Sarah, an EFL teacher in Barcelona, shares how she went from sceptic to advocate after using AI to personalise materials for her mixed-ability class of adult learners.
When Sarah first heard colleagues talking about using ChatGPT to write lesson plans, she rolled her eyes. "I thought it was just another EdTech fad," she admits. "And honestly, I worried it would make teachers lazy — or worse, replaceable." Eighteen months later, she's one of the most vocal AI advocates in her school.
Sarah teaches Business English to adult professionals at a language academy in Barcelona. Her classes are notoriously mixed — she might have a B1 accountant sitting next to a C1 marketing director, both expecting material that challenges them at their level. It was this challenge, more than anything else, that pushed her to experiment with AI.
"The breakthrough came when I started using AI to differentiate a single activity," she explains. "I'd write one task and then ask Claude to give me three versions — one for B1, one for B2, one for C1. What used to take me an hour took me ten minutes. And the quality was genuinely good."
She's quick to add that AI hasn't replaced her professional judgement. "I always review and edit what it produces. I change the vocabulary, I adjust the context to match my specific students. The AI gives me a first draft, not a finished product." She estimates she spends around 40% less time on materials preparation now — time she reinvests in actual lesson delivery and student feedback.
Her advice to sceptical colleagues: "Start small. Don't try to overhaul your whole teaching practice. Just pick one painful task — the thing you dread preparing every week — and try using AI for that. Once you see it working, you'll find your own way forward."