Intro to AI

Adult Ed, Polson School District

Course Overview

Course Objectives

  • Learn about AI technology
  • Spend time playing with AI technology and exploring AI tools

Meeting Information

When

Every Monday from 5:00 to 6:30 PM

Starting February 2nd

Where

Polson High School Library

Instructor Contact

Best way to contact me is via email. My email is cjmulvaney@gmail.com

How to Use This Learning Hub

This learning hub is your central resource for the Intro to AI course. Each week, you'll find:

  • Slides: View or download presentation materials for each session
  • Independent Work Task/Assignment: Weekly assignments to practice what you've learned
  • Videos: Links to videos that are relevant to the week's content
  • Additional Resources: Links to helpful articles, tools, and further reading

Navigate through the weeks using the expandable sections below. I will update the content weekly as we progress through the course.

AI Tool Use Overview

Never used an AI chatbot? Start here.

  1. 1
    No paid subscriptions needed for this class. Don't pay for any AI subscriptions until you feel like you need to. This class is structured so that we can explore with free tools.
  2. 2
    Chat naturally. AI chatbots are designed to be conversational. Just type your questions or thoughts as you would in a normal conversation.
  3. 3
    Creating an account is helpful. You can use these tools without signing up, but creating an account allows you to view previous conversations and customize your experience.
  4. 4
    It's okay to experiment. Try asking questions in different ways. The AI learns from context, so providing details helps you get better responses.
  5. 5
    AI isn't always perfect. Chatbots can make mistakes or provide incomplete information. Always use your judgment and verify important facts.

Ready to chat with AI? Here are some that I recommend.

Generally these three AI chatbots perform very similarly. One is not necessarily "better" than the others.

ChatGPT

Created by OpenAI

Visit ChatGPT →

Claude

Developed by Anthropic

Visit Claude →

Gemini

Created by Google

Visit Gemini →

Note:This learning hub was built by Connor without writing any code. He built this website just by telling Claude Code, an AI powered coding tool, what he wanted to build.

Weekly Content

📚Slides

View the presentation slides below or download them as a PDF.

Download Slides (PDF)

✏️Independent Work Task/Assignment

Week 2 Independent Work Tasks

~45 minutes

Choose ONE task that feels comfortable to you

Task Option 130-40 minutes

Find Your AI Use Case

Best for:People still getting comfortable with AI chatbots

Use a ready-made interview prompt to have AI help you discover one practical thing you could use it for on a regular basis — at work, at home, or in your community.

Start Task
Task Option 240-45 minutes

Explore and Test Your AI Use Case

Best for:People comfortable chatting with AI who want to go deeper

Customize an interview prompt to fit your specific situation, have a focused conversation with AI about how it could help you, and then test-drive your top idea by having AI produce a real sample for you.

Start Task
Task Option 345 minutes

Design Your Own Deep-Dive Interview

Best for:People ready to build something substantial with AI

Design your own in-depth interview prompt from scratch, tailored to a specific area of your life where AI could be a real asset. Then run the full interview, and use what AI learns about you to kick off an ongoing project.

Start Task

🎥Videos

Video content will be added here once available

🔗Additional Resources

Copy and paste this prompt into your chatbot:

How many words are in the following sentence: “I stepped outside and felt the sharp mountain air instantly freeze my breath while the crunch of dry, powdery snow echoed loudly through the silent woods.”

OpenClaw is a new AI software that got a lot of news recently. Here are some videos to learn about that tech:

An A.I. Assistant That's Too Good to Be True?

Hard Fork explores OpenClaw, the open-source AI assistant that can manage your email, calendar, and more from the chat apps you already use — and why it's generating both excitement and skepticism.

The Bizarre World of Moltbook (And What It Means for You)

Hard Fork dives into Moltbook, a social network built entirely for AI agents where bots post, comment, and debate with each other — and what this strange experiment reveals about where AI is headed.

AI Coding Updates from OpenAI & Anthropic Are Good... Maybe Too Good?

AI For Humans breaks down the latest AI coding tools from OpenAI and Anthropic and what it means when AI can write and debug its own code.

📚Slides

View the presentation slides below or download them as a PDF.

Download Slides (PDF)

✏️Independent Work Task/Assignment

Week 3 Independent Work Tasks

~45 minutes

Choose ONE task that feels comfortable to you

Task Option 020-30 minutes

Your First AI Images

Best for:People who have never tried AI image generation before

Generate your first AI images by trying out simple prompts. This is a low-stakes, exploratory task — no specific goal, just play around and see what AI can create.

Start Task
Task Option 130-40 minutes

AI for Home Design & Iteration Practice

Best for:People who want practice having iterative conversations with AI

Use AI to brainstorm home design ideas for a room in your house. You'll practice iterating on AI's suggestions through follow-up questions — a key skill for getting better results from AI tools.

Start Task
Task Option 230-40 minutes

Generate a Song with Suno

Best for:People who want to try AI creative tools and have fun

Use Suno, an AI music generator, to create an original song. You'll give it a purpose, write a simple prompt, and generate a song you can actually listen to and share.

Start Task
Task Option 340-45 minutes

Design a Flyer with AI

Best for:People interested in practical design and visual content creation

Create a flyer for a real or imaginary event, business, or project using AI design tools. You'll explore two different approaches and reflect on what AI got right and what it struggled with.

Start Task

📚Slides

View the presentation slides below or download them as a PDF.

Download Slides (PDF)Open in Google Slides

✏️Independent Work Task/Assignment

Week 4 Independent Work Tasks

~45 minutes

Choose ONE task that feels comfortable to you

Task Option 125–35 minutes

Build Your Personal AI Instructions

Best for:People who want to make their chatbot feel like it actually knows them

Set up custom instructions for your AI — a short profile that lives in your chatbot's settings so it always knows who you are, how you like to communicate, and what you care about. You won't write these instructions yourself. Instead, you'll paste a prompt into your chatbot and let it interview you, one question at a time. When it's done, it'll hand you a ready-to-paste instructions block.

Start Task
Task Option 230–40 minutes

Explore NotebookLM

Best for:People comfortable chatting with AI who want to try a focused, custom workspace

NotebookLM is a Google tool that lets you upload your own documents and then have a conversation with them. You're not asking a general-purpose AI about the internet — you're asking your specific documents questions. It's surprisingly useful for manuals, health documents, organizational paperwork, and anything else you've ever wished you could just ask.

Start Task
Task Option 340–45 minutes

Build Your AI Context Vault

Best for:People who want to go deep on AI personalization and build something they'll actually keep using

The AI Context Vault is a structured document created by AI educator Allie Miller. It's designed to capture who you are across multiple dimensions of your life — your background, preferences, goals, communication style, and more — in a format you can hand to any AI to give it rich, instant context about you. Think of it as a detailed "about me" document built specifically for AI.

Start Task

🎥Videos

Video content will be added here once available

📚Slides

View the presentation slides below or download them as a PDF.

Download Slides (PDF)Open in Google Slides

✏️Independent Work Task/Assignment

Week 5 Independent Work Tasks

~45 minutes

Choose ONE task that feels comfortable to you

Task Option 125–45 minutes

Go Back to Week 4

Best for:People who want to revisit, finish, or go deeper on AI customization

Week 4 had three great tasks that a lot of people didn't get all the way through — or maybe you finished one and want to try another. This is your chance to pick up where you left off, or go deeper on something you found interesting.

Start Task
Task Option 230–45 minutes

Build Something with AI

Best for:People who want to try making something — a game, a webpage, or a story — using a free AI chatbot

This week Connor showed you that he built a working web app in about 2 hours using AI. You're going to try a version of that — without any coding knowledge, without any special tools, and without anything beyond the free chatbot you've already been using. You'll describe what you want to build, paste a starter prompt into ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini, and watch it make something. Then you'll poke at it, ask for changes, and see what happens.

Start Task

Connor is out of town this week — no class on March 9th. If you'd like to keep up with the topics we've been covering, check out the podcast episode below for an update on the Anthropic/OpenAI/Pentagon story from last week.

📚Slides

View the presentation slides below or download them as a PDF.

Download Slides (PDF)Open in Google Slides

✏️Independent Work Task/Assignment

Week 8 Independent Work Tasks

~45 minutes

Choose ONE task that feels comfortable to you

Task Option 1~5 minutes

Take the Feedback Survey

Best for:Everyone

This is the last week of the course. Your feedback helps make it better for the next group of students — take a few minutes to share your honest thoughts.

Start Task
Task Option 2~30–45 minutes

Explore Resources and Discuss

Best for:Everyone

Browse the blog posts and videos in the Week 8 Resources section. Pick one or two that interest you, read or watch them, and come ready to share your takeaways with the group.

Start Task
Task Option 3~45 minutes

Continue a Previous Week

Best for:People who want to finish earlier work or explore a topic they haven't tried yet

Every week's task sheet is still available at learning.connormulvaney.com. If there's something you didn't finish, want to go deeper on, or haven't tried yet — now's the time.

Start Task