Charles Ungerleider, Professor Emeritus, The University of British Columbia
[permission to reproduce granted if authorship is
acknowledged]
School officials in New York City
have banned or blocked
ChatGPT, the chatbot I wrote
about last week. They are worried about students using it to do their
homework and write essays. A spokesperson for the New York school system, Jenna
Lyle, said, “While the tool may be able to provide quick and easy answers to
questions, it does not build critical-thinking and problem-solving skills,
which are essential for academic and lifelong success.”
It has always been my view
that teachers are primarily responsible for building critical-thinking and
problem-solving skills. Teachers do that by instructing students in the
application of standards of judgment, logic, and canons of evidence. However, if one were to apply the standard to
which Lyle refers, New York would be banning almost
every educational support in use today: textbooks, worksheets,
manipulatives, microscopes, encyclopaedias, the periodic table, etc. I do not
want to block access to those conventional educational support materials. Nor
do I want to block access to or use of ChatGPT.
Kids with resources have been
getting help writing essays and doing homework since before I was born. Essay
mills flourished long before the advent of the internet. If you were
privileged, you could pay to have someone – sometimes underpaid teachers –
write an essay for you. Or you could obtain an essay from a friend’s older sibling
or an older relative.
Parents – at least those who
have the luxury of time – frequently help their kids with homework. The
affluent can afford tutors or “academic coaches” – often retired teachers or
teachers who are moonlighting.
I am not a fan of homework.
Its impact is small and the stress it causes kids and parents is not worth what
few, small benefits it produces. For students who work to support themselves or
their families, homework is more than a minor irritant. So, let’s stop giving
homework.
I do not think the ban or
block that the officials in New York have instituted will have an appreciable
impact on the use of the chatbot, nor should it. I think students should be using the chatbot
to write essays and do research. In
fact, school officials should be encouraging its use for essay writing and for
investigating issues. Yes, you read that right. I said that teachers
should be encouraging students to use artificial intelligence to help them
learn to verify the accuracy and test the logic of the bot.
Students should be required
to use the chatbot to write the first draft of their essay. Then, and this is
crucial, they should be required to verify the accuracy of the information
contained in the essays by citing at least two credible, independent sources
for each claim. They should also be required to name any of the logical gaps in
the bot’s argument, explaining what the gap is and addressing the gap.
In last week’s blog, the
chatbot wrote:
Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to revolutionize the way
we teach and learn, particularly in elementary and secondary schools. In recent
years, there has been a growing trend towards incorporating AI into education,
with a range of applications that can support teachers and enhance the learning
experience for students.
If this were the first draft
of the essay prepared by the chatbot, I would expect students to supply
evidence of the growing trend and the range of applications.
I would want evidence that the use of AI would produce a radical change (revolutionize)
teaching and learning because the changes mentioned in the essay seem to be
enhancements of current practice. They do not seem to be significant departures
from what teachers and students currently do.
I would also expect students
to provide references for the claims made in the essay. For example, the
chatbot claims, “these programs use data and machine learning algorithms to
tailor learning experiences to the individual needs and abilities of each student.”
I would expect some reference to adaptive testing and to “the use of
virtual assistants or chatbots . . . to answer students' questions, provide
feedback on assignments, and offer support and guidance as needed.”
Artificial Intelligence is not
the threat perceived by the New York City education system. It does, however,
hold promise for supporting teaching and learning in the manner described in
the bot’s essay, if employed thoughtfully.