Lit and Tech

I just finished packing up my classroom for the 23-24 school year; my 28th year as an English teacher. What a ride it has been. I'm not retiring, I just mean this last school year has been quite a ride. In 22-23 ChatGPT became a thing and students started to try using it. I started to try to guide them in ways to use it better. You can find previous posts about lessons for introducing AI and strategies for promoting academic honesty elsewhere on this blog. Ideogram: A high school English classroom of seniors 23-24 though, was the year we all took more than just a few cautious steps. A new group of students meant I had to start over with my campaign to convince them I can tell when they use AI instead of doing their own writing. Teenagers are natural risk takers, and that is generally a good thing, but it also means a few of them will take a risk and try using AI to cheat. Eventually, they believe me that they will probably be caught. I overheard one of my seniors tell a student

How I convinced my students that I could tell if they used AI

Part of preventing students from using generative AI to do their work for them is showing them ways it can be helpful without violating academic integrity. I wrote about that process here. But another big part of keeping students from using the AI unethically, is convincing them that I will be able to tell they "cheated." This is how I showed my 9th graders that I could tell when they used AI to respond to a question. One of my colleagues came to me because she thought one of her students had used ChatGPT for one of the short paragraphs about a book we were reading as part of a novel study. We talked about the student, why they might have done that, why she thought it was AI, etc. And then I ran it through an AI detector. As predicted by this expert educator colleague of mine, it was flagged as entirely AI written. She pursued her own actions at that point, but I saw an opportunity. The Opportunity: I took the AI generated response and put it on a page with two other res

NBCT: My Experience with Component 2: YA ELA

Assembling Component 2 Considering National Boards? I recommend the process, but you should know what you are getting into. Start early and get organized. In the spring of 2016 I began pursuing National Board Certification for teaching. I know eventually someone will ask me for my thoughts and advice about that process, so I'll capture them now while the experience is fresh. Because I teach 9th grade, and previously taught middle school for ten years, I decided to do my NBCT in the area of Young Adolescent ELA. (Yes, I also taught 11th grade for six years, but that was a while ago.) Though some do it in one year, I'm taking two years to complete my NBCT. Last summer, at a small local conference, I stumbled into a conversation about National Boards and happened to find out that my County Office of Education sponsored a support program. I was just in time to sign up. Through that program I got early advice and support to help me understand expectations and deadlines. The

What Happens When Students Have Access to Instant AI Feedback?

I teach English to 9th graders, which means I frequently ask them to write things. Right now we are working on a narrative unit and I often ask them to write stories related to our readings. Recently, we have watched the famous TED talk about the danger of a single story, and read a great essay on the same topic, and then I asked students to write about a time when they had a single story about a person or place, or a time when someone else had a single story about them. Nothing revolutionary here, just a pretty typical classroom writing exercise, except that I also gave them access to immediate AI feedback through Magic School . What happened: Some students started writing, some went to the idea generator in the Magic Student room I gave them, and then started writing. So, as usual, the first ten minutes of writing time was pretty productive and on task. Initial AI Feeedback Then we hit the usual wall. You know the wall. The moment when one student declares, "I'm done,&q

Preserving Authenticity in Student Writing in the Age of Generative AI

Ideogram: student writing synth wave A huge part of the angst about generative AI centers around the generalized concern that students will use it to cheat. News flash, they will. Student will cheat with AI because there have always been students who cheat, this is just a new way for them to do it. Cheating is not new. But, let's put this problem in perspective. Risk taking is normal teenage behavior. All teens take risks, some drive too fast, some jump off roofs into swimming pools, some drink in excess, some lie to their parents, and some turn in work they did not do. Some teens are more cautious and some are less cautious. Brain science, and yes I have read about this with my students, shows us that teens value rewards higher in many risky situations, therefore making poor decisions seem more attractive. I am not trying to excuse academic cheating. It's just that I stopped viewing it as a moral failing, and I now see it as part of the risk taking, adventuresome, process o