The topic of generative AI was the topic for me to avoid at all costs in my institution this semester. The primary theme when it came up, was that it is the latest and greatest cheating tool for our cheating cheatiest students. Never mind they are the most hard working, unsettled group we have taught with many of them struggling to find accommodations even as the semester has ended.
What I have found with my use of AI and the use of it in the classroom is AI products feels like filler a lot of the time unless carefully considered and it has been helpful. It helped me to be prompted to write when I have failed to find them in my own mind, helped me generate scenarios for my classes I can then build on, reminded me how to calculate marketing reach for a non-profit donations campaign I am involved in as a volunteer and given me a skeleton for developing training plans for coaching swimmers. It’s saved me some time for sure. Time that I can then devote to considering the people in front of me and their needs more carefully.
I have a few times now,I have been able to tell when a student has plugged in their assignment and generated an AI product. I also know they do this to save time, the same as I do when I use AI. Which means they haven’t had the time to put the thought in, or learn to be confident in presenting their writing skills or the understanding to create what is needed. Does it mean I am going to get punitive? Not so far. So far, It’s a conversation, a deadline extension and an opportunity to show me the true learning that has taken place through a different assessment or the opportunity to discuss what writing looks like when it is “general” and generated from AI and what it looks like when it can truly come from them.
A dialogue from a few weeks ago:
Me: “I came to this workshop to connect about experiential learning. I don’t want to talk about AI. I don’t want to talk about AI at all.”
Colleague: “AI is amazing, a game changer. Let me tell you everything I know about it…..” He proceeds to tell me everything about how AI will challenge the academy.
Me: Mentally checkout while my colleague talks at me for 5 minutes straight.
What I wish for is to talk about how we can work with students and how we can change the traditional schedules to help them learn and be successful. How we redesign programs and courses to make the learning appealing and possible for students. How to build consensus between ourselves and students to decide what their learning practice needs and what we can do to embed integrity in it and how to coach students to be critical and learn to be a part of a community. Those are the conversations I would like with my colleagues please. How to facilitate better with students, how to teach them to learn and how to design so they can accept the learning happening.