RMHS chemistry teacher Mr. Estes has served as a leading voice in the support of AI in schools and how students and staff should appropriately use AI in the classroom.
Throughout the last few years, the conflict between AI and educators has continued to grow. While some are open to the idea of AI and what it has to offer, others are profoundly opposed to it and have guided their students away from the use of computers for certain assignments. The Orbit has covered the emergence of AI in education in a previous article and in a podcast.
Mr. Estes has worked with teachers across RMHS to help integrate AI into the classroom. In an interview, he describes the harms and benefits of AI and how he personally navigates the tool.
Karina: How do you use AI in your own classroom?
Mr. Estes: I use it all the time – for generating new lab ideas, developing analogies, and refining how I introduce topics. I’ll input what I’ve done in the past and ask for alternative approaches, and it can generate a wide range of possibilities. I also use it to review emails, organize notes, and even structure timelines from older materials. It’s helpful for creating alternate versions of assessments without starting from scratch, and for mapping out course timelines based on learning objectives.
Karina: What would you say are the pros vs. cons of using AI in the classroom?
Mr. Estes: It’s a tool – and like any tool, it’s not perfect. It can give incorrect answers, and I try to show students that regularly. Sometimes we’ll put in a homework question and evaluate the response together – whether it’s strong or flawed. I want students to understand that there’s a right and wrong way to use AI. Simply copying answers doesn’t help you learn. Instead, it should be used as a support system, more like a coach. Teaching that distinction can be challenging.
Karina: Do you have any hopes for further AI use in classrooms or are you pretty happy with the way things are going right now?
Mr. Estes: What’s fascinating is that the AI we’re using today is the worst it will ever be – it’s constantly improving. I’m excited to see where it goes. Ideally, I’d like to see more built-in safeguards – tools that are designed to guide students rather than just give answers. For example, a version of AI integrated into a device that’s prompted to act as a coach, offering feedback instead of solutions. That’s the direction I hope it moves in.
Karina: What advice would you give to teachers or students who are new to AI but want to explore it?
Mr. Estes: For students, my advice is to treat AI as a thinking partner, not an answer machine. Start simple – introduce yourself as a student (without sharing personal information) and ask an AI chatbot like Google Gemini to explain concepts at different levels, generate practice questions, or help you brainstorm ideas rather than just giving you final answers. For teachers, exploring tools like Gemini Gems and NotebookLM is a great entry point because they’re flexible and relatively intuitive. The key is to experiment, reflect on what works, and always verify the output. If you approach AI with curiosity and a bit of skepticism, you’ll quickly see how it can deepen understanding rather than replace it.
Karina: Do you have any other ideas or tips regarding AI that you would like to share?
Mr. Estes: One important shift is to focus on prompting as a skill. The quality of what you get from AI depends heavily on how you ask the question, so teaching students to write clear, purposeful prompts is incredibly valuable. I also encourage showing students how to use AI in real time. It’s important for them to see that working with tools like Google Gemini is often a trial-and-error process, where teachers adjust prompts on the fly to refine results. Modeling this process helps demystify AI and builds critical thinking. It’s also important to recognize that the version of AI you’re using today is the worst version you’ll ever use – it’s constantly improving. If you don’t get the result you’re looking for now, there’s a good chance you will in a few months. Ultimately, the goal is to use AI to spark better questions, not just faster answers.
Mr. Estes also encourages his students to use a prompt from a Harvard study that allows AI to serve as a coach and help students, rather than just providing them with an answer.
