What a week! ISTELive 2025 brought together thousands of educators and edtech enthusiasts in San Antonio. The conference certainly lived up to this year’s theme: “Inspiring Bold Innovation.”
Representing Teaching Channel, we connected with teachers, tech coaches, and school leaders from all over the country. One of the highlights was learning about how educators are using AI in their classrooms, from time-saving hacks to student-centered projects. With so many AI tools now available, a common theme was seeking guidance on which to add to their instructional toolbox to best support teaching and learning goals. Whether folks were just curious or already experimenting with AI tools, the inspiration was flowing!
Below, we’re sharing highlights from our poster sessions. Click the links to explore the resources and try some of the ideas yourself!
AI Your Way: Create a Custom Chatbot That Gets Your Teaching Style
The focus of our session, AI Your Way, was the ability for educators to create custom chatbots tailored to their classroom needs. These AI assistants can reflect your voice, routines, and teaching style, and they can be built in just a few minutes using ChatGPT’s custom GPT builder (paid version) or Google Gemini (called Google Gems).
Custom GPTs are trained to respond using resources and formats that meet the educator’s unique classroom context. They can be reused and shared, and save prompting time.
To get started, check out our AI Your Way slides, explore custom GPTs you can try, or follow our step-by-step guides to build your own custom GPT or create your own Gem. Each one is designed to help educators use AI in practical, personalized ways.
Dialing Up the Awesome: AI-Powered Projects for Elementary Learners
This session was all about what happens when classroom creativity meets smart, responsible AI use. We teamed up with a practicing elementary gifted and talented teacher and math coach who had taken two of our AI-focused courses. She used what she learned to design engaging, age-appropriate AI projects for students.
Her students used Magic School AI to help create scripts for stop-motion videos, write speeches about STEAM heroes that shared a part of their identity, and generate trivia questions about AI. These projects gave them a chance to explore AI in the classroom in ways that were hands-on, thoughtful, and easy to manage. Each project encouraged students to build AI literacy.
You can browse the AI-Powered Projects slides and explore the project resources for real classroom examples and templates you can make your own.
Give it a go!
Pick one idea from above and try it out. Create your own custom chatbot in minutes, or test-drive an AI project with your students. Start small, stay curious, and let your creativity lead the way!
About the Author
Sarah Murphy is the Evaluation Manager and a Professional Learning Specialist at Teaching Channel. She holds a B.A. in History and a Master’s in Education. Sarah began teaching in 2004 at the elementary level. She now leads Teaching Channel’s Evaluation Team, managing our wonderful team of Course Evaluators. Sarah is also a coursewriter and content creator, specializing in edtech, educator wellness, and content area teaching.
Fun fact: Sarah has camped in 18 national parks and hopes to visit all 63 someday!
