I will be the first to admit I was scarred by watching 2001 A Space Odyssey in college at a retro film night. So I was not the first to be eager to jump on the AI bandwagon. It just sounded a bit too “Hal” for my tastes. Add a dose of a dislike of anything smacking of plagiarism and I am definitely cautious about AI.
When I read about an AI vehicle for educators, however, my curiosity got the better of me. What I discovered was a tool for secular educators that I believe could have crossover benefits for those ministering to children and teens.
Magicschool.ai has a free account and a more advanced account for a monthly fee. From playing with it a bit, I believe most in ministry could probably manage with the free account. They also automatically give you a trial of the more advanced account without having to give them a credit card, if you want to try the extras out before deciding. I also appreciated that they didn’t ask for a lot of information about where I taught, which makes some educator sites not work as well for those of us in ministry – especially volunteers.
I think you could spend hours trying out the various tools – there are at the moment 60 basic ones. Many don’t necessarily apply to ministry, but I jotted down a few I believe have potential. The basic tools included things like a family email generator, song generator (how cool is that for helping kids memorize all sorts of Bible facts?!), review games (Jeopardy was the one I noticed first), ice breakers, a text leveler (for taking difficult text and rewriting it on lower grade/reading levels) and a social story creator for those working with children with special needs. I’m sure there were more helpful tools, but frankly it was a bit much to absorb all at once.
The other thing I appreciated was that they gave a brief explanation at the beginning of how to use what is generated without being guilty of plagiarism. Be careful though, because it is one of the first screens and is easy to breeze right through it without reading.
If you’ve been avoiding AI or didn’t think it could help much in ministry, this site may be a good place to give it a try. It may just free up some of your time to do other things – like spending more time with your students.