While you can run an llm on an “old” laptop with an Nvidia GC it will likely be really slow. Like several minutes to much much longer slow. Huggingface.co is a good place to start and has a ton of different LLMs to choose from that range from small enough to run on your hardware to ones that won’t.
As you are a teacher you know that research is going to be vital to your understanding and implementing this project. There is a plethora of information out there. There will not be a single person’s answer that will work perfectly for your wants and your hardware.
When you have figured out your plan and then run into issues that’s a good point to ask questions with more information about your situation.
I say this cause I just went through this. Not to be an ass.
I used to use Sleep As Android. All kinds of functionality. Monitors your sleep and records when an “event” happens. Talking in your sleep, snoring, sirens. Easy to review sounds. Charts integrations alarms you name it. Don’t use it anymore cause I just don’t care about my sleep habits.