A timely exploration, Jeff. How much interference is enough. What does it mean. Where does originality end and groupthink blend in? What is the difference in using ChatGPT to make suggestions vs three rounds in feedback and ideas gym?
AI has become another challenge as my students are always looking for shortcuts in getting their work done. I stress the importance of learning to be an effective writer and doing their own work. But I am still finding numerous students on every assignment using AI. Even personal essays or interviews. I hate having to threaten every time I give an assignment. Thoughts?
Hi Janell, I can only imagine what it's like to be a teacher these days. As you mention, they absolutely need to learn to write on their own. I wonder if there might be *one or two* assignments where you deliberately allow them to use AI services but then raise the bar much higher on the expected volume and quality of the assignment. The other idea that came to mind is making them write while in class, pen and paper. Two cents.
Definitely have done more pen and paper assignments lately.
I did one thing last year where we had looked at primary sources and then I gave them a generic AI produced essay and they had to add quotes and info from the primary sources to beef it up. I am all for teaching them how to use AI as a tool not as a substitute for their own work.
I don’t use AI in my writing, but I do use Otter to record and transcribe my interviews. Lately I’ve noticed that it’s aggressively prompting me to use its AI feature. It also supplies (unasked) an AI-generated summary of my interview. I haven’t systematically evaluated these summaries, but I have sometimes noticed that it gets things hilariously wrong (for instance, misattributing opinions to the wrong speaker). I remain skeptical of how useful these tools will be, at least for the type of work I do.
A timely exploration, Jeff. How much interference is enough. What does it mean. Where does originality end and groupthink blend in? What is the difference in using ChatGPT to make suggestions vs three rounds in feedback and ideas gym?
Thanks. Good questions!
AI has become another challenge as my students are always looking for shortcuts in getting their work done. I stress the importance of learning to be an effective writer and doing their own work. But I am still finding numerous students on every assignment using AI. Even personal essays or interviews. I hate having to threaten every time I give an assignment. Thoughts?
Hi Janell, I can only imagine what it's like to be a teacher these days. As you mention, they absolutely need to learn to write on their own. I wonder if there might be *one or two* assignments where you deliberately allow them to use AI services but then raise the bar much higher on the expected volume and quality of the assignment. The other idea that came to mind is making them write while in class, pen and paper. Two cents.
Definitely have done more pen and paper assignments lately.
I did one thing last year where we had looked at primary sources and then I gave them a generic AI produced essay and they had to add quotes and info from the primary sources to beef it up. I am all for teaching them how to use AI as a tool not as a substitute for their own work.
I think everybody who writes and trys out Chatgpt ends up with this question/essay. I also had a draft titled original thought.
Curious why you used ChatGPT instead of Otter’s own AI bot. Is Chat GPT better at cleaning up the prose?
I haven’t played with Otter’s AI as much, so I’m not sure. It’s a good question.
I don’t use AI in my writing, but I do use Otter to record and transcribe my interviews. Lately I’ve noticed that it’s aggressively prompting me to use its AI feature. It also supplies (unasked) an AI-generated summary of my interview. I haven’t systematically evaluated these summaries, but I have sometimes noticed that it gets things hilariously wrong (for instance, misattributing opinions to the wrong speaker). I remain skeptical of how useful these tools will be, at least for the type of work I do.