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If your school runs Microsoft 365 Education on an A3 or A5 license, you probably already have AI lesson-planning tools built in — most teachers just don’t know they’re there yet. Unlike ChatGPT, Gemini, or Claude’s teacher programs, there’s no individual sign-up or verification step: access is controlled by your school’s existing license, not by you.
In this guide: how to check whether you already have it, what the “Teach” module actually does, how to open it, what teachers are actually saying about the lesson plans it generates, and how it compares to the free programs from OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic.
Do You Already Have Copilot for Teachers?
As of July 2026, Microsoft made its AI-powered “Teach” module free for every Microsoft 365 Education customer on an A3 or A5 academic license, worldwide, with no increase in the per-user fee. If your district already pays for A3 or A5 Microsoft 365 Education, this is already switched on at the license level — there’s nothing for an individual teacher to sign up for or get verified for.
Separately, Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is available at no extra cost to anyone signed in with a school (Entra ID) account, as long as the school’s tenant has an eligible Education license. A full paid tier, Microsoft 365 Copilot for Education, also exists at roughly $18 per user per month for schools that want more than the free Teach module and Copilot Chat provide.
If you’re not sure which license your school has, ask your IT department or district technology coordinator — this is an admin-controlled setting, not something you can unlock yourself.
What Is the "Teach" Module?
Teach is a dedicated home inside the Microsoft 365 Copilot app where educators can access AI-powered teaching tools without hunting through a general chatbot for the right prompt. Instead of a blank chat box, you get guided workflows built specifically for lesson planning, rubric and quiz generation, and differentiating material for different learners.
It works on Windows, Mac, and the web, and shows up inside both the Microsoft 365 Copilot app and Microsoft Teams for Education.
The 4 Things Teach Actually Does
Teach isn’t a general-purpose chatbot — it’s four specific, guided workflows. Here’s what each one actually produces.
1. Lesson Plans
You give it a topic, grade level, and standard, and it drafts a lesson structure you can then edit. Teachers reviewing early versions have flagged that the output tends toward descriptive, expository lessons — the teacher explains, students listen — rather than inquiry-driven or student-centered activities. Treat it as a starting skeleton to rebuild around active learning, not a finished plan.
2. Rubrics
Generates scoring criteria for an assignment based on what you describe. Useful as a first draft of the categories and language, but review the point breakdown yourself — generated rubrics tend to need rebalancing once you see them against real student work.
3. Quizzes
Drafts questions and answer keys from a topic or source material. Double-check anything generated for math or other fact-heavy subjects specifically — reviewers have flagged that generated content in these areas can contain factual errors that aren’t always obvious on a first read.
4. Differentiation
Takes existing material and adjusts language, reading level, length, and difficulty for different learners, with support for academic standards from 35+ countries. This is the workflow with the least controversy attached — rewriting a fixed piece of content to a different reading level is a narrower, more checkable task than generating a lesson from scratch.
How to Open Teach
- Sign in with your school (Entra ID) account at Microsoft 365 or in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app.
- Open the Microsoft 365 Copilot app on Windows, Mac, or the web, or open Microsoft Teams for Education.
- Look for Teach in the left-hand side panel of the Microsoft 365 landing page or inside the Copilot app.
- Pick a workflow — lesson plan, rubric, quiz, or differentiation — and follow the guided prompts.
If you don’t see it, your school’s license may not be an eligible Education SKU yet, or the feature may not be turned on in your tenant — check with your IT department rather than assuming it isn’t available at all.
Is It Actually Good? What Teachers Are Saying
Early educator reviews have been genuinely mixed, and the criticism is specific enough to be worth reading before you rely on it:
- Pedagogy concerns. The most common critique is that Teach’s default lesson plans miss key elements of effective teaching — particularly student-centered learning and built-in formative checks for understanding — and tend to position students as passive listeners rather than active participants.
- Limited customization. Once a lesson plan is generated, restructuring its underlying pedagogical approach is more constrained than working with a general-purpose AI chatbot — you can edit the text, but reshaping the teaching method itself is harder.
- Accuracy in fact-heavy subjects. Generated content in math and other fact-based subjects can contain errors that aren’t always obvious without checking.
One educator summed up the broader worry this way: leaving pedagogy design entirely to a technology company risks producing tools that quietly encode a narrow, outdated model of teaching. That’s a reasonable caution, not a reason to avoid the tool — it’s a reason to treat every generated lesson as a draft you actively reshape, not a plan you hand to students as-is.
Security and Privacy Notes
Because Copilot in Microsoft 365 can surface content from across your school’s existing Microsoft 365 environment — files, emails, Teams messages — permissions matter more here than with a standalone chatbot. If your school’s file and folder permissions are misconfigured, Copilot can potentially surface content to a user who shouldn’t have access to it, simply because it searches across what you’re technically permitted to see.
This isn’t a flaw specific to the Teach module — it’s a general property of how Copilot integrates with an organization’s existing Microsoft 365 data. Worth raising with your IT department: has anyone audited SharePoint, OneDrive, and Teams permissions since Copilot was turned on?
Microsoft Copilot vs ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude for Teachers
Copilot for Teachers | ChatGPT for Teachers | Gemini for Teachers | Claude for Teachers | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
How you get access | Your school’s existing A3/A5 license | Individual verification | Workspace for Education account | Individual or district signup |
Cost | Free with eligible license | Free through June 2028 | Free with Workspace for Education | Free 1 year from signup by June 2027 |
Signature feature | Guided Teach workflows (lesson/rubric/quiz/differentiation) | Unlimited flagship-model access | Deep Google Classroom integration | Standards mapped to all 50 states |
See our full reviews of ChatGPT for Teachers, Google Gemini for Teachers, and Claude for Teachers.
Frequently Asked Questions
The Teach module and Copilot Chat are free at no extra cost if your school has an eligible Microsoft 365 Education license (A1, A3, or A5). A separate paid tier, Microsoft 365 Copilot for Education, costs roughly $18 per user per month for schools that want more.
No. Unlike ChatGPT, Gemini, or Claude’s teacher programs, access is controlled entirely by your school’s existing license — there’s no individual verification step for a teacher to complete.
Ask your IT department or district technology coordinator whether your school’s Microsoft 365 Education plan is an A1, A3, or A5 academic SKU. If it is, Teach and Copilot Chat should already be available to you.
Not always. Reviewers have flagged that generated content in math and other fact-heavy subjects can contain errors, and that default lesson plans lean toward passive, teacher-led formats rather than student-centered activities. Treat every output as a draft to check and reshape.
Copilot works within your school’s existing Microsoft 365 permissions, which means misconfigured file and folder permissions can let it surface content to users who shouldn’t see it. Ask your IT department whether SharePoint, OneDrive, and Teams permissions have been reviewed since Copilot was enabled.
The biggest difference is access: Copilot is unlocked by your school’s license, not by an individual teacher signing up. Its strength is the four guided Teach workflows; the others focus more on open-ended chat access.
Should You Use It?
If your school already pays for Microsoft 365 Education A3 or A5, there’s no real downside to opening Teach and trying it — it costs nothing extra and takes a few minutes to find. Just don’t treat the first draft of a lesson plan, rubric, or quiz as finished. The recurring theme in early educator feedback is the same one that applies to every AI teaching tool on this site: useful as a fast first draft, not a replacement for your own judgment about what actually works in your classroom.
See our ChatGPT for Teachers, Google Gemini for Teachers, and Claude for Teachers reviews for the individual-signup alternatives.
Want an AI skill you can add to your resume? See our guide to free AI certifications for teachers.