MagicSchool offers students and teachers the opportunity to pursue different learning styles in addition to getting help for what is needed most; as well as keeping the personal bond between teachers and students alive.
When logging into MagicSchool, a dashboard appears that allows the user (teacher or student) to access everything. For teachers, it provides toolsto create rubrics, lesson plans, and more. For students, it allows them to create images, access a student support chat, receive tutoring, plus more. Teachers can use the “launch to students” tool to send out the specific tools they want to use in class for the day or select their favorites. Teachers can customize the tools to match their students’ needs, such as allowing AI to answer only certain questions. Additionally, teachers can track when and how they’ve used MagicSchool to ensure it’s being utilized effectively as a tool.
DGN Instructional Coordinator in Technology and Information Services, Lisa Lichtman, acknowledges the benefits of MagicSchool for teachers and students within the building. Since its implementation in January 2024, Lichtman has emphasized that MagicSchool enhances learning without replacing the essential connection between teachers and students.
“This one stood out as a tool that was learner-centered and by that, I mean that it is about the students and how to make the students interact with the material on an easier, how to get the students more collaborative, how to help the teacher reach everyone sitting in front of them,” Lichtman said. “That’s a top philosophy here. Learning teaching and learning and students and teachers, it should be human-centered. It’s all about relationships, it’s all about you and the classroom.”
Many high school students struggle with asking a teacher for help. Using MagicSchool allows students to not feel pressured to mess up in front of a teacher while getting the correct answers they need to succeed. Unlike other online help curriculums, the answers can come back quickly with an answer that can be understood at any level.
“I feel like MagicSchool can help students know the questions to ask by giving them feedback in a low level, low state, not low level, low stakes environment. When you’re with a person, sometimes if you’re not good at coming up with questions or you know what to ask, the person on the other end had to pull that out of you and they didn’t know you that well. MagicSchool, I feel like, is low stakes. No one’s in there listening to you,” Lichtman said.
Teaching involves human interaction to deepen the meaning of human-based relationships. Teachers are now flooded with more work than having enough to care about the student’s connections built from teaching. According to Gallup, more than 4 out of 10 K-12 workers in the U.S. say they “always” or “very often” feel burned out at work, outpacing all other industries nationally. MagicSchool can help create lesson plans for teachers as well as help students learn in ways that work best for them when help is needed, all while still staying engaged with students.
Students have taken advantage of MagicSchool in their Intro to Teaching class at DGN. From writing an email to a potential coworker to creating lesson plans that cater to auditory, visual, reading writing, and problem-solving learners, senior Luci Pampalone has used these tools to increase her students’ learning ability and save time.
“I think it can really be used for anything, math, reading, and even music. It can give you a summary of a book, act like Photomath, and even make songs to help you remember materials,” Pampalone said. “MagicSchool also allows for students to get information quickly as well. Instead of looking it up on the internet with multiple answers,
MagicSchool allows students to get one answer simplified to their level which can benefit my future teaching as well.” MagicSchool has enabled teachers and students to utilize AI in impactful ways.