Primary schools try out AI teaching tools with 'guard rails' in place

In her Primary 5 and 6 classes, an English language teacher, 45, has been using artificial intelligence over the past three years to help her pupils write better compositions.

- Elisha Tushara Correspondent

Called SchoolAI, the Al-powered educational platform is able to guide her pupils, prompting them with questions to think creatively as they dig deeper into character dilemmas and plot twists, before they put pen to paper.

Singapore teachers like her have been experimenting with different Al teaching assistants or other tools to help in learning, amid growing attention on the role of Al in education.

In primary schools, however, this has been met with some uncertainty as parents of younger children remain cautious about the potential effects of introducing these tools too early.

Education Minister Desmond Lee had said earlier in 2026 that Al will be gradually introduced from Primary 4.

This is done under close supervision and with "low exposure", with priority given to learning the fundamentals, he said at The Straits Times Education Forum on April 1.

Shortly after, Ms Liew Wei Li, director-general of education at the Ministry of Education (MOE), addressed parental concerns in a LinkedIn post, assuring them that guard rails are in place.

Schools use specially selected Al tools with specific features for learning tasks and only with teacher supervision for this age group on the Singapore Student Learning Space (SLS), she said. SLS is an online learning portal by MOE for use in schools.

As Al becomes increasingly pervasive, she said it is better that schools teach pupils to use Al well "rather than leave it to chance and the open internet".

Ms Liew added that pupils learn how Al works and how to use it responsibly, along with why the process of learning, which includes struggling and persevering, is important.

Teachers interviewed said they set guard rails or parameters including programming the chatbot not to allow pupils to stray from the topic, not to give them immediate answers, or not to let pupils access information other than what is needed for the lesson.