Artificial intelligence, AI has been taking the world by storm now. I’ve recently noticed how popular it has become in search engines on our computers to ask a simple question about a topic. It is available on Snapchat at the touch of your screen to ask your personal AI companion. It’s looked at as an advanced form of Google but gives you all the answers you’re looking for with the generated text provided but the problem is, it may be teaching us how to cheat our way through life.
In a Harvard Graduate article, I read about how AI may not be an enemy if used properly. Many remember that Chat GPT became available in November 2022, and many were eager to use this program but mostly it was not used for the right reasons. With many students who went through the COVID-19 years, trying to learn was a virtual nightmare. When ChatGPT became available after the pandemic was in a lull phase, this encouraged us to not use the proper studying techniques and hack our way through the system. As AI became more popular, the concern about academic integrity became more of an issue. Many wondered if it was inaccurate and just leading individuals down a rabbit hole of falsity. Teachers were now grappling with how to deal with the shift in this world as we now change the way we learn.
AI is here to stay, that much we know, but with that being said, how do we teach others to use it as a tool and not as a loophole? The bottom line is having teachers being educated on this matter is very important. Knowing how to use it, when the best time for it is, and how to provide it as a teaching tool. I’ve seen many different responses, including one at my university on how we can navigate our way through AI with the increase of student use on assignments and one common answer is changing the way we learn. We are in a digital age where social media and digital media are increasingly popular fields of interest for many. The recommendation that many teachers are leaning towards is engaging in AI along with their students when possible. What does this mean? It means changing basic assignments from the standard essay to maybe a video post, making it more digital and creative in terms of a basic assignment. Being a graduate student who teaches I have witnessed how many students take advantage of AI to complete an entire assignment and don’t truly learn anything since they are just trying to get an essay submitted by midnight. I think what a lot of students don’t realize is that AI detection is a thing, and we can see how much is used whether it’s 10 – 100%.
Teachers want their students to succeed in classes but it’s hard when you cannot see the true work of a student. With AI being our new normal it’s time to make changes in the way we learn. We are living in the digital world and with that we will have to adapt. I think education on AI would be great for educators worldwide so that they can navigate how to get the best out of their students by teaching them the proper ways to use a program like AI.