Nikki Shepard

Higley Traditional Academy

4th Grade

"I leverage AI to enhance the learning experience and streamline my teaching processes as well as enhance my creativity." -Nikki Shepard

Enhancing Classroom Instruction

Nikki Shepard, 4th grade teacher at Higley Traditional Academy, is transforming education through her innovative use of AI tools. Nikki integrates AI into her teaching and personal projects, creating a dynamic learning environment that benefits both her students and her workflow. Her adaptability and creativity showcase how teachers can harness AI to innovate while maintaining a personal touch.

Mentor Sentences

Nikki utilizes AI to generate mentor sentences that align with specific grammatical structures or stylistic techniques. For example, while teaching James and the Giant Peach, she crafts a prompt like “Can you help me write a mentor sentence that uses past tense verbs and is a compound sentence from Chapter 6 of James and the Giant Peach?” By inputting the desired focus (e.g., complex sentences, vivid imagery), the AI provides tailored examples for students to analyze and emulate.

ELA Novel Studies

To keep her lesson plans cohesive, Nikki leverages AI for concise chapter summaries, particularly favoring Microsoft Copilot because it does a better job at highlighting the main events and themes. By asking for a summary of specific chapters, she saves time while ensuring her activities align with the novel’s events and themes.

AI supports Nikki in crafting detailed, standards-aligned lesson plans and rubrics. By providing specifications such as grade level, learning objectives, and subject matter, she's able to create effective resources for her students like discussion questions, engaging activities, and assessment methods that align with the standards.

Here's a recent rubric Nikki created with AI. It outlines clear and detailed expectations in student friendly language with performance levels rated 1 to 3.

Nikki emphasizes the importance of specificity when working with AI. Clear, detailed prompts yield better results, and she often refines the outputs to suit her needs.

Peach Perfect Article.pdf

Nonfiction Texts

To supplement her curriculum, Nikki uses AI to create nonfiction articles tailored to her lessons. For James and the Giant Peach, she requested paragraphs on the history and life cycle of peaches, enriching her students’ understanding. She asked AI "Can you help me write two short paragraphs that explain how peaches came to the United States?" The she asked it to write a short paragraph about the life cycle of a peach. She formats the AI-generated content with added visuals to create engaging classroom resources.

Prompts used to create the nonfiction text:

"Can you help me write two short paragraphs that explain how peaches came to the United States?"
"Please write a short paragraph about the life cycle of a peach."
Write a blurb about interesting facts about peaches.

Bridging Efficiency and Depth

Nikki’s approach to AI isn’t just about saving time—it’s about enhancing depth and engagement. By using AI to draft objectives connected to Depth and Complexity Icons, she ensures that her lessons challenge students to think critically while aligning with educational standards.

AI Projects Beyond the Classroom

Flyers for HTA and Booster Club Activities

Nikki’s creativity extends into her personal and extracurricular projects, where she uses AI to design visually stunning materials like flyers and yard signs. Examples include a festive Bake-Off flyer featuring a red, white, and green baked goods border or a striking soccer player silhouette against a sunset for a Booster Club sign. She fine-tunes AI-generated images in Canva to achieve professional results.

Santas vs Grinches.pdf

Nikki Shepard is a perfect example of how technology can enhance the educational experience. Her purposeful use of AI empowers her to focus on what matters most: fostering a love of learning in her students. Are you ready to follow in her footsteps and bring AI into your classroom?

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