New Teacher Feature alert!
Diane Wagener (email diane.wagener@eagleschools.net) is a language arts teacher and the head coach for the Speech and Debate team at Battle Mountain High School. She has been teaching for 23 years and has become more fascinated with the role of Generative AI (Artificial Intelligence) in education after attending the speech and debate coaching conference in Denver this past summer as well as her son's position as a sales engineer for a Series A start-up in NYC that is using AI to assist in legal document work. Read below for how she is using this emerging technology with her students!
What question were you trying to answer?
How did you decide to answer that question?
First, last Spring we used ChatGPT to help students generate literary analysis essays. Because the site was blocked for students during this time, we used it together on the “big screen,” marveling at the speed, laughing at the errors, critiquing the limitations, and in general, simply “playing” with it. We did lessons on developing prompts and discussed how problematic it would be if you didn’t read the book and simply trusted the AI to “get it right.” We had a hilarious exchange where we argued with the AI about a certain character in the story that the AI was trying to defend as a major protagonist! Specifically, the students took the AI-generated essays, edited them first for any misinterpretation, and then also added their own textual evidence and voice to the draft.
Currently, my students are working on one of the oral communication standards and using AI to generate "Words to live by" slogans and artwork. Then, using the AI-generated work, the students are pitching their slogans to the class. We are in the middle of this project, but the hope is that because the slogans were developed by AI the students won't feel self-conscious about them and instead, embrace the presentation component (since that's the standard being assessed.)
In the latter example, more to come! We are in the middle of this so I’m not sure if it will be evident that presenting AI-generated work versus something more personal will help kids focus on the presentation itself. For the former assignment, many students commented that getting a draft to edit versus starting from scratch gave them confidence in the writing process that they had never had before. Many students who were already strong writers did A LOT of editing. Those who normally struggle with the writing process felt good about their final essay because they saw (and hopefully learned) that the organizational structure of what the AI provided gave them a strong start…something that they don’t feel confident about normally in their English classes.
I think it would be foolish to be afraid to introduce the use of Generative AI in our classes at this point. It’s not going away and will continue to get better. Because AI is evolving and improving at light speed, doing things differently the next time has to be part of the process. The newer iterations of ChatGPT will stop relying on the internet to generate content and allow for a .pdf of the book, chapter etc. to be used - so the “mistakes” you hear about won’t likely be as much of a problem moving forward. I have always thought that it’s important as an educator to show my students that I am also a learner - not an expert - and learning with them is powerful. So, rather than avoiding AI, make it just another tool in your arsenal!
What impact did the solution have on your students?
In the latter example, more to come! We are in the middle of this so I’m not sure if it will be evident that presenting AI-generated work versus something more personal will help kids focus on the presentation itself. For the former assignment, many students commented that getting a draft to edit versus starting from scratch gave them confidence in the writing process that they had never had before. Many students who were already strong writers did A LOT of editing. Those who normally struggle with the writing process felt good about their final essay because they saw (and hopefully learned) that the organizational structure of what the AI provided gave them a strong start…something that they don’t feel confident about normally in their English classes.
If you were to do it all again, would you do anything different? Any other tips or tricks you would recommend for teachers wanting to implement something similar in their classroom?
I think it would be foolish to be afraid to introduce the use of Generative AI in our classes at this point. It’s not going away and will continue to get better. Because AI is evolving and improving at light speed, doing things differently the next time has to be part of the process. The newer iterations of ChatGPT will stop relying on the internet to generate content and allow for a .pdf of the book, chapter etc. to be used - so the “mistakes” you hear about won’t likely be as much of a problem moving forward. I have always thought that it’s important as an educator to show my students that I am also a learner - not an expert - and learning with them is powerful. So, rather than avoiding AI, make it just another tool in your arsenal!
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