Introduction to AI
When we first hear about AI chatbots and what they can do, we are naturally concerned about the role they may take in student learning. Will students use this to do their assignments? Do I need to revise every assignment to make it more difficult for AI to write it?
Focus groups conducted with NLU students from across the university have indicated they are expecting their instructors to know what AI and chatbots are capable of and provide clear guidance on how these tools can be used in the classroom.
Choose a tab below to familiarize yourself with AI theory, associated tools, and usage guidance. These learning resources can also be used to help educate your students on how AI and Large Language Models, like those used to build chatbots, operate.
Artificial Intelligence, or AI, is used to create systems and machines that can perform tasks that would typically require human intelligence, such as learning, problem-solving, and decision-making. ChatGPT is a specific implementation of AI, known as a language model, which is trained to generate human-like text based on a given prompt. This technology can be used for a variety of applications, such as natural language processing, automated writing and content generation, and conversational interfaces for chatbots and virtual assistants. The goal of ChatGPT is to make it easy for developers to add human-like language capabilities to their applications, making the interactions with their systems more natural and intuitive for end-users.
(The above introduction was written by Chat GPT given the following prompt, "To an audience of faculty, explain the purpose of AI and Chat GPT")
Video Credit: TechTarget (retrieved from: https://www.techtarget.com/searchenterpriseai/definition/AI-Artificial-Intelligence)
Understanding the Basics of Large Language Models
This video will explain how chatbots, like Bard and ChatGPT, work.
An important point to emphasize with students is that chatbots are predicting the next word based on context - not pulling sentences or phrases from internet sources. This key distinction will help students understand why we caution them against using chatbots to write assignments: Chatbots making predictions can be - and often are - wrong. This is called a hallucination. Chatbots can hallucinate information. If we ask a chatbot to cite sources, it often hallucinates those as well.
This is why we must apply critical thinking and critical analysis to any interaction with AI.
During the 2023-24 Academic Year, the University will engage the shared governance system to address in position and policy the student use of artificial intelligence (AI) when completing academic work. The plan is to charge the Student Academic Standard Committee (SASC) to review FP302 - Academic Honesty to include artificial intelligence technology such as ChatGPT, Bard, Talk to Books, and Formula Bot. Additionally, the Learning Quality Committee (LQC) will recommend to Academic Cabinet the University’s position on student use of artificial intelligence technology as a tool for engaging academic work.
In the meantime, individual faculty should check with their college leadership team or program chair to determine the program’s position on the use of artificial intelligence technology to engage course work. Below is guidance on permitting and discouraging student use.
The Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence (CTLE) maintains this webpage about artificial intelligence. There are resources, ideas for classroom use, and a presentation of various detectors and their success rates. The CTLE team frequently updates this page as new resources and ideas emerge, so check back often. Additionally, the CTLE will be hosting workshops each month. Check the faculty newsletter or return here for upcoming workshops.
Additionally, each of the colleges are offering trainings and workshops. See their respective newsletters and communication channels or reach out to your chair for more information.
If you have any questions or want to talk to someone about AI in the Classroom, please contact the CTLE: ctle@nl.edu
Usage Guidelines
Artificial intelligence can be an effective tool to help students during the writing process. It can generate outlines, write an introduction paragraph, and write thesis statements. Additionally, it can be used as a brainstorming partner or to provide information about topics. That being said, students should use artificial intelligence technology to augment or support their engagement in academic work, not replace their efforts.
As AI continues to evolve, it will become more and more difficult to spot when a student is using it. Further, students will increasingly be asked to responsibly use these tools in the workforce. Therefore, we are advocating an approach that adheres to the key highlights above. Some recommended next steps:
- Explicitly state in the syllabus and D2L course site that the use of artificial intelligence is permitted to support or augment the assignments in the class. Even though artificial intelligence is permitted, be sure to inform students that submitting academic work entirely generated by artificial intelligence is unacceptable.
- Spend class time modeling the appropriate and effective use of artificial intelligence. Additionally, dedicate class time to allowing the students to experiment with artificial intelligence and support and provide feedback to students in the moment. Investing time in modeling and supporting appropriate use will communicate your expectations about the ways in which students may use AI in your class.
- Include APA citation for AI usage.
Amy Hall and Sarah Leeman, from The University Library, discussed ChatGPT's relevance to Academic Honesty. For more information regarding this topic, please see the Teaching Academic Honesty Lib Guide.
Did my student use Chat GPT? Identifying & Addressing AI Academic Honesty in the Classroom
Upcoming: Academic Integrity Office Hours
Join the University Library for open-ended, faculty-focused discussions on all things related to academic honesty and plagiarism, including teaching strategies, AI tools, Turnitin, APA style, plagiarism detection, student conversations, and more. Bring questions, concerns, and scenarios, or simply come to chat.
Academic Honesty Office Hours are hosted by the University Library on the 4th Wednesday of the month from 11:30am-1:00pm (CST).
The emergence of AI has led to the creation of a number of chatbots capable of conversational support for learners. Typically, individuals use these chatbots to overcome writer's block and to help get started on a project or paper. It can help with a number of preparatory activities such as generating written content, outlines, code, poetry, etc.
Faculty have also been using these features to quickly develop work samples for students to analyze/scrutinize. Outputs from chatbots are not intended to be finished products and often contain errors or biased outputs. Examples of common chatbots:
The most commonly used at this time is ChatGPT. To learn more about the ChatGPT language model, it's conversational approach to interacting with humans, and it's ability to generate content, visit the ChatGPT blog site.
If you're looking to create an account to start using ChatGPT to learn how it works or to lesson plan, please sign-up or log-in to ChatGPT here.
Quillbot (Word Processor)
QuillBot is a word processor that acts as an AI co-writer. It can help students paraphrase, break through writer's block, and check for grammar.
Talk to Books (Quotes)
Talk to Books (by Google Books) allows users to ask books to quote themselves. A user enters a question and the response comes in the form of quotes from different books that may address that question.
Formula Bot (Excel)
Formula Bot allows users to generate an excel equation by explaining the type of formula they need. For example, "Display a 'No' when Column A is less than 60% and 'Yes' if it is greater than 60%."
Consensus
This AI search engine allows users to search for the scientific consensus on a particular topic. For example, ask Consensus a question and it will provide the answers "Yes," "No," or "Possibly," and cite associated research that supports each answer.
Jasper (Marketing)
Jasper is a copy writing tool to help businesses write copy in the voice of a particular brand - typically their own brand. Jasper is built on multiple language models to use recent search data, brand voice, and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to help individuals create on-brand copy for an organization's social media, web sites, and marketing materials.
Khanmigo (AI Tutor)
Khan Academy is creating an AI tutor, khanmigo, to guide students through the learning process. Khanmigo will ask students questions to guide them through a critical thinking process, rather than providing them answer in response to a prompt. It also mimics a writing coach by offering prompts and suggestions for improvement.
Media Generators
In addition to chatbots, which primarily output content as text and tables, there are a host of AI tools that output images, art, and even video.
- Canva - Enter words and phrases to generate images.
- DALL-E 2 - Creates images and art from natural language (by OpenAI)
- Midjourney - Creates realistic pictures from text (Examples)
- Lumen5 - Turn blog posts, whitepapers, or other longer text into videos.
- Riffusion - Explain a style of music to generate a musical beat.
AI Chatbots and other tech are not just for students. In the wake of ChatGPT's release, faculty are exploring how AI can help them prepare for their classes as well. Ethan Mollick, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, framed it this way, "Think of it like having an intern, but one who just happens to work instantaneously, can write both code and solid descriptive writing, and has a large chunk of the world’s knowledge in their brain."
Visit his blog, The Mechanical Professor, to see his use of a Chatbot to create a 12-session MBA-level Intro to Entrepreneurship class, complete with readings, assignments, and summary of what will be covered in each module.
Here are some other AI tools, which faculty may find useful.
Co-Pilot
Students aren't the only ones who can benefit from AI. Copilot offers faculty a platform that can help them generate lesson plans, handouts, writing prompts, and templates for project outlines. Copilot is a paid service, but offers a free trial before committing to $9/month. Visit the Copilot website for more info.
For an example of the work Copilot can help with, we asked Copilot to create some resources for an imaginary Introduction to Maya Culture unit. Here are the results:
Introduction to Maya Civilization Lesson Plan
Maya Agriculture Context Builder
Ag and Religion Writing Prompt
Khanmigo (for Faculty)
Khan Academy is introducing a teacher companion to their Khanmigo platform (discussed above). This version of the product will help instructors lesson plan and think through student feedback by prompting instructors with questions to help them gain deeper insights into their students and ideas to meet course objectives.
Educator Applications of ChatGPT
Chatbots can help you write lecture notes to accompany your lesson plan. The Chatbot can output notes, but it's important to continue to prompt the Chatbot to meet your specific lesson plan requirements. See the video below for an example.
Leaning into AI
First, AI chatbots like Chat GPT, Bard, and Bing are not perfect content creators. As highlighted in this Hard Fork podcast, to get ChatGPT to generate an above-average assignment, the student really needs to know the right questions to ask the chatbot. In order to ask the right questions, the student will need to be well-versed in the content.
Knowing this, we can use these AI chatbots as a teaching tool, rather than a potential cheat, as discussed in this Inside Higher Ed Article. Here are some articles to guide you in leaning into AI in our classrooms.
Don’t Ban ChatGPT. Use It as a Teaching Tool - Education Week
Key Takeaway: Chatbots can provide the structure so that students can focus on content.
Advice Academics Can Use Now - Inside Higher Ed
Key Takeaways:
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- Be deliberate. Adjust quickly.
- Don’t Abandon Pencil and Paper.
- Question How Writing Is Taught.
- Think a Few Years Out.
- Delegate Responsibilities.
- Identify and Reveal Shortcomings.
- Remind Students to Think.
- Invite Students Into the Conversation.
- Experiment. Don’t Panic.
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ChatGPT: Threat or Menace? - Inside Higher Ed
Key Takeaway: Offers multiple strategies for using chatbots like ChatGPT in the classroom.
ChatGPT Both Is and Is Not Like a Calculator - Inside Higher Ed
Key Takeaway: An emerging comparison for chatbots is to a calculator. Calculators did not ruin math; today they are used to help teach it. This school of thought asks us to think of chatbots as an "Essay calculator" whereby we use chatbots to generate text, which is then reviewed and edited by students. Editing may include adjusting the tone or correcting mistakes made by the chatbot.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
We know that there are and there will continue to be many questions from faculty about Artificial Intelligence (AI), especially the use of ChatGPT. Given how rapidly evolving these programs are, NLU is working to develop comprehensive policies related to the use of AI or ChatGPT. The work will be done through the Provost’s Office and shared governance structures in the upcoming months. In the meantime, the Provost Office is sharing the following FAQ guidance and resources for your use. The FAQ and this page will be treated as a living document and will evolve as we work to understand the implications of AI within the classroom.
Below is a list of some of the tools that students or faculty could be using. Tools like the ones below typically help students and faculty generate different types of content.
- ChatGPT (Chatbot capable of generating written content, outlines, code, poetry, etc.)
- Bard (Chatbot capable of generating written content, outlines, code, poetry, etc.)
- Bing (Chatbot capable of generating written content, outlines, code, poetry, etc.)
- Jasper - (Writes copy that is on-brand)
- Fireflies (AI notetaker)
- QuillBot - (Word processor and writing assistant)
- Talk to Books (Ask books quote themselves)
- Forumlabot (Generate Excel formulas)
- Khanmigo (Education guide designed to help students without giving them an answer)
- Copilot (Generates lesson plans, activity/project/paper prompts, PowerPoint decks, and study guides for instructors)
- Canva (Image generator)
- Fotor (Image generator)
- Dall-E 2 (Image generator)
- Midjourney (Art generator)
- Lumen5 (Video generator)
- Riffusion (Music beat generator)
While on the surface, AI Tools seem to be able to answer or produce responses to any prompt imaginable, there are several limitations and considerations in using the tool.
- Chatbots' main goal is not accuracy. Because AI chatbots generate responses based on predictive text using data found freely on the internet, its responses may contain errors, misconceptions, or bias.
- The model attempts to predict the most commonly expected next word - based on most of the information on the internet.
- For example, one of the areas ChatGPT often errs is generating accurate citations or references.
- Also, AI chatbots will struggle with returning reliable content for recent events or concepts that have little online discourse from which to draw data.
The first step in curating an AI-positive environment is to explicitly talk to your students about the tool, its limitations, and how students can or cannot use the tool for your course or the assignment. Here are some guideposts for those conversations:
- As a starting point, clearly articulate what tools and resources can or cannot be used both verbally and in assignment instructions. This will communicate your expectations to students.
- Next, seek student input on how they imagine using the tool. Come to consensus and communicate that out.
- Finally, as you introduce each assignment:
- Discuss the implications of AI on the assignment
- Find consensus on expected and acceptable uses of AI for that assignment
- Discuss the use of citations for AI tools - see Usage Guidelines dropdown above for APA guidance
AI in Higher Ed Podcast Spotlight
Dara Ryder talks about how not to try to fight against AI (and lose) - He discusses how pedagogy that incorporates AI will better prepare students to enter their fields of study.
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