Examples
These examples are fictional and de-identified. Do not enter real student names, diagnoses, exact class lists, or sensitive details.
Safe classroom scenario
A Year 8 science teacher is planning a lesson on food webs and energy flow. Students will annotate a food web and explain what may happen if one organism is removed.
The teacher wants support for learners who can identify organisms but lose the cause-and-effect chain when writing explanations. The teacher also wants an extension option for students ready to reason about multiple changes in the ecosystem.
Weak input example
"Help my Year 8 class with food webs. Some students struggle and others finish early. Make it differentiated."
This is safe but weak. It does not include the learning goal, evidence of learning, task details, specific mismatch, or constraints.
Stronger de-identified Signal Brief example
Year level: Year 8
Subject: Science
Topic: Food webs and energy flow
Learning goal: Explain how energy moves through a food web and predict the effect of a change in one population.
Current task: Students annotate a food web, identify producers and consumers, then answer written cause-and-effect questions.
Required evidence: A short written explanation that predicts two effects of removing one organism from the food web.
Learner-task mismatch: Some learners can identify organisms but lose the reasoning chain when explaining indirect effects. Several students need vocabulary support before writing. A few students need a higher-challenge pathway that keeps the same learning goal.
Constraints: 45-minute lesson, pairs allowed, no student devices.
What stays constant: The learning goal and written evidence of cause-and-effect reasoning.
What can change: Vocabulary support, diagram scaffold, sentence stems, worked example, peer talk structure, and extension scenario.
Sample prompt excerpt
"Use the de-identified Signal Brief to create a scaffolded resource that preserves the learning goal and required evidence. State what stays constant, what changes, and how the scaffold can be faded. Avoid lowering expectations by default. If the brief is too weak, ask clarifying questions before giving strategies."
Why the stronger version is safer and more useful
The stronger version does not identify students. It focuses on the lesson goal, task, evidence, observable learner-task mismatch, and practical constraints.
It also gives the external AI tool enough context to produce planning support that is tied to the task rather than a generic list of strategies.