AI is changing thinking!

By now, you have heard of ChatGPT. Maybe you have tried it, maybe not. Be assured that your children have tried it, and many use it at school.

I hear you wonder... How? How do they use ChatGPT (or other AI tools) at school?

Alarmingly!!!! To write their assignments for them. To build Google Slide presentations for them. To compose poems for them. To create pieces of art for them.

Essentially... to do their work and their thinking and their learning for them.

We have a school policy for Academic Integrity with strict consequences. The IB has very, very strict consequences for students who present the work of others as their own (no Diploma!). These policies are critical for emphasizing a very important point. We come to school to LEARN.

Demonstration of LEARNING is evidenced through ORIGINAL and INDEPENDENT thought.

When students use AI tools to do their work for them, there is no demonstration of learning. If it is not cited, it becomes an Academic Integrity issue (more on this below).

What is Possible???

It is now possible for your child to use ChatGPT to compose a 3000-word essay for their History class, titled "The History of Lebanon", written from the perspective of a 15 yr old Druze high school student. They don't need to know anything about Lebanon or anything about being a Druze or anything about history.

They can run a prompt through ChatGPT, copy the result, paste it into a Google Doc and submit it to their teacher. They might earn a very good grade. 

And herein lies the problem...

If, as I have written already, we focus our conversations with our children on Grades, then in this case, we would celebrate with our child...

Parent: "Well done! You earned an A for your Lebanon essay!"

Student: "Thank you"

Parent: "What do you know about Lebanon now?"

Student: "Aah... well... hmmm..."

We have NEVER encountered this challenge before, either as parents, as teachers, as students or as a school.

This challenge did not exist at the start of this school year! We all have a lot of learning to do to understand how to use this new technology in a way that does not sacrifice LEARNING.

LEARNING is critical because it is at the heart of BEING ABLE TO DO. 

AI is changing our thinking 

As shared above, the new AI tools that are at our fingertips have begun to change WHAT we think about, WHAT problems we solve, WHAT we spend our time researching.

Continuing with the earlier example of the Lebanon essay, the student in this example is mentally engaged in the following...

• What would be the best prompt to generate a good essay?

• How can I reword the prompt to improve the content?

• How can I change some of the words to make it read more like I wrote it?

• How can I use something I have already written to make the essay more like my style of writing?

Alarmingly, there are no thoughts about the history of Lebanon!

Knowing HOW to use this new technology becomes increasingly important. We are actively sourcing training for our teachers in using AI Tools so they can work with students next year to use the new technology in the most beneficial ways. 

A part of the challenge students face RIGHT NOW is not how to use it but WHEN.

Recently, we discovered that most students used AI to complete a major IB assessment task.

Because we are all learning about this new tech, and it is our role to teach, we are working with those students to resubmit ORIGINAL work - their OWN original work.

Rather than submit the work to the IBO and have it identified as not being original and all students then being banned from obtaining an IB Diploma (which is the IB strict consequence for submission of non-original work), we are instead considering this a learning moment. Students are learning...

WHEN to use AI Tools. And when NOT to use AI Tools.

Schools and Universities have always expected students to submit ORIGINAL, INDEPENDENT work they have composed themselves. Schools and Universities have always expected students to formally cite any and all sources of work/ideas/content that are not their own. Considerable time is spent learning how to compose these citations. This has not changed and will continue to be an expectation.

Work completed by an AI tool falls into the category of work/content/ideas/etc that needs to be cited because it is not the ORIGINAL or INDEPENDENT work of the student. Work generated by AI Tools is NOT original or independent.

We need to spend a lot more time working with students to learn HOW and WHEN to use AI to IMPROVE learning rather than REPLACE it.