I suppose at times I come across as being generally very cautious about AI. That reputation is deserved, and anyone following the Grok image generation controversy this week will understand why.
When AI is in the wrong hands, the consequences are serious.
But in the right hands, used ethically and with genuine subject expertise, AI allows you to create things you could only have dreamt of.
Two months ago, JavaScript or Python would have sent me running for the hills. Now? I’ve just built two quiz apps using Claude Code and Gemini. One covers Irish History anniversaries , the other World and European History. Both challenge you to place key 2026 anniversaries in chronological order.
As a history teacher, timelines matter to me. Chronological thinking is fundamental to how students understand cause and consequence. These apps let students test that understanding in an interactive way I could never have built before. Both are the result of what is known as Vibe Coding.
You can give them a spin here:
World and European History Quiz
Irish History Anniversaries Quiz
What Is Vibe Coding?
The term was coined by Andrej Karpathy, a co-founder of OpenAI. You describe to the AI (in this case mainly Anthropic’s Claude) what you want in plain language. The AI writes the code. You see and run the result, request changes, and iterate until it matches your vision.
Using the recording feature in Claude from Anthropic, I could simply speak my instructions aloud: what I wanted, what was not working, what needed to change.
I suspect one skill I have developed over thirty years of teaching is giving clear instructions. That matters here more than I initially realised.
This Is Not Easy
The AI does not produce a perfect app. Far from it. The process involves constant iteration. Here is what that actually looks like:
- The quiz displays but the events appear in random order on the review screen
- The sound effects work on Chrome but not Safari
- The colours clash on the intro screen
- The text is unreadable on mobile
- The drag and drop function is laggy
- The screenshot prompt appears at the wrong moment
- The timer counts up instead of down etc.
Each problem requires you to identify what is wrong, articulate clearly what needs to change, review the result, and repeat. None of this happens automatically.
Birthday Cakes for Deaths and Hunger Strikes
At one point, the AI decided every anniversary needed a birthday cake icon. Every single one. Including the deaths of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, as well as the beginning of the Blanket Protests during the Northern Irish Troubles.
Why?
The AI has no understanding of context, tone, or appropriateness. It does not know that a birthday cake beside “Beginning of the Blanket Protests” is grotesque. It simply saw “anniversary” and reached for the wrong conclusion.
I caught it immediately. A non-specialist might not have noticed. A student using AI without subject expertise or good old “cop on” might see no issue. The bottom line here is plain to be seen.
These tools amplify whatever you bring to them.
Bring expertise, and you get powerful resources.
Bring ignorance, and you get confident nonsense, inappropriately decorated with birthday cakes.
I Am Beginning to Learn
Here is an unexpected development. After building several of these apps, I am starting to recognise patterns in the code. I can now jump in directly, make small changes myself, and save prompts. This matters because even on the premium version, Claude limits how many prompts you can use. Knowing when to edit directly and when to ask the AI saves time and keeps you moving.
I am certainly not a coder. But I am no longer entirely dependent on the AI for every minor adjustment.
The Real Value
The process demands patience and attention. But the resources this allows me to create are genuinely useful: interactive quizzes tailored precisely to the Leaving Cert curriculum, built by someone who would previously have needed to hire a developer or simply do without.
If someone like me can produce functional educational apps in a matter of hours, I genuinely cannot wait to see what trained developers will create.
Patrick Hickey is the Head of History with the Tuition Centre. He is one of Ireland Ireland’s leading providers of Teacher AI CPD in Ireland. Patrick has been featured on Irish media outlets such as RTÉ Six-One News, TV3’s “Tonight Show,” “The Irish Times” and Newstalk Radio on the area of AI in Education.
Email Patrick at aiteachingguru@gmail.com for any requests for training, webinars, workshops or keynote speaking