A pre-workshop tech checklist for AI-assisted facilitation doesn’t need to be long — but it does need to be consistent. Five items, checked every time, eliminates the vast majority of avoidable live failures.
Why a Checklist Beats Memory
Experienced pilots use checklists not because they’re forgetful, but because checklists are more reliable than memory under pressure. Before a workshop, your attention is already partly on your content, your students, and your energy — which means tech setup is competing for cognitive bandwidth. A written checklist removes that competition. You follow the list, not your memory of what you think you already did.
The same logic applies to AI-assisted facilitation. The items on this checklist are all things you know to do — but “knowing” and “remembering to do it right before a session” are two different things.
The Five-Item AI Facilitation Checklist
One: AI tool open and logged in. Not just bookmarked — actively open in a pinned browser tab, with a confirmed active session. Two: all planned prompts tested. Every prompt you intend to use live has been run at least once today. You have read the outputs and they are accurate and appropriately sized. Three: screen share confirmed. You have tested your screen share in the same app you will use for the session — Zoom, Google Meet, or whatever your platform is — and confirmed that students will see the AI interface clearly. Four: backup activities written. For each AI moment in your session, you have one sentence in your notes describing what you will do if the tool is unavailable. Five: notifications silenced. All desktop notifications, email alerts, phone pings, and calendar reminders are off for the duration of the session.
What This Means for Educators
This checklist takes three to five minutes to run. That is a small investment against the risk of a 20-minute session derailed by a logged-out tool or a desktop notification popping up during a screen share. Treat it the way a surgeon treats a pre-op checklist — not optional, not improvised, not skipped because you are in a hurry.
The Simple Rule
Save this checklist somewhere you will see it before every session. The best checklist is a useless one if it lives only in your memory.