AI Lesson Planning & Grading: Teacher Workload Impact

Thanks for taking a few minutes for this! We're trying to understand how AI tools for lesson planning and grading are actually affecting your workload — the good, the messy, and the in-between. Your responses are completely confidential and anonymized. About 8 minutes, and there are no wrong answers.

Which types of AI tools have you used for lesson planning or grading in the last month?

• AI lesson planning assistant (e.g., MagicSchool, Diffit)
• AI grading or feedback tool (e.g., Grade genie, Turnitin AI)
• AI rubric or differentiation generator
• General AI chatbot used for drafting materials (e.g., ChatGPT, Claude) (Template note: replace these tool examples with the ones your staff actually use)
• Something else

Overall, how much have AI tools reduced your weekly workload for lesson planning and grading?

About how many hours per week do these AI tools save you, compared to doing the same work without them?

Thinking about where AI actually saves you time, split 100 points across these tasks based on how much of the time savings comes from each.

• Lesson planning
• Grading and feedback
• Differentiating materials for different students
• Parent or student communication
• Administrative paperwork

How much do you agree with each statement about the AI tools you use?

Which of these tasks would benefit most from additional AI support?

• Drafting initial lesson plans
• Creating differentiated materials for different skill levels
• Grading multiple-choice or short-answer assessments
• Writing narrative feedback on essays or open-ended work
• Generating quiz and test questions
• Translating materials for multilingual families
• Flagging students who need extra help based on their work
• Handling routine parent emails

Overall, how would you rate the quality of the lesson plans or feedback AI tools generate for you?

Anchor on the respondent's workload-reduction rating and their trust-in-grading answer. Ask them to walk through one specific recent week: which task actually got faster because of AI, and where AI created extra work, like double-checking or fixing errors. If their workload-reduction rating was low, probe what's blocking bigger savings — tool limitations, school policy, or lack of trust. If they said they trust AI for graded work, ask what safeguards they use before finalizing a grade.

What has gotten in the way of using AI tools more for lesson planning or grading?

• School or district policy restrictions
• Concerns about accuracy or bias in the output
• Cost of tools not covered by my school
• Lack of training on how to use them well
• Concerns about student academic integrity
• I don't see enough time savings to bother
• Nothing — I use them as much as I want to

What subject area do you primarily teach?

• English / Language Arts
• Math
• Science
• Social Studies
• Elective or special subject
• Multiple subjects
• Prefer not to say

What grade level do you primarily teach?

• Elementary (K-5)
• Middle school (6-8)
• High school (9-12)
• Multiple levels
• Prefer not to say

How many years have you been teaching?

• Less than 3 years
• 3-9 years
• 10-19 years
• 20+ years
• Prefer not to say

That's everything — thank you for the honest answers. Your responses will help school leaders decide which AI tools are worth keeping, dropping, or getting more training on.