The New SHS Curriculum Must Empower Teachers, Not Replace Them With AI

For some three years now or so, teachers have had to recommit their every to PLC for a chosen specific day each week. The aim is to prepare teachers adequately to implement the new curriculum. It has been stressful and monotonous but it is compulsory and teachers are expected to take whatever been shared to them for implementation.

Each day after PLC, I reflect deeply on the impact of this new curriculum to the future of our country. I came to the conclusion that the entire concept is good but the implementation strategies must be looked at from the perspective of teachers.

No doubt the new curriculum has come to stay but we must not be implementing a curriculum targeting at solving the contemporary educational challenges and the social, economic, cultural and technological needs of a country with rigidity. Such will defeat the essence of the transformation. As a teacher, my position has not changed, and my colleagues know too well where I stand and I have always offered my opinion mostly criticising some of the weaknesses of the curriculum.

Firstly, I fully support the inclusion of ICT, including Artificial Intelligence, in the new SHS curriculum. Our students live in a digital world. If we do not equip them with AI literacy, critical digital skills, and problem-solving with technology, we are setting them up to be consumers instead of creators.

The irony, however, is that the same tool we want students to understand is now being pushed as a replacement for the teacher. That is where I draw the line.

Proponents of “AI in the classroom” argue that it personalizes learning and solves the problem of limited resources. But they forget what teaching really is.To me, teaching is not fixed. My pedagogical choices on any given day depend on three main things:

1. The level and capacity of the learner sitting in front of me

2. The learner’s environment, what they ate, what they heard at home, the language they think in

3. The availability of teaching and learning materials and my ability to improvise when they are not there

In the same class, teaching the same lesson, Strategy A may fail. An experienced teacher reads the room and immediately switches to Strategy B. That split-second professional decision, born from training and experience, cannot be coded.

Any system that seeks to limit the creativity, innovation, and flexibility of the teacher is dead on arrival.

Let us remember that those who developed AI are human beings, leveraging critical reasoning, problem solving, and innovation.

If we make both teachers and students AI-dependent, we are cutting down the very tree that bore the fruit. The nucleus of a productive nation is not information retrieval. It is critical thinking, innovation, and problem solving.

National values cannot be practical if learning becomes an exchange between a student and unsieved, AI-generated information. Our students need natural, practical life interchange like debate in class, mentorship after class, correction with tone and context, and the “unique ambiance” of a human space.

I am not against discovery learning. Students must explore, ask questions, and experiment. But discovery must be regulated.

The internet and AI are full of information that is biased, inaccurate, or culturally irrelevant to a student in Wa, Lawra, Fian, Jirap, or Ho. Without a trained teacher to sieve, contextualize, and guide, discovery becomes confusion.

For the new curriculum to succeed, we must do four things: Teach ICT and AI as core 21st century skills, but reject the idea of using AI to deliver lessons to learners. We must use AI as a tool for teachers in lesson planning, research, and assessment, not as a substitute for teacher judgment. Government and stakeholders must invest in teacher training, TLM, and classroom resources instead of pretending an app can replace teacher improvisation. Finally, we must promote regulated, guided discovery and guard against unfiltered, AI-dependent learning.

Ghana does not have a shortage of information. We have a shortage of guided learning, mentorship, and professional teachers who can adapt.

If the new SHS curriculum succeeds, it will be because it trusted teachers. If it fails, it will be because it tried to digitize what is fundamentally human.

The classroom is not a server room. It is a human space. Let’s keep it that way.

Denis Andaban

Birifoh Senior High School