EdTechTeacher is excited to be back presenting at the MassCue Fall Conference at Gillette Stadium! One of the best edtech conferences in the nation, MassCue has always proven to be an amazing event that showcases the best in educational technology and digital learning strategies.

This year's conference carried a noticeably different energy. Hallway conversations between sessions kept circling back to the same question: how do you teach critical thinking about technology when the technology itself is evolving faster than curriculum committees can meet? Attendees swapped stories about students showing up to class having already used generative AI to draft essays, remix artwork, and build functioning apps on their phones over the weekend. Several educators mentioned that their biggest challenge wasn't getting students interested in technology — it was helping them evaluate the technology already competing for their attention.

That theme of digital ubiquity surfaced repeatedly throughout the weekend. One breakout discussion explored how AI-driven personalization now shapes nearly every digital experience students encounter outside the classroom, from the recommendation engines behind their streaming queues to adaptive difficulty systems inside mobile casinos and other app-based entertainment that adjusts in real time to user behavior. The point wasn't to catalogue every platform — it was to illustrate how pervasive the underlying technology has become, and why students need the analytical vocabulary to understand what's happening beneath the interface. A few teachers in the session noted that framing AI through examples students actually recognized made the abstract concepts far more concrete.

That practical, student-centered lens carried directly into the featured presentations. Across the main stage and smaller breakout rooms, speakers kept returning to the idea that the best way to prepare students for an AI-saturated world is to put creative tools in their hands and let them build with the same technology they're consuming passively everywhere else.

Check out our session slides and resources below!