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One of the high points of recent years for me has been when a group of former students take me out to lunch annually. They don’t see each other much in the interim, so it’s like a mini-reunion each year.
I love it!
It’s a diverse group, and they go to a variety of different colleges.
I asked them about Artificial Intelligence – their use of it and how their classmates use it.
All of them said that nobody ever reads instructor’s materials anymore – “they’re too long and too boring.”
They said that they, and all but about ten percent of their classmates – just feed the materials into AI to get summaries.
I was a little surprised by that but, after thinking about it, probably shouldn’t have been. I mean, it’s not like textbook authors put much effort into making their books very engaging. The only textbooks I’ve ever seen that try to make themselves engaging are ones specifically geared towards English Language Learners, and they have to bend over backwards to make their texts accessible. It’s sort of why I always say that “Good ELL teaching is better teaching for everybody.”
Textbook publishers should take note – no one is going to read the same old stuff anymore. It’s a new day.
Until they get that message, I guess that’s where some AI tools could come in handy (see Google’s New “Learn Your Way” Could Be Very Useful In Making Boring Textbooks More Accessible).
Just as this could be a wake-up call for textbook publishers, it should probably also be one for college instructors (as it is for high school teachers – see A REALLY BAD THING ABOUT AI IS THAT IT FORCES US TEACHERS TO SPEND A TON OF TIME RETHINKING OUR LESSONS. I GUESS THAT MIGHT BE A GOOD THING ABOUT IT, TOO).
Interestingly, my former students told me that they don’t use AI much for their writing. However, they graduated three years ago just as AI began to go mainstream. So, they developed good writing skills during their K-12 career.
I think it’s very realistic for K-12 educators to teach with AI guardrails (see The “Best” Strategies For Creating AI-Resistant Assignments and A Beginning List Of Different Types Of Guidance Educators Are Giving Students About AI Use In Their Classes), but I suspect a fair number are not receiving the support and training they need to do just that.
I’ve got to say that if I was a high school student, and I was in a class that I could get away with having AI do a lot of my writing, I suspect I would do it so I could spend more time with my friends.
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