AI Prompts for Teachers: Lesson Planning Prompt Playbook, Middle School

One prompt frame for planning with AI, in any subject and any tool

This playbook doesn't hand you a long list of prompts to copy. It teaches one way to write a prompt (Task, Context, Constraints, Evidence, and Verify) so it works in whatever AI tool your school allows. You see the frame used on ten everyday planning jobs, each with a weak, better, and strong prompt and an explanation of what changed. Every job ends with checks you do yourself, without AI, because no prompt makes AI right every time.

What's Included

• Teacher notes on how to use the playbook

• The Frame: the five parts of a strong prompt, each with one plain sentence and an example line, plus all five put together

• Privacy First: rules for what goes into a prompt, and how to describe the need instead of the student

• Ten Teacher Jobs, each with a weak, better, and strong prompt, what changed between them, and a Check It Yourself step: lesson plan outline, leveled reading passage, practice questions with a key, rubric criteria, feedback starters, differentiation ideas, exemplar and non-example, vocabulary set, family email draft, and exit ticket ideas

• A Your Turn table for writing your own strong prompt, on nine of the ten jobs (the feedback starters job fits on one page)

• Revise a Prompt: what to change in the frame when an answer misses

• Pre-Flight Checklist: a one-page card to run before any AI output reaches students, with the three statuses (GREEN: CLEARED, YELLOW: RESTRICTED, and RED: HUMAN ONLY)

• Terms of use page

• Made for Google Drive: you get your own editable copy of the Google Doc.

How Teachers Use It

• Add the playbook to your Google Drive and read The Frame and Privacy First.

• Pick the job that matches your planning task, and read the weak, better, and strong prompts.

• Write your own strong prompt for your class in the Your Turn table, then use it in the AI tool your school allows.

• Do every step of Check It Yourself before you use the output.

• Run the Pre-Flight Checklist before anything reaches students.

Why It Works

• One frame works in any AI tool, so you aren't tied to special words or tricks.

• Seeing a weak, better, and strong prompt side by side shows exactly what makes a prompt stronger.

• Every job ends with your own check. Asking AI again does not count as a check.

• Every prompt works without any student information.

• The examples use invented classes and topics across science, math, social studies, and ELA, so you can change the details to fit your own class.

Pairs Well With

• Classroom AI Policy Kit https://payhip.com/b/RO28y: the same three statuses and AI Use Note, set as the AI policy for your class.

• Assignment Redesign Guide https://payhip.com/b/3kaco: six moves that make assignments harder to hand off to AI.

• Spotting AI-Written Work https://payhip.com/b/F90Rh: a calm writing conference for when a piece of work makes you wonder whether AI wrote it.

• AI Use Note Slips (free) https://payhip.com/b/XgcQd: short slips students turn in to show how they used AI, or that they didn't.

• AI Prompt Writing Unit for Middle School https://payhip.com/b/jzbqp is a five-day student unit on writing clear prompts.

• Department Meeting Mini-PDs (free) https://payhip.com/b/07WGL: three 15-minute AI sessions for staff.

Good to Know

• This playbook is a starting point to adapt to your school and district rules. It is not legal advice.

• No prompt makes AI right every time. The playbook teaches you to check the output yourself.

• One license covers one teacher. Each additional teacher needs their own license.

• Made for Google Drive: after checkout, open the link in your download and click Make a copy to get your own editable version. You need a Google account.

• Format: Google Docs.

• 25 pages in Google Docs.

• Grades 6-8, any subject.

For the full student curriculum, see the AI Literacy Curriculum for Middle School (5-unit bundle) https://payhip.com/b/Et7Rd.

About Us

We're a husband-and-wife team: a former elementary and middle school English teacher and structured literacy coach with a master's in instructional design, and a pilot.

The Human in Charge Team