It’s the Wild West days of AI, just like the internet in the 90s. Do what you can with it now, because it’ll eventually turn into a marketing platform. You’ll get a handy free AI model that occasionally tries to convince you to buy stuff. The paid premium models will start doing it too.

Nobody says it, but Trump literally stole the election. He did it by having his goons involved with every step of the process, scrutinizing workers until they quit, challenging confidence in the mail-in voting system, removing mail-in ballot boxes, reducing the number of voting stations, and of course the gerrymandering already in place. There’s probably more. It was a landslide victory for people who didn’t vote, and I think that had as much, if not more, to do with access than disinterest. Trump won by a narrow margin among those leftover. He would not have won otherwise.

Hadn’t thought of it like that. I wish I could at least donate my digital library, though.

Just think. At least you can sell off those nick-nacks. What value is there in digital goods you don’t want?

I wouldn’t go so far as to say my opinion is better than anyone else’s, it just an experience that suits the context of the life I’m living now. There are definitely schools out there where the learning culture probably couldn’t handle it.

Again, if they’re doing individual work with headphones in, and they’re clearly being productive, I don’t see a problem with it. If they’re doing it while I’m actively trying to teach, that would be a problem.

I actually sometimes ask my students to use their phones to produce presentations and such (AI permitted). I just think the rule needs to be no phones in sight otherwise, and the phone stays if you go to the bathroom.

Yep. I totally agree. Hopefully I’ll find a school that does pay me for planning time eventually,

Thanks. It’s motivating to hear that.

I think she learned the lesson on her own on that one. No need to rub salt on the wound.

Furthermore, at their level, they already assume that they’re hopeless. I don’t want to reinforce that idea and discourage them from reproaching the subject later on. We’re talking about a lower vs mid elementary proficiency rating here, so no one’s life is changing.

Do you have a suggestion?

Well in my case, I leverage AI to extract specifics in long texts, such as level-appropriate vocabulary and collocations related to the topic. I can do this with YouTube video transcripts, for example,then use a different tool to quickly spit out learners definitions of all the words extracted, example sentences with fill-in-the blanks (emphasis on the topic of the lesson), and whatnot. I have to verify that the definitions and example sentences are suitable, then I slap everything together in a handout template I have in Affinity Publisher, along with some topic-related discussion questions. The students watch the video, and then I give them the handout afterwards.

That’s just one example.

I know of a company producing experimental AI tests, that basically put you in a D&D role playing scenario. It shows a scenario on screen, narrates a situation, then asks you to respond. Based on your response it’ll take you in one direction or another, the whole time grading your skills behind the scene. The students don’t even know they’re being tested. At the end, it prints out a score, but it feels more like the end of a video game match than a test.

I think that’s cool af.

You’re not wrong, but the difference is that they came up with a creative solution to avoid the task, not a creative solution to engage the task. If I ask them follow up questions to explain their thoughts and reasoning behind their own work, I get deer in the headlights.

Now, I think the tide is rising with AI and it’s sink or swim if you’re a teacher, so it’s better to just learn what AI is and how to leverage it no matter what people think of it, or if I’m even getting paid for my effort.

A different approach I’m considering is embracing AI for teenage groups and changing the format of the course entirely so there’s more interaction (incorporating AI) than production. I’ll be the first at my school to do it, but I’m also the only person there who could tell you what the fediverse is.

Well yes, and it’s a tourism based economy, which means I usually don’t have to deal with any particular group for longer than a few weeks. Some groups are loads of fun and don’t have any problems with their phones. It usually just depends on which part of wherever they’re coming from, and how life is like for them back home.

When I need them to, I do, but then suddenly everyone starts needing to go to the bathroom way more frequently.

It took all of school to help me realize what kind of person I wanted to be, and more importantly, what kind of person I didn’t. It seems it had the same effect for you, albeit a much different outcome. I changed my major two times and was in university a couple years longer than most. It was wasteful for sure, but it directed me down the path that eventually led me to my current career and meeting the wonderful woman who became my wife. My studies don’t really apply to anything I do, but I know they’ve enriched me as a human being.

Just because you didn’t find a use for math in your life doesn’t mean nobody else does either.

I had the class build a database of ideas, but one I really liked went like this:

You put a bunch of quiz questions into an AI song generator. The students listen to the song and try to provide the answers afterward.

You can make it really stupid and funny if you want.

Another would be to have AI produce a “podcast” about some topic, maybe Elvis interviewing Churchill about who Darwin was. Tell it to use some key points you want the students to take note of, then let them hear it and talk about it afterward.

I don’t care that much. I live on an island and most of my “students” are actually just tourists pretending they’re there for educational purposes.

It’s possible, but it takes time and effort to prepare, and I’m not getting paid at home, so I’m reluctant to do it.

You could offer the students a choice: no AI and a 5 slide presentation, or allow AI but with a 15 slide presentation, then let them decide. AI makes work more efficient for us, so if we can be 3x more productive, I should expect 3x more product.

I taught an ESL group once. One of the girls, around 15-17, plastered a bunch of ChatGPT text on the slide and sat the whole period on her phone. When it was her group’s turn, she quickly realized the position she put herself in as she was now in at the front of the class trying to sound out a wall of high-level English words she’d never heard before. I gave her the standard score because, even though she failed the task, she tried really hard to read out all those difficult words and I thought that was probably more work than anyone else had done.

I worked in a school in Asia that actually banned students from bringing their phones to school. One year there was an earthquake in the morning that caused all the trains to stop for half a day while they checked the rails. We were all on our way to the school, got stranded, and some had to walk for hours to get back home. The school got a few calls from parents and the policy was changed the very next week. Now students can bring their phones, but they need to be turned in at the front office when they arrive.

One girl forgot to do it once, so she put her phone her locker. Another earthquake set off the warning alarm system and her phone went off in the hallway. Later that day I saw her getting lectured hard by the staff and the poor thing was in tears. She was actually a good student, so it was weird seeing her in that scenario.

Anyway, I wouldn’t mind the idea of students handing in phones at the front desk, but I was allowed to pack a cd player, a Nokia, and a variety of other devices around my school as a kid. I don’t really see smartphones as being much different, so I don’t mind them being around just so long as students are using them in their own time.