This study integrated the Smart Education of China platform and calligraphy AI agent to create an innovative U-OCAET model for primary school calligraphy appreciation, enhancing educational quality and students’ core literacy. Addressing current challenges like inflexible handwriting skills, limited aesthetic literacy, and superficial cultural understanding, the model was developed based on unit teaching, instructional design, gestalt, and deep learning theories. It integrated unit design(Unit), literacy-oriented objectives(Objectives), “task group + question chain” teaching content(Content), AI-empowered appreciation activities(Activities), human-intelligent collaborative evaluation(Evaluation), and technology empowerment(Technology). A two-month quasi-experiment in a Guangzhou primary school validated the model’s effectiveness. Results indicated that the model significantly enhanced students’ calligraphy basic knowledge, generated calligraphy appreciation works, and improved calligraphy core literacy. This research offers a valuable design perspective and practical methods for the digital transformation of calligraphy appreciation classrooms.