AI Is Already in the Classroom. Is the Technology Around It Ready?

Artificial intelligence is no longer simply a future issue for New Zealand schools. Much of the discussion, understandably, has focused on how teachers and students should use it, what it means for assessment, and where the appropriate boundaries should sit.

Those are important questions. But there is another, much more practical question schools should also be asking: is the technology around the classroom ready for it?

AI isn't going to arrive as one new piece of equipment sitting beside the whiteboard. It is increasingly becoming part of the applications, devices and online services teachers and students already use. Preparing for AI therefore isn't just about choosing AI tools or writing policies. It is also about making sure the wider classroom environment can support how teaching and learning are changing.

AI in New Zealand schools is already a practical issue

The Ministry of Education's current guidance on generative AI covers its use by teachers and students, assessment, privacy, checking AI-generated information and the need for schools to establish appropriate policies.

Importantly, the Ministry's approach keeps teachers at the centre. It emphasises professional judgement, human oversight and the need to check AI-generated information rather than simply accepting it as correct.

That is also a useful way to think about technology investment. Schools don't necessarily need to start buying products because they have an "AI" badge on them. A better starting point is to identify how AI could realistically be used in teaching and then ask whether the existing classroom technology makes those activities easy or difficult.

Start with the classroom use case, not the feature list

Before looking at new technology, it is worth identifying a handful of situations a school actually expects to see.

A teacher might use AI to help generate ideas or lesson material and then want to share that content with the class. Students might compare several AI-generated answers and investigate which is more accurate. A class might examine an AI-generated image, argument or explanation and discuss what it gets right and wrong.

These don't necessarily require an entirely new technology stack. But they do place greater value on some fairly basic things: easily sharing content from different devices, having a clear display everyone can see, being able to annotate and discuss material together, reliable internet connectivity and having sensible controls around the tools students can access.

That should be the starting point for procurement: what are we trying to make easier for the teacher and students?

Only then should the conversation move to product features.

The classroom display can become a place to challenge AI, not simply display it

One of the more interesting opportunities is how the main classroom display can be used.

Imagine a Year 9 class investigating a historical event. Instead of the teacher simply presenting information, students could ask an AI tool the same question using several different prompts. Two or three responses could then be shared on the classroom display and compared as a group.

Which answer is more convincing? What evidence has been provided? What is missing? Has the AI presented opinion as fact? Can the class find another source that confirms what it has produced?

The Ministry specifically warns that AI can produce content that appears plausible while containing incorrect information and recommends that outputs are reviewed and checked. A shared classroom screen provides a very practical place to teach exactly that skill.

The same approach could work in English by comparing an AI-generated argument with a student's own work, in science by questioning an AI explanation of a concept, or in mathematics by examining not only whether an answer is right but whether the method used to reach it makes sense.

In that environment, an interactive display isn't simply replacing a whiteboard. It becomes somewhere teachers and students can collectively examine, annotate and challenge digital content.

If schools are considering upgrading this part of the classroom, our guide on how to choose an interactive display for a New Zealand classroom covers the practical factors worth considering.

Sharing content needs to be almost effortless

AI is also likely to increase the amount of content being created across different devices. A teacher may have something on a Windows laptop while students are working on Chromebooks or iPads. Another student might have generated an image, another a presentation, and another might have found something the class needs to examine together.

None of that is particularly useful if getting it onto the classroom screen becomes a five-minute technical exercise.

Before investing in new classroom technology, schools should therefore test the real environment rather than relying on a feature list. Take the devices actually used in the school and try them. Connect the teacher's Windows laptop. Cast from a managed Chromebook. Share from an iPad. Play a video with sound. Try a guest device that isn't already configured for the school.

Then give the room to someone who wasn't involved in selecting the equipment and see whether they can work it out without instructions.

That's a much better test of classroom technology than watching a polished product demonstration. The goal should be simple: if a useful piece of work exists on a device in the classroom, getting it in front of everyone else shouldn't interrupt the lesson.

Our overview of wireless presentation and screen sharing explains some of the options available for different classroom and device environments.

Test the network before you scale

One of the biggest changes in classroom AV over recent years is that displays are no longer necessarily standalone devices. Wireless presentation, cloud applications, device management, online video and connected classroom tools all bring the school network into the equation. Greater use of cloud-based AI services makes it even more important that AV and IT aren't planned independently.

This doesn't mean every school suddenly needs a network upgrade because of AI. It does mean schools should understand how their technology will operate before deploying it across 30, 50 or 100 classrooms.

A sensible pilot might use three different spaces: a typical classroom, a specialist or senior learning room, and a shared learning area. Run the proposed technology in those rooms for a period using the school's actual network and devices.

During that pilot, test the situations that commonly cause problems. Can staff and student devices share content if they sit on different parts of the network? Can a visiting presenter connect? Does video play smoothly with audio? What happens when several devices want to share? Does everything reconnect properly the following morning?

Just as importantly, record where teachers need help. If the support team receives the same question repeatedly during a three-room pilot, multiplying the solution across 50 rooms isn't going to make that problem disappear.

Testing at small scale is much easier and cheaper than discovering these issues after an entire campus has been deployed.

Privacy needs to become part of everyday classroom technology

AI introduces some very specific privacy considerations.

The New Zealand Office of the Privacy Commissioner's guidance for education providers advises schools to take particular care with learner information when using digital technologies, including AI. It specifically warns against entering learner personal information into free versions of AI tools and recommends due diligence before new digital technologies are implemented.

This needs to translate into practical behaviour.

A teacher asking an AI tool to create ten generic maths questions is very different from copying an identifiable student's assessment, learning-support information or personal circumstances into an unapproved public AI service and asking it to provide recommendations.

For significant new platforms, schools should also consider whether a privacy assessment is required before deployment rather than discovering the risks after the tool is already widely in use.

Schools therefore need more than an AI policy sitting in a folder. A simple one-page guide for staff could make clear which AI tools are approved, what information must never be entered, any relevant age or account restrictions, the need to check important AI-generated information, and who staff should contact when they want to use a new tool.

Netsafe's artificial intelligence resources for schools include policy support and classroom resources that can help schools work through these questions.

The same thinking should extend to the devices around the classroom. Schools should know what is connected to their networks, how devices receive security updates, what cloud services they communicate with and who has responsibility for managing them.

Managing one classroom is very different from managing 80

This is another area that is easily overlooked when technology is being evaluated.

A demonstration unit can be configured manually. So can two classrooms. Even ten might be manageable. Once technology is deployed across an entire school, however, the equation changes.

IT teams should ask practical questions before deployment. Can settings be pushed to every classroom centrally? Can firmware and security updates be scheduled without someone visiting each room? Can unnecessary applications or functions be restricted? Can IT see whether devices are online and operating correctly? If a configuration needs to change next year, how much work will that involve?

Standardisation becomes important as well.

If one classroom behaves completely differently from the room next door, teachers need to learn multiple systems and support teams have more variables to troubleshoot. If the basic experience is consistent across a school, people know what to expect and support becomes considerably easier.

There can still be different technology for specialist spaces. The objective isn't to make every room identical. It is to avoid unnecessary complexity.

Don't pay an "AI premium" without understanding what you're getting

Over the next few years, we are going to see AI added to a lot of product descriptions. Some of those capabilities will be genuinely useful. Others may have very little impact on what happens during a normal school day.

The right question isn't simply "Does this product have AI?"

A better question is "What problem does this feature actually solve for our teachers or students?"

If an AI capability can genuinely save preparation time, improve accessibility, simplify a workflow or help students engage with learning differently, it may have real value. If the only difference is that AI has been added to the marketing material, schools shouldn't feel obliged to pay more for it.

Start with the educational outcome and work backwards towards the technology.

A practical readiness check for schools

Before making the next major classroom technology decision, schools should be able to answer a few basic questions:

• What devices do teachers and students actually use, and can they all connect easily?
• Can a teacher or student share something to the main display within seconds rather than minutes?
• Have we tested the system on our real school network rather than only in a demonstration?
• Have we tested several representative classrooms before committing to a wider rollout?
• Do staff know which AI services are approved and what information can and cannot be entered into them?
• Have privacy, age restrictions and terms of use been considered for the tools students may access?
• Can connected classroom devices be updated and managed centrally?
• Are the core controls and connections consistent between classrooms?
• Do teachers know where to get help when something doesn't work?
• Most importantly, does the technology remove friction from teaching or create more of it?

There is something slightly counterintuitive about where all of this is heading. The technology underneath the modern classroom is becoming more sophisticated, with more connected devices, cloud services, software platforms and increasingly powerful AI tools operating around it.

But the experience for the teacher should move in the opposite direction.

A teacher shouldn't need to understand casting protocols, network architecture, firmware versions or the inner workings of an AI model to teach a class. They should be able to walk into the room, connect, share, teach and move on.

That's why some of the smartest technology investments schools make in preparation for AI may not actually have AI written on the box. They may simply create classrooms that are easier to connect, easier to collaborate in, easier to manage and easier to teach in.

And ultimately, that's what the technology is there for.

QUNO Technology works with New Zealand schools and their technology partners across classroom displays, wireless presentation and wider AV environments. Explore our education technology solutions or talk to QUNO about an upcoming classroom technology project.