You can use AI to design timed challenges, scoring criteria, and real-time prompts that turn any workshop segment into a friendly competition that boosts energy and participation.
Why Challenges Work in Live Workshops
A well-run challenge does something a lecture can’t: it makes people play. When participants are racing a clock or comparing results with a neighbor, they stop passively watching and start doing. That shift — from audience to participant — is where real learning happens.
Think of it like a spelling bee in school. Nobody had to convince kids to care about spelling when there was a competition on the line. The same principle applies to adults learning to use AI tools, structure a course, or build a client onboarding process. Add a little friendly pressure and suddenly everyone is leaning forward.
How AI Helps You Build the Challenge
Give Claude or ChatGPT your workshop topic and ask it to generate a timed challenge with clear rules, a scoring rubric, and a debrief question. For example: “Design a 10-minute live challenge for a group of coaches learning to write AI prompts. Include a scoring guide and a question to discuss after.” The output gives you a ready-to-run activity in under two minutes.
AI is also good at generating the raw material for the challenge — the prompts participants respond to, the scenarios they work through, or the criteria they judge each other’s work against. You can ask for multiple difficulty levels so you can accommodate a mixed-skill group without anyone feeling left behind.
What This Means for Educators
As a trainer or coach running live sessions, challenges solve one of your biggest problems: keeping energy up after the first 30 minutes. Passive listening is easy to walk away from — a timed activity is not. When you build even one short competition into a 90-minute workshop, you break the session into memorable moments participants talk about afterward.
You don’t need special software. A shared Google Doc, a Zoom poll, or even a verbal countdown works. AI handles the design work so you can focus on facilitating.
The Simple Rule
Use AI to design the challenge, then run it yourself. Ask your AI tool for a 5-10 minute activity with clear rules, a way to score or compare results, and one debrief question. That structure is enough to turn a flat session into something participants remember. Once you run one, you will start building challenges into every workshop you design.