How to use ChatGPT as a learning tool
As technology develops, professionals have continued to look for fresh ways to innovate in their own fields and in education. However, the advent of new technology might be intimidating. One such example is artificial intelligence (AI), which is the computer emulation of human intellect. The introduction of ChatGPT, an AI program that is fast growing, has presented new difficulties for educators in particular. However, according to experts, it also has the ability to support students’ learning and help them become ready for professions after college. Thus, we have made this post on How to use ChatGPT as a learning tool.
Additionally, the AI startup OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot software, released in November 2022, generates web data and conveys it in a way that feels natural. ChatGPT can produce Shakespearean poems, provide relationship advise, and—especially worrying to educators—answer exam questions as well as compose essays, unlike a search engine. Early evaluations of GPT-4, the newest version of OpenAI’s big language model, show that the program’s capabilities have improved.
Since critical thinking is more crucial in the real world than rote memory, several teachers have begun working with ChatGPT in order to better prepare their students for it. Follow along as we go into more detail about this below.
How to use ChatGPT as a learning tool
You can use ChatGPT as a learning tool through the following tips:
1. Take into account your course objectives
There are several learning goals for every educational course. If you’re deciding whether to use ChatGPT in your class and how to do so, consider your unique teaching objectives. There will be certain courses when employing GPT is improper. However, in other circumstances, it could be a helpful teaching tool.
What are you teaching your pupils, and what skills are you aiming to gauge in them? It could be beneficial to consider ChatGPT as a calculator. A calculator could make learning basic addition more difficult. However, using the same technology in a calculus class can free up mental assets to support students in learning more difficult abilities.
Similar to this, ChatGPT may endanger students’ ability to acquire fundamental knowledge if you are teaching an initial course. Tools for spelling and grammar, for instance, could interfere with determining whether pupils can write. The other tools, however, make essays simpler to read and aid teachers in determining if students have understood the content if your aim is to promote excellent ideas.
It may sometimes be acceptable to use online proctors or software that restricts access to ChatGPT in classrooms that you feel are unlikely to benefit from utilizing it.
2. Promote critical thinking
You could find ChatGPT’s quick and simple access to information undesirable in certain learning circumstances. Finding methods to integrate AI technologies into your course, however, might really assist prepare pupils for real-life situations where they will need to apply ideas rather than just remember data. Instead of teaching pupils what everyone else already knows, you should teach them how to think like experts.
The bot could be most effective when used to guide students’ critical thinking on known subjects. Similar to conversing with a coworker, it may be an engaging companion that’s helpful in subjects you already have a lot of knowledge about, allowing you to critically assess the advice instead of just duplicating it verbatim.
Additionally, ChatGPT teaches students how to formulate stronger questions and then argue those questions, which may help them develop into true scientists. You may utilize ChatGPT to stimulate conversation in a classroom or lab setting. You may, for instance, ask the bot why one hypothesis is superior to another. Ask once again why the subsequent hypothesis is superior. Students may learn to accept opposing viewpoints and consider both sides fairly before coming to a conclusion.
Using ChatGPT in your class also promotes critical thinking about the topics covered in class as well as technology literacy in a society that is becoming more and more tech-centric. Consider the environment your pupils will enter as well as the kind of thinking habits you wish to establish in them. They may effectively portray the nature of their respective disciplines since this is true. This entails finding out how to combine cutting-edge technology so that activities in the classroom may involve real-world scenarios.
3. Consider the drawbacks
Technology as a whole raises questions regarding academic fraud. Theoretically, ChatGPT is available to your students during an exam if they have access to a computer. Be advised that due to the way ChatGPT combines data, it is simple to respond to test questions. Avoiding multiple-choice examinations might help allay that worry. Open-ended tests, however, could be more challenging to grade, particularly in big classrooms.
Additionally, educational experts advise avoiding changing your exam questions to game the system. You risk leaving out material that your students should be studying if you attempt to build tests with questions that ChatGPT can’t address. The kind of questions that require students to synthesize and contrast are the ones you should be asking them, and these models are excellent at answering them.
Putting measures in place that have been found to lessen cheating in all forms may also be more beneficial. Set clear expectations for the class and encourage participation from the students. Making tasks and papers into smaller, more manageable pieces might also make it tougher to plagiarize. This is true, particularly if you often give pupils comments that they must integrate into their work. Supporting pupils who may be having trouble with the content is equally vital.
Additionally, it’s helpful to spend some time at the start of the semester outlining the significance of academic honesty in your class as well as afterwards. Inform them that although cheating might make things simpler in the short term, it will not help them in the long run since they are not developing the skills they will need to succeed in their jobs.
4. Express expectations
Universities will create formal behavior guidelines regarding the usage of ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence (AI) tools as they mature. It’s up to you to put into practice and express rules around how students may and cannot use these technologies in your class up to that point. Provide clear examples of when using them is acceptable and inappropriate in your curriculum. Also, make sure your teaching aids are communicating effectively.
It is important to underline the significance of equality if you are okay with students utilizing ChatGPT in certain circumstances. And you may introduce ChatGPT to the whole class to stop savvier pupils from receiving higher scores. This will make it more likely that they understand how to utilize it. Since curves additionally depend on averages, everybody need to be educated and have access to the same resources.
5. Give it a try
Spend some time using ChatGPT yourself before deciding if it will benefit or impede your students’ learning. Understand what it can (and cannot) accomplish by putting it to the test. If you’re not yet ready to integrate technology into your course, utilize it for administrative or planning needs.
Urge your students to give it a go for fun whether you are running a lab or teaching a course. With the right education, individuals learn more effectively when they have more opportunities to experiment and get their hands dirty.
Be patient as technology develops further as well. Due to the excessive number of users, ChatGPT has sometimes been unavailable as of early 2023. To be notified when it becomes available, think about subscribing to auto-notifications.
Recent innovations like ChatGPT may be difficult to use and time-consuming to learn. But taking the necessary steps to comprehend them can provide you and your class with additional strength.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is important to use caution when using any new technology in the classroom, and ChatGPT is no different. Just like they would when incorporating other technology into their classes, educators must take ethics, cheating, and equity into account. But when used properly, ChatGPT may be an effective and ground-breaking instrument for preparing pupils for their future employment.
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