Have Fun, Learn Something

 

With the start of another school year at hand, many universities and professors are grappling with how to manage the amazing AI tools that are available to students.   AI tools are amazing.  They can generate PowerPoint slides, essays, solve math and science problems, write code, generate videos, translate passages and documents… the list seems endless. 

I don’t know about most professors, but I believe I have a sense of when AI has been copy-pasted into a writing assignment.  This is especially true, if I have gotten to know the student.  Simply, the writing does not sound at all like them or there are glaring differences in writing sophistication in different sections of the paper.

I tell the students; they should use AI.  They should use it to generate reference lists.  If the topic at hand is not totally arcane, AI is perfect for this.  They should use it to outline or draft their paper.  AI is perfect for taking a finished paper and providing a PowerPoint deck to present the paper.  It can find graphics or examples to enhance the paper or PowerPoint slides.  Lastly, I emphasize if they do any of these things, they need to provide a reference entry or citation so I know how they used AI.   I go so far as to tell students if they use AI for a first draft of the paper, they should actually copy/paste the draft as an addendum to their paper.  In that way I can see how they revised the AI draft to make the paper their own. 

This seemed like a good idea.  In a year and a half with close to 300 hundred students writing two papers each, only one student actually attached an AI draft of one paper to his final paper.  There were perhaps a quarter to a third of the students who I strongly suspected used AI for their entire paper. 

Here in lies a problem.  We emphasize one metric:  grades or points.  The students are motivated by that metric and like to get the highest grade, the most amount of points, with the least effort.  AI is most certainly an amazing ‘least-effort’ tool that can generate a high grade.  This has made grades a poor indication of learning and subject matter mastery.

I have begun asking students ”why are you here?” Why are you are in college?  What are your objectives?  Do you really want to learn?  Gain knowledge?  Learn to communicate effectively?  Be able to think critically?  Master some skill?  “Or do they just want a degree with a high GPA where learning is ancillary benefit if it happens at all?”

This kind of questioning is to get students to understand that one of the main purposes of college is for them to shift from doing things because of extrinsic motivation to intrinsic motivation.  Extrinsic motivation is that provided by teachers and parents to ensure that students do their homework and study for exams.  Extrinsic motivation is critical in K-12 and, of course, dependent on the intrinsic motivation of parents and teachers.  Intrinsic motivation comes from the individuals own drive to get something done or achieve some goal.  Of course, the quality and voracity of both kinds of motivation varies person to person.

In many of my assignments, I add this to the last line of the assignment online: “Have fun, learn something.”  If the objective is to learn something, the grade will follow.

This may be my objective this academic year, to emphasize learning and intrinsic motivation to truly maximize the return on the students’ tuition investment.  If I can do, I might truly be a teacher.