Guide · UK teachers
AI for teachers in the UK: a pedagogy-first guide
A grounded look at what AI actually helps UK teachers with — and where it gets in the way. Built on Oxford doctoral research into how teachers reason.
The honest summary
AI is good at first drafts and bad at judgement. For UK teachers, that means it can shorten planning, marking and parent communications — but the decisions that actually shape pupil progress must stay with you.
Where AI genuinely helps
- Lesson planning drafts aligned to the National Curriculum
- Differentiated tasks for SEND pupils (using anonymised profiles only)
- Retrieval practice and low-stakes quiz generation
- Parent newsletters and routine communications
- Marking commentary banks the teacher then edits
Where AI is a poor fit
- Final assessment decisions affecting pupil progress
- Anything involving named pupils or safeguarding information
- Curriculum sequencing — a professional judgement, not a generation task
- Pastoral conversations
UK-specific must-haves
- UK English and UK curriculum terminology by default
- A clear data retention and UK data-position statement
- No prompts that invite pupil PII
- Outputs an Ofsted inspector would recognise as good practice
Oxford-rooted
Doctoral research into UK teacher reasoning.
Curriculum-aligned
National Curriculum, GCSE, A-Level.
Safeguarding-aware
Anonymised identifiers by design.
Explore the Teachers.guide modules
A whole suite designed around UK teaching, not US workflows.