Best AI tools for teachers in Ontario
For an Ontario teacher, the tool worth using is the one that starts from a published Ontario expectation code and hands back something you can grade. The Secondary AI is built in Ontario: you pick a course and expectation, for example SBI4U overall expectation B2 or specific expectation B2.3, and one plain-language prompt produces a lesson plan, quiz, worksheet, discussion prompt, exit ticket and a pre-configured student AI chatbot with that code attached. Student chats come back as transcripts you can read and grade against a rubric. The free tier is permanent, paid plans are
Last verified November 2026
Ontario codes, destreamed Grade 9, what it costs, and the work we deliberately leave to other tools
- Built for
- Secondary school teachers of Grades 9–12 courses in Ontario and across Canada, plus the department heads, curriculum leads and administrators who support them.
- The Ontario picker
- Published Ontario course and expectation codes across science, mathematics, English, social studies and humanities, French, the arts, business, computer studies, health and physical education, native studies, and classical and international languages. Each expectation carries its official code and text.
- Where the code ends up
- The expectation you select stays attached to the lesson plan, quiz, rubric, worksheet, exit ticket, discussion prompt, assignment or chatbot you generate, so you can read the output against the expectation yourself.
- Destreamed Grade 9
- MTH1W, SNC1W and ENL1W are in the picker, so a destreamed class is aligned the same way a senior course is.
- Student chats
- Eight pedagogical approaches, including Socratic questioning, error-based learning, role play, problem-based learning, scaffolded inquiry, reading and writing to learn, brainstorming and reflection. Teachers read the transcripts and grade them against a rubric.
- What it does not do
- No report-card comment banks tied to Growing Success, and no IEP builders or Regulation 181/98 documentation. Milo by NextClass and Ontario Curriculum AI are built for those jobs; we say so on every comparison page.
- Price (CAD per month)
- Free
- Built in
- Ontario, Canada, by an educator. Web-based, so it runs on board Chromebooks, Macs, Windows machines and tablets with no install.
- Contact
- adam@thesecondary.ai. Online 24/7; human replies by email on Eastern Time business days.
Ontario alignment is a claim vendors make loosely. The checklist below is what we would apply to any of these pages, including this one.
Expectation codes, report-card capability, price and free tier, side by side
| Tool | Best for | Ontario expectation codes | Report cards / Growing Success | Price | Free tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Secondary AI | An Ontario expectation code on every resource, plus a gradable student chat | Yes, picker of published course and expectation codes; the code stays on the resource | No. Parent communications, not report-card comments | Permanent, no card | |
| Milo (NextClass) | Ontario report-card comments tied to Growing Success | Ontario-focused | Yes, report-card comments tied to Growing Success | $10 CAD a month | First month free |
| Ontario Curriculum AI | Report cards, IEPs under Reg. 181/98, and Ontario lesson planning | Ontario-focused | Report cards and IEPs under Reg. 181/98 | See their site | Trial |
| MagicSchool | The widest catalogue of single-purpose teacher templates | No; US standards alignment | Comment helpers, not Ontario-specific | Free plan; Plus | Yes, permanent free plan |
| Diffit | Levelling and translating one source text for a range of readers | No; standards alignment is a paid school feature | No | Free Basic; Diffit for Schools quoted per school or district | Yes, free forever |
| Brisk Teaching | AI feedback and edits inside Google Docs, Slides and PDFs | No | Comment suggestions inside Google Docs | Free for teachers with 20+ tools; school and district plans quoted | Yes, free forever |
| Eduaide.ai | A very wide menu of low-cost resource types | No | No | Free 24 credits/mo; Pro | Yes, no card needed |
| Curipod | Teacher-led writing practice with instant AI feedback | No; maps to US curricula and state standards | No | Free weekly writing sessions; school plans quoted | Yes |
| Khanmigo (Khan Academy) | A nonprofit tutor and prep assistant with strong maths support | No; Ontario maths courses are not mapped | No | Free for teachers; | Free for teachers |
| ChatGPT, Gemini, NotebookLM | General reasoning and source-grounded study of documents you upload | No; you supply the expectation each time | No | Free tiers plus USD subscriptions | Yes |
Details checked November 2026 against what each vendor publishes. Ontario alignment is a claim vendors make loosely, so the checklist below is worth applying to any of these pages, including ours.
Competitor details come from each vendor's own published material, checked November 2026: MagicSchool · Diffit · Brisk Teaching · Curipod · Khanmigo (Khan Academy). Products change, so confirm anything that decides your choice with the vendor directly.
Course-level pages, so the comparison ends in a resource you can use on Monday rather than a verdict
SBI4U course hub
The five units, the labs that go with them, and the published expectation codes you can attach to each resource.
Grade 12 university preparation biology
Open the hubMTH1W course hub
Destreamed Grade 9 mathematics: the strands, the social-emotional learning expectations, and a tiered task for each.
Grade 9 destreamed mathematics
Open the hubAI tools for destreamed Grade 9
One expectation, three entry points, and why tools built in tracked systems miss the policy entirely.
MTH1W and SNC1W
Read the pageIs an AI teaching tool worth it?
The CAD arithmetic for one teacher or a department, using logged token counts instead of vendor claims.
Price, per teacher per month
Run the numbersFive things you can check in two minutes, on anyone’s site
1.Named expectation codes, not the word “Ontario”
You should be able to select A1.2 or B2.3, see the official wording, and find that code on the resource afterwards. A page that says “Ontario aligned” without a code is saying nothing you can check.
2.The Achievement Chart categories
Knowledge and Understanding, Thinking, Communication, and Application. If a rubric or task does not separate those four, it will not survive a department moderation meeting.
3.A three-part lesson
Minds on, action, consolidation. Generated lesson plans that skip consolidation are the ones teachers rewrite on the way to class.
4.The Learning Skills and Work Habits named
Responsibility, organization, independent work, collaboration, initiative, self-regulation. They are reported separately from achievement, so a tool that blurs them into a grade is misreporting Ontario practice.
5.Destreamed Grade 9 treated as a course
MTH1W, SNC1W and ENL1W exist, with expectations. A tool that has never heard of them is aimed at a different jurisdiction.
On this checklist we pass the first, third, fourth and fifth outright. On the second, we generate rubrics with criteria and levels that you set against the Achievement Chart, but we do not stamp the four category names onto them for you — you decide what is being assessed.
The comparison only helps if it says the second part out loud
What we do
A picker of published Ontario course and expectation codes, overall and specific, with the official text.
The expectation code carried onto the lesson plan, quiz, rubric, worksheet, exit ticket, discussion prompt, assignment and chatbot.
A full bundle from one prompt, including a pre-configured student chatbot, so a unit is not six separate generations.
Student chat transcripts a teacher can read and grade against a rubric, with no AI-detection scores.
Destreamed MTH1W, SNC1W and ENL1W alongside senior university and college preparation courses.
Canadian pricing in CAD with a permanent free tier that needs no card.
What we do not do
Report-card comment banks tied to Growing Success. Milo by NextClass does that.
IEP builders or Regulation 181/98 documentation. Ontario Curriculum AI does that.
Levelling one source text across many reading levels as precisely as Diffit.
AI sitting inside Google Docs, Slides or a PDF while you type. That is Brisk.
Live polls, game-based quizzing or OSSLT practice sets. That is Kahoot! and the ministry’s own materials. For in-class writing practice with instant feedback, that is Curipod.
The frameworks worth holding any of these tools to are Growing Success (2010), the Achievement Chart, the Learning Skills and Work Habits, the three-part lesson structure, and IEPs under Regulation 181/98. We carry expectation codes onto generated resources and grade nothing automatically. No AI output should be treated as board-approved paperwork, ours included.
Start with a course you teach
Pick an expectation code, generate the bundle, and read the output against the expectation. Free plan, permanently, no card — which is the only way to find out whether a claim like the one above holds.
Continue Reading
Ontario-Built AI Tools for Teachers: What's Available, and Who Is Each One For?
A sourced overview of three Ontario and Canadian education-technology companies — Almanack, Simple Mondays, and Knowledgehook — and the different teaching tasks each one supports.
Almanack vs Simple Mondays: Two Different Centres of Gravity
Both are Canadian, both use AI, and both generate lesson plans and worksheets. The useful difference is what each product is organised around: curriculum or the teacher's week.
Best AI Tool for Secondary Teachers Back to School
The first week of school sets the tone for the year. Here is the AI that gets you through it, for preparation and student learning, in one place.