

That has all changed in the past few months (here, I have to give huge credit to my new HoD, Tom - a huge AI advocate and generally inspirational presence, as well as Matt, the Digital Learning Adviser at my previous employer). I am now watching AI code applets for me in real time. Applets that can genuinely help with teaching. Applets to do things I've wanted to do for eons, if only I had any idea of how. And it does them in mere moments.

The AI of choice is Gemini, via Google AI Studio.

This really was kickstarted a few weeks ago. I was in a grumbly mood and bemoaning the lack of software to draw simple Venn diagrams (it is a huge pain doing it in Word, especially shading some of the more 'niche' ones). Enter Tom, who boots up Google AI Studio, gives it a prompt, and... boom. There it is.

Okay, maybe not. The first attempt was very simplistic. Very basic. 3 minutes earlier I'd have been grateful for that but, not now. Now I wanted more. Now I wanted the option to type in my own combinations. To see how far I could push it in combining them. He urged me to embrace my creativity and experiment. (I've often 'memed' that I'm the ideas guy, not the actions guy - it seems like it's true...)

I went home, opened a can of (insert professional-sounding-and-definitely-not-just-cheap-lager name here) and started again. Interestingly, with a very similar prompt to the one Tom had used, the output was somewhat different. But, this time, I went back to it with ideas - how about three sets? Can I have buttons to input my own combinations? What if I want sets A and C to be mutually exclusive, huh? Did you think about that, AI? Didya?

This was the result:

Pretty cool, huh? Not a bad five minute's work, half of which was spent victory-sipping le beverage whilst playtesting my new toy.

After that, I went to spend time with my wife, child and dog. AI had conquered Venn diagram drawing.

Then, the next day, I had a thought. It only drew a few Venn diagrams... it's not like that was a huge ask. It wasn't exactly A-Level Calculus...

So, I thought I'd challenge it. Write me an applet that can support my Year 13 students with differentiation. I want them to be able to practice the Chain, Product and Quotient rules. I want a tab which poses mixed questions so they have to decide on the correct method. I want a challenge tab (heck, we've gotta differentiate when teaching differentiation, right?) which asks combinations (perhaps a product of three functions, or a quotient involving a product in the numerator...). Hell, I even want to be able to generate worksheets and answer keys as pdfs - literally I'd pay for software that could do all that.

Wow. Just wow. Satisfied, I went downstairs to tell my wife how amazing AI was. She hates it. She hates that I don't hate it anymore. Honestly, it could be the final wedge in our marriage... but this applet was awesome! We sat and watched Scrubs reruns, and possibly an episode of Only Connect... and then, I shot up out of my chair in horror.

What about implicit differentiation? What about tangents and normals? Stationary points? For the love of all that is holy, what about concavity and points of inflection???

This one was definitely harder for AI to crack - there were numerous issues with questions failing to generate, the LaTeX not rendering correctly, the worksheet generator being blank, the question types being too generic. It's still far from perfect... but it's 100% usable, and would be useful to some students. I went to bed, an hour later than planned but happy with *my* work.

All of these widgets are provided free to use in your classrooms, or to share with friends, colleagues and randos in the street. I find the concept of ownership bizarre... I didn't write them... but I suppose they are my brainchild, my ideas made flesh, my intellectual property? As such, I ask that if you are sharing the applets you do so by directing people to my site... or I guess you could get AI to write you your own applets?

Over the coming weeks, I'll be sharing more of my AI applets and my AInecdotes (oh, the joys...), so stay tuned! Next week's post will contain some useful statistics applets for GCSE mathematics and GCSE/A-Level Statistics, as well as my attempts to get AI to survive the daunting task of an applet for Circle Theorems!