How AI takes over and overtakes the classroom!

(Text format: Response to News article Teachers Are Revealing The Disturbing Realities About How ChatGPT And AI Tools Have Changed The Classroom, And They're Not Holding Back)

It is always intriguing to read what teachers think when anything new and important, such as AI infiltrates school walls and classrooms. Here, all thirteen teacher's opinions and experiences were highly interesting to read. While some of the expressed views, such as the use of AI leading to cheating, a lack of critical thinking and originality, and the decline of analysis and research skills, are already widespread knowledge, two statements were kind of surprising to read.

In the first statement, a teacher said:

"I had this one student who was quiet and didn't have many friends. I then found out that he talks to some sort of AI chat tool like it's his friend. I sat down and had a talk with him and asked him, 'Why do you talk to the computer instead of real people?' His response was, 'Because unlike real kids, AI knows stuff.' I felt terrible for a couple of minutes, and then I realized he said, 'unlike real kids.' He called the chat tool a kid."

To call a chat tool a kid and chat with it like its friend clearly shows how children quickly can see a chatbot as more than just a tool. They are gullible and the younger they are, the less likely they might understand that a chatbot is actually not a human buddy.

Or even if they understand this, they still might prefer it to real human friends for any reason, such as not having any, being bullied, preferring a chat bot over other kids their age, etc.

We already live in a world where technology rules and isolates humans. Taking chatbots away from students isn't a likely measure, as they are everywhere these days. However, what parents and teachers can do is to explain that these bots are not your friends but only mere tools, limiting the time spent with and only using them for work or retrieve knowledge. Society might need to do a reality check to understand why exactly kids and teens would use a chatbot as a friend and address the reasons and issues.

The other statement which stood out was:

" It. is. AWFUL. I teach high school, and it has become increasingly clear that nothing these kids submit is original; their work is either from AI, cheating, or both. These children do not have an original thought in their heads. I have literally watched kids in real-time (through monitoring software) email their friends their AI-generated papers and ask them to edit them because it's coming up as 50% AI on Turnitin, and then multiple friends work on it and edit it until it reads as more 'original.'"

The latter part of the above response was new to me. Now students are not only using AI for assignments, yet also try to outsmart AI software checkers? This takes cheating to the next level and makes it even harder for teachers to spot AI generated work. The question is what can we all do to make students understand how important it is not to use the "easy AI way out" and how to motivate them to do their schoolwork?

Not all statements in the article were negative, however. Some teachers expressed how AI can help with (creative) lesson planning, writing sensitive emails, and inspiration for students, which is all completely understandable.

AI will become an integral part in schools and in student's lives. Key will be to explain students to use it the right way. The two quotes of the article which are helpful to understand for any student and left an impression were:

"Generated images can contribute to student brainstorming and creativity as long as students are aware that they serve simply as inspiration, cannot be turned in as their own, and recognize flaws that exist."

This rings true for anything you can generate with AI, not only art or images. But why should you follow the above approach?:

"We keep trying to explain that if you can use AI to get an answer, so can an employer, so why would they employ you?"—s Rain

The answer is simple: Employers will only employ if you can analyse, correct, or improve what AI generates. And in order to do this already now and even more so in the future, you need to become a highly knowledgeable, critical, analytical, structured and creative thinker.

Students need to understand that if they continue to outsmart themselves, AI will outsmart them!