With the announcement of ChatGPT back in November, educators scrambled to make sense of the new technology. At first, many believed that artificial intelligence would be the downfall of our schools and universities. Students would no longer be able to think critically or write a coherent essay.. With this in mind, the knee-jerk reaction was to police the new technology and forbid its use. However, as time went on and instructors began experimenting, attitudes slowly changed and AI was seen as a tool that could assist both teachers and students with all types of tasks, thus reducing the workload.  The next several blogs will discuss how AI tools such as ChatGPT can act as an assistant in the classroom that will prove to help both teachers and students. 

One of the first areas to understand about AI is that it is merely a tool. Yes, it is a powerful tool that continues to improve everyday, but it is still a technology tool that is only as good as the prompt used to create a response. Like all technology tools, ChatGPT and other large language models (LLMs) can be used to reduce workload and increase student engagement in the classroom. It’s just a matter of learning the tool and becoming more comfortable with how it works. My suggestion to teachers is to play with one of the LLMs, Google’s Bard or Open AI’s ChatGPT have free versions, but there are many other AI tools you can choose. 

The introduction of a new technology can feel overwhelming, especially when teachers already have so much to get done. Who has time to learn a new tool? Yet, these tools are easy to learn and will quickly reduce workload, so it won’t take much time to get the hang of it. I know when I started playing with ChatGPT, I wasn’t sure what to ask. I was already completing my workload without its assistance, so why start now? However, as soon as I learned the tool and thought of questions to ask, I kept thinking of how it could help me with the class I was teaching and the courses I was designing. 

My recommendation to you is to take the first baby step and begin experimenting with just one or two AI tools. Get familiar with how it works and see what it produces for you. I asked ChatGPT to create a lesson plan for me, and I didn’t like the result because it was too formulaic and lacked creativity and depth. However, when I asked it to brainstorm ideas for projects surrounding a specific concept, it quickly spat out fifteen ideas.Many of the ideas seemed obvious, but a few of them were new to me, which sparked other ideas.  This is only the beginning of what these tools can do. Let me know what you tried and if you liked the results.