UK government invests £4M to enhance AI tools for education

This initiative will enhance AI's ability to assist teachers in marking homework and planning lessons, making their jobs easier and more efficient.

The project will create a comprehensive content store that pools various government documents, including curriculum guidance, lesson plans, and anonymised pupil assessments. This content will be utilised by AI companies to develop more accurate and high-quality AI tools, such as tailored lesson plans and workbooks, that can be reliably used in schools.

The content store is designed to support technology companies specialising in education. It aims to help them build tools that can assist teachers with marking, creating classroom materials, and managing routine school administration tasks.

New research shows that parents are supportive of teachers using AI, as it would free up more time for face-to-face teaching, aligning with the government’s goal to break down barriers to educational opportunities. However, both teachers and AI developers agree that better data is necessary for these technologies to function effectively, which this project aims to address.

Science Secretary Peter Kyle emphasised the importance of this initiative: “We know teachers work tirelessly to go above and beyond for their students. 

“By making AI work for them, this project aims to ease admin burdens and help them deliver creative and inspiring lessons every day, while reducing time pressures they face. 

“This is the first of many projects that will transform how we see and use public sector data. We will put the information we hold to work, using it in a safe and responsible way to reduce waiting lists, cut backlogs and improve outcomes for citizens across the country.”

Minister for Early Education Stephen Morgan highlighted the potential benefits of the project: “We are determined to break down the barriers to opportunity to ensure every child can get the best possible education – and that includes access to the best tech innovations for all. Artificial Intelligence, when made safe and reliable, represents an exciting opportunity to give our schools leaders and teachers a helping hand with classroom life. 

“Today’s world-leading announcement marks a huge step forward for AI in the classroom. This investment will allow us to safely harness the power of tech to make it work for our hard-working teachers, easing the pressures and workload burdens we know are facing the profession and freeing up time, allowing them to focus on face-to-face teaching.”

The content store, supported by £3 million, represents a pioneering approach to processing government data for AI, as the UK government continues to advance its use of technology to improve public services. The project also includes a partnership with the Open University, which is contributing learning resources.

This follows recent Department for Education tests, which demonstrated that providing generative AI models with this type of data can increase accuracy to 92%, compared to 67% when no targeted data was used.

Minister Morgan announced the project during a speech at the Global Education Innovation Summit (GEIS) in Seoul, Republic of Korea. The event, focused on “classroom revolution led by teachers with AI,” will also see the launch of the Global Education and Innovation Alliance, with the UK as one of its founding members. He noted that this initiative marks the first government-approved store of high-quality education material optimised for AI development, aimed at producing safe, legally compliant, and evidence-based tools that meet teachers’ needs.

To encourage the use of the content store, the government is offering a share of an additional £1 million to AI companies that propose the best ideas for reducing teacher workload. The selected companies will develop AI tools specifically for feedback and marking, with the goal of having these tools ready by March 2025. Applications for this funding will open on 9th September 2024.

A survey from TeacherTapp indicates that almost half of teachers are already using AI to assist with their work. However, current AI tools are not specifically trained on documents that outline teaching practices in England.

Chris Goodall, a teacher and Head of Digital Education in the Bourne Education Trust, shared his experience with AI: “AI has been a hugely powerful tool for me and my colleagues at the Bourne Education Trust. It allows us to create engaging, personalised learning experiences for our students while also significantly reducing the time taken to create them. Personally, I’ve used AI to quickly generate scaffolded activities, adapt materials for students with special educational needs, and create more engaging lessons that are accessible to all. The time saved allows school staff to focus on what matters most, interacting with students and providing individualised feedback and support. 

“The content store will take this to the next level by offering easy access to high quality evidence based and legally compliant education materials. Developed with input from educators it supports effective teaching practices and fosters collaboration and innovation. 

This initiative demonstrates how AI, when implemented responsibly and ethically, can support and empower teachers to create more dynamic, personalised learning experiences for students.”

Ian Cunningham, Chief Technical Officer of TeachMate, a company that develops AI tools for teachers, highlighted the potential impact of the new content store: “TeachMateAI already saves teachers over 10+ house of time each week through our AI tools, but we are ambitious about what more we can do to support teachers and schools. The AI education store has the potential to enable us and other developers to produce highly accurate tools for the sector in a much more efficient way, reducing cost, compute and the time it takes us to bring new products to market.”

The Department for Education is also committing to publishing a safety framework on AI products for education, due later this year. Minister Morgan will meet education technology companies before setting out clear expectations for the safety of AI products for education.

Professor Ian Pickup, Pro Vice-Chancellor, Students, at The Open University, expressed enthusiasm for the project: “We’re excited to be a founding strategic partner in this initiative alongside DfE. Since our founding in 1969, we have remained at the forefront of innovation in education. As part of this mission, we have provided free, open-access materials via OpenLearn since 2006, and see the deployment of AI as a means through which even more learners can benefit from the transformative power of education.  

“By making content accessible to new educational technology tools, we foresee a future where learning materials can be best matched to personal needs, where learning tasks can be pitched at the right level for student success, and where students can progress at a pace that is right for them.”