Using AI to help students better visualize animal adaptations

At this station, I'll share an AI-powered activity I developed with my fifth-grade students to explore animal adaptations, biomimicry, and evolutionary biology — and attendees will get to try the core activity themselves. In the original project, students first used an AI image generator to research existing animal adaptations, inputting prompts like 'polar bear thick fur adaptation' or 'camel hump water storage' to visualize and analyze how specific features helped animals survive in their biomes. Next, students used the AI tool to design their own hypothetical animals with unique adaptations for a specific, challenging environment. They defined the environment's parameters — temperature, food source, gravity, etc. — and used the AI to generate an image of their creature based on the required adaptations. The project culminated in a presentation where students explained their animal's adaptations and the biological principles that inspired them, demonstrating how AI served as a tool for scientific creativity. As an extension, students used their AI model to 3D print their new animals