Panic has been the initial response among educators across the country when ChatGPT was launched publicly five months ago. ChatGPT is an online program that can write long-form essays in a matter of seconds or solve algebraic equations step-by-step and create outlines, among other capabilities. Predictably, examples of cheating using ChatGPT immediately emerged in the Bay Area and elsewhere. At San Francisco’s academically competitive Lowell High School, an informal poll by the student newspaper found that 19% of students included in the survey appeared to be using the program to cut corners, saying they used “AI-powered writing software to complete classwork, essays, or tests.”
However, in a relatively short period of time, the panic started to ebb as teachers acknowledged that cheating is not new. Students have long conned their way to good grades – from crib notes scribbled on an arm to copying from the encyclopedia to texting test questions to friends and plagiarizing from the internet. But with five months of exposure to the new technology, educators say ChatGPT and similar technologies have the potential to enrich and enliven teaching and learning rather than gut them. While educators remain on the lookout for ChatGPT cheaters, the opportunities in this technology are thrilling.
AI technology as an educational opportunity
"This is a moment that’s going to go down in history,” said Helen Crompton, Old Dominion University educational technology Professor. Crompton argues that not only does AI and ChatGPT offer opportunities to make teaching and learning more interesting and interactive, but it can also expose deficiencies in outdated forms of education.
For example, some teachers over-rely on essays about the same topics year after year, like the five-paragraph argumentative essay. Instead of having students write that stereotypical essay, which ChatGPT could do in seconds about virtually any subject, the student could prompt the program to debate the topic, turning in the back-and-forth result to their teacher, demonstrating knowledge of the subject and the ability to present an argument.
Or the teacher could prompt ChatGPT to write the argumentative essay and then have students critique it, improving on the technology’s version, which incorporates a massive amount of information and spits out a stereotypical and mediocre response that lacks voice, creativity and other aspects of individualistic thinking.
Possibilities of ChatGPT in the Classroom
Aisling Prange, the English department head at Roosevelt Middle School in San Francisco, is excited about the possibilities ChatGPT brings to her classroom. “It’s incredible technology so how can we use it?” Prange asked. It seems there’s a place for it in project-based learning, she added, with students using the chatbots to come up with ideas or help write outlines or offer summaries of research.
However, that means class assignments need to incorporate what a chatbot can do, but also require using the human brain’s ability to reason and critique, something a machine can’t do.
While she hopes to incorporate ChatGPT into assignments in the future, Prange continues to worry about cheating using AI products or other methods. Roosevelt’s principal, Emily Leicham, agrees, saying that while the way to cheat has changed, the need to educate students on why it’s a bad idea is a constant. “When you’re an educator you see all the tricks,” she said. “Being honest, that’s something we really really push with our kids now.”
Teaching Academic Honesty
In recent months, educators have turned to technology to help identify AI-written work, using a variety of programs like TurnItIn or other screening tools to look for the footprint of artificial intelligence, including tone, word usage, and other aspects to determine whether it is likely AI generated or not. But those tools aren’t always accurate, and students are already finding ways to beat the AI detectors, including misspelling words, inserting typos, and rewriting a handful of sentences.
The best defense against cheating remains teaching academic honesty. Noticing a rise in cheating, Prange, and her school’s administrators sent a letter home advising parents and guardians that they were seeing plagiarism as well as the use of ChatGPT, QuillBot, and other online AI programs in language arts classrooms. She hopes parents will talk to their kids about the cons of cheating, something reinforced in her classes and school-wide.
While some schools have attempted to prevent access to the AI technology, some experts think trying to make it go away won’t work. Furman University philosophy professor Darren Hudson Hick, one of the first in the country to catch a ChatGPT cheat, equated that tactic with the futile effort to ban the internet from classrooms 30 years ago, for fear students would plagiarize information or access inappropriate material. “This is 1993 all over again,” he said, referring to the fear around new technology. “What does AI mean for education a year from now, five years from now? Who knows.”
