Primary tabs

Ready your teaching for the AI era with this six-part framework

By kiera.obrien, 1 July, 2025
AI can help educators reclaim what they love most about teaching – but they need to approach it with an intentional mindset. The six steps of the THRIVE framework can guide the way
Article type
Article
Main text

I see AI framed as a marvel or a menace. What’s missing is a mirror. If AI can complete an assignment as well as a student, you have to ask, was that really meaningful? Sadly, many of our lessons, passive lectures, rote memorisation and formulaic writing were weak long before AI arrived.

I was mid-lecture on the “future of AI” when ChatGPT launched. I remember it clearly. My students, giddy. Me, queasy. “Can I use this to write my essay?” “Does this mean we still have finals?”

AI didn’t creep into education, it thrashed in, like the “gradually then suddenly” tipping point Malcolm Gladwell warned about. If you’re reading this, you’re now in one of two tribes: those who have taught students to work only with humans and those who never will. As Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said, “Every CEO going forward is going to manage humans and [AI] agents together.”

Too many of us either resist or surrender to AI, but neither serves our students or schools.

AI is already reshaping our economy: 89 per cent of CEOs rank AI as key to future profitability but nearly half (47 per cent) say employees lack needed skills. They had better learn quickly. Shopify’s CEO recently announced staff will need to prove jobs can’t be done by AI before getting more headcount.

The World Economic Forum says creativity and problem solving are essential for future jobs. Salesforce’s head of AI describes this as “agency”, your initiative to see and solve real problems. AI can do many things, but we must creatively direct it: sage advice for ourselves and our students.

This is why I designed the THRIVE framework, to offer educators a guiding path that sees both AI potential and the irreplaceable value of your teaching. It’s a framework that puts you, not algorithms, on pace.

THRIVE with AI: a teacher-centred framework for adopting GenAI

There’s a moment, maybe you’ve had it too, when I’m staring at my stale lesson plans, and the clock insists there’s no time to revise. Students are coming in. And somewhere between my fifth tab and third coffee, I wonder, “Is this what teaching has become?”

For me, THRIVE began not as a framework but with a feeling – one I know many of you share. We’re all striving to spend less time on tasks that deplete us, and more on the moments that matter: the flash of insight in a student’s eyes; the conversation that shifts a view; the creativity no rubric could capture.

Despite the headlines, AI doesn’t need to replace those moments. It might help us reclaim them. These tools we fear could bring us back to what we love most: guiding, connecting and inspiring.

THRIVE can be a checklist but it’s more a mindset – an invitation to design your relationship with AI with the same care and intentionality you bring to your classroom. Each letter is a guidepost to help you navigate AI without losing your bearings or your purpose. 

T – Transformative engagement 

Imagine a class where students don’t sit absorbing information – they question it, reshape it, argue with it. With AI as a partner, engagement becomes less about consumption and more about creation.

I watched a teacher use AI to simulate a debate between Benjamin Franklin and King George III on freedom, governance and liberty. Students didn’t just watch, they participated, challenged biases and left with sharper minds. That’s not automation. That’s liberation.

Transformative engagement is about using AI to make learning more meaningful for students and for you. That means using AI to personalise content, support different learning styles or give students more agency in how they learn.

H – High productivity 

I think often about what it means to be “productive” in education. The papers graded? The hours on slides? Or is it the quality of our presence with students, with ideas, with ourselves? When we let AI help our prep, we aren’t abdicating responsibility. We’re reclaiming time for feedback, for thought, for meaningful work of learning design.

With AI, I’ve revised lectures into a case format, saving hours. The focus shifts from formatting slides to facilitating discussion; from content delivery to engagement. High Productivity uses AI to clear the clutter, so you can focus on what really matters. By improving organisation and lesson planning, AI can help keep you on track, aligned with learning objectives.

R – Resilient adaptability 

This pillar begins with humility. The kind that lets you say, “I don’t know this yet,” and keep going. AI changes fast – faster than classes or diplomas. But we’ve always been adapters. Think of how quickly you pivot when a lesson falls flat or a student walks in with a crisis. Resilience isn’t about mastery. It’s about curiosity tethered to care for yourself.

At my university, we’ve formed an AI Lunch and Learn where colleagues pilot tools, compare results and share dilemmas. A colleague shared, “We need to know more about what we can do with AI.” Agreed. 

I – Imagination and creativity support

In my own MBA classes, students role-play as stakeholders in a space tourism firm, interacting with AI bots simulating C-suite executives. They build strategies and AI-assisted prototypes with plans we’d never get with traditional lectures. Used well, AI becomes a cognitive amplifier.

Challenge your students, and yourself, to use generative AI to make something new. Reimagine how it can be a rival, a customer, a collaborator to spark innovation. In an age where creativity is currency, educators become facilitators of possibility.

V – Value through ethics 

AI, like many things, reflects the values we embed in it. What data is it trained on? Who does it include, or exclude? Ethics in the AI age is not a policy document, it’s a practice – one that begs the question: “How do I use this power without losing my principles?”

This is an opportunity to co-design an AI use policy with students. Together, you can explore algorithmic bias, plagiarism and transparency. I know you want to protect what matters: student trust, equity, privacy and dignity. And I think they want that too.

E – Efficient optimisation 

There is a grace in simplicity. AI can help you spot which students are slipping, where confusion hides in data or how to restructure lessons for better flow. But optimisation isn’t about shaving minutes off the clock. It’s about clarity and alignment – letting the noise fall away so the learning signal comes through.

A provost uses an AI dashboard to spot dropout risks and intervene before it hits. They bring us into the loop, co-designing a solution supported by what the data means, and how to act on it. Brilliant. 

What kind of teaching thrives with AI? 

Bill Gates predicts AI in education will close the gap in teacher shortages. A London secondary school started using AI tools to help students prepare for exams. So, will AI replace teachers? 

The better question is: what kind of teaching will flourish in a world of AI?

My hope is that THRIVE helps you find your answer, not by offering easy solutions, but by guiding you toward the ones that align with your values, your goals, your joy. Because if you approach AI with intention, it might just give you more time to be the educator you always wanted to be – the one you see in the mirror. 

Patrick Lynch is AI faculty lead at Hult International Business School.

If you’d like advice and insight from academics and university staff delivered direct to your inbox each week, sign up for the Campus newsletter.

Standfirst
AI can help educators reclaim what they love most about teaching – but they need to approach it with an intentional mindset. The six steps of the THRIVE framework can guide the way

comment