The Workshop That Made a Maths Teacher Cry (Almost)

We walked into St. Paul's Matric Hr Sec School, Vaniyambadi on a Tuesday morning, and the security guard recognized us. "Navaratan? Sujal? You boys come back for TC copy ah?" We weren't there for a transfer certificate. We were there to teach.

Five years ago, we sat in those classrooms. We wrote exams in that hall. We got scolded by those same teachers for talking too much during assembly. We completed our 12th standard here in 2021 and walked out thinking we'd never come back in any official capacity.

We came back — not as students, but as the guys running the AI workshop.

Why We Did This

Here's the thing about small-town India: the people who teach you are often the most underserved when it comes to new technology. Our teachers at St. Paul's are dedicated. They care. They've been teaching for 15, 20, sometimes 25 years. But nobody has ever walked into their staff room and said, "Hey, there are free tools that can cut your workload in half."

We know this because we've lived it. When we started using AI for Stashed and 2BFT, we realized something uncomfortable: the tools that transformed our business could also transform a classroom. And nobody was bringing these tools to schools like ours.

So we reached out. No formal proposal. No PowerPoint. We just called the school, explained what we wanted to do, and said: "It's free. We just want to help."

They said yes. Probably because they remembered us as the two boys who were always up to something. Some things don't change.

The Setup

We kept it simple. No fancy projector setup. No branded slides with our logo plastered everywhere. Just a laptop connected to the school's old projector, a whiteboard, and a room full of teachers who were equal parts curious and skeptical.

The skepticism was fair. These teachers have seen plenty of "technology initiatives" come and go. Smart boards that nobody uses. Computer labs with outdated machines. "Digital India" posters on walls next to chalk-dusted blackboards. They've been promised tech revolutions before. None of them materialized.

So when two former students walk in saying "we're going to teach you AI," the raised eyebrows were expected. That skepticism is exactly why we give away free skills — gatekeeping knowledge doesn't serve anyone.

What We Actually Taught

We didn't start with theory. No "AI is the fourth industrial revolution" slides. No history of neural networks. Teachers don't need that. They need to see it work.

Gemini for lesson planning. We opened Gemini right there, typed in a prompt: "Create a lesson plan for Class 10 Chemistry — Periodic Table classification, 45-minute session, include two activities and three assessment questions." The output appeared in seconds. A complete, structured lesson plan that would have taken 30-40 minutes to write manually.

The room went quiet. That's when we knew we had them.

Claude for worksheet generation. We showed them how to generate differentiated worksheets — easy, medium, hard — for the same topic in under five minutes. One teacher (Mrs. Lakshmi, English department) immediately asked, "Can it make worksheets for different learning levels in the same class?" Yes. Yes it can.

Nano Banana for visual aids. This was the fun part. We generated images of historical events, science diagrams, geographical formations — all in real time. The Social Studies teacher leaned forward and asked us to generate an image of the Indus Valley Civilization's drainage system. When it appeared on screen, detailed and accurate, he just nodded slowly. That nod was worth the entire trip.

Every single tool we demonstrated was free. We kept hammering this point because it matters more than anything else. AI is for everyone — our dad's story is the clearest proof: a 52-year-old jeweller using Gemini in Hindi on a Jio phone, no tech background required. Schools don't have AI budgets. Teachers don't have personal software subscriptions. If the tool isn't free, it doesn't exist for them. Gemini — free. Claude free tier — free. Nano Banana — free tier available. No budget required. Just curiosity and a phone.

Mr. Naresh, Maths Teacher

Every workshop has a moment that makes it all worth it. Ours was Mr. Naresh.

Mr. Naresh has been teaching mathematics at St. Paul's for over a decade. He's the kind of teacher who stays after school to help struggling students. The kind who writes extra problems on the board because the textbook "doesn't have enough practice." We know this because we were his students. We've been on the receiving end of those extra problems.

When we first approached him about the workshop idea, he listened politely. You could tell he was humoring us a bit — two former students who probably still can't solve differential equations, now claiming they can teach him something.

But he gave it a shot. That's the thing about good teachers — they're learners at heart.

We showed him Gemini Learning Mode. Specifically, we showed him how it could take a complex, multi-step maths problem — the kind that sprawls across three pages in a textbook — and break it down into a clear, concise solution that fits on one page. Same rigor. Same mathematical accuracy. Just better explanation.

He tried it for a week after the workshop. Then he called Nav.

His exact words: "We listened to them explain it. I tried it for a week. I was blown away."

Years of teaching maths. Thousands of problems solved on blackboards. And Gemini Learning Mode showed him a way to explain complex 3-page sums so they fit in a single page — cleaner, clearer, more intuitive for students to follow.

His recommendation, which he gave us permission to share: "Thanks Navaratan and Sujal. I recommend every school adopt AI workshops."

Coming from a teacher who has been in the trenches for over a decade, that means everything. This isn't a LinkedIn influencer endorsing AI for clout. This is a man who spends his days making sure 15-year-olds understand quadratic equations, telling us that this actually works.

We're not going to pretend we didn't get emotional. We almost did. He almost did. The room almost did. Let's just say there was a lot of eye-rubbing and sudden interest in ceiling fans.

What Happened After

The workshop sparked something we didn't fully anticipate. Teachers started a WhatsApp group (of course they did — this is India). They share prompts now. Mrs. Lakshmi posts her Claude-generated comprehension passages. Mr. Naresh shares Gemini-solved problems. The Science department has started using AI-generated diagrams in their notes.

None of this required a budget approval. None of this needed IT infrastructure. None of this needed permission from the education board. Just teachers, phones, and free tools.

EDII Tamil Nadu Workshop

St. Paul's wasn't our only workshop. We also completed an AI workshop for EDII Tamil Nadu (Entrepreneurship Development and Innovation Institute). Different audience — aspiring entrepreneurs and trainers — but the same core realization: people are hungry for practical AI skills, and nobody is teaching them in a way that's accessible and free.

The EDII workshop reinforced what we learned at St. Paul's: the demand is massive. The supply of practical, no-nonsense AI training is almost zero. Especially outside metros. Especially for people who aren't tech professionals.

The Real Point

We didn't do this workshop for content. We didn't do it for engagement metrics. We did it because five years ago, these teachers gave us their time, their knowledge, and their patience. The least we could do is come back and share what we've learned since.

But here's the thing that gets us excited: this is replicable. Everywhere.

Every town in India has schools. Every school has teachers who are overworked and under-supported. Every one of those teachers has a smartphone. And every tool we demonstrated in that workshop is free.

The barrier isn't money. It isn't technology. It isn't infrastructure. The barrier is that nobody has walked into those staff rooms and shown them what's possible.

That's a solvable problem. We know because we just solved it in Vaniyambadi.

If You're Reading This and You Run a School

We're serious about this. If you're a school administrator, college dean, or training institute — we run these workshops.

Want us to run an AI workshop at your school, college, or institution? We've done it at St. Paul's, EDII Tamil Nadu, and more. We customise every session to your audience — teachers, students, or administrative staff — in English, Tamil, or Hindi. No technical background needed from your end.

Get a quote: Email [email protected] with your institution name, audience size, and preferred language. We respond within 24 hours.

Your teachers deserve to know about these tools. Your students deserve teachers who have them.

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Want to explore the AI skills we taught in these workshops? The 2BFT Academy skill library has them all — free, no sign-up needed.