#964: AI as a Lesson Planning Thought Partner: A Design-Based Pilot with Preservice Elementary Teachers

This design-based pilot study investigated how a group of elementary pre-service teachers used Artificial Intelligence (AI) as a thought partner in a teaching practicum seminar. They learned about an AI-Mediated Teaching Framework in 3 sessions and used it to design a sequence of three 45-to-50-minute AI-Mediated standards-aligned lessons. Mixed methods drew on anonymous pre/post surveys (pre n=9, post=6, unpaired). Quantitatively, agreement among the respondents increased across all items (i.e., confidence, equity planning, bias awareness), with all preservice teachers agreeing that AI has a positive role in K-12 education. Findings show actionable routines in refining AI outputs, and limitations/next plans are discussed.