I was anxious the first time I dabbled in ChatGPT. That’s probably an understatement. I actually feared that someone was watching over me, lurking in cyberspace, waiting to sound alarm bells when I typed a certain phrase or combination of words into the blank search bar.
I’m a journalist and journalism educator. I teach kids about sourcing and how to avoid plagiarizing material. In my media ethics class, I ask them to sign a contract saying they won’t use other people’s material.
So what the heck was I doing playing with AI? And what if I actually liked it?
Spoiler alert: I did, and it’s kind of awesome.
ChatGPT has become helpful for me
Teachers have focused so much on how our students might use AI to cheat that we may have forgotten how it can help us in the classroom and at home.
I’m using AI (specifically ChatGPT) in practical, everyday ways.
I recently completed a 16-week intensive ELA and math tutoring program in our local school district. The material I was given for the program didn’t work well for my kids, so I ran it through ChatGPT to make it more digestible.
With AI, I can customize my lessons — quickly. Tens and ones review? No problem. Bar graph with ice cream flavors? Done. First grade fractions? Been there, done that, too. I’ve even started playing around with Bingo designs for fun.
I’m also using AI to play teacher at home. When my 6th grader needs to review states of matter or the history of ancient China, we turn to AI together. ChatGPT whips up multiple-choice quizzes (with answer keys) faster than I can make dinner. The same thing goes for studying India’s monsoon season. Once, I even asked AI to create a quiz on how to spot fake news.
I recently looked back on my ChatGPT history and realized how much I had used AI to generate study guides, like the one I made for “The Outsiders,” by S.E. Hinton. My son got an A on that quiz.
I don’t think AI will ever replace me
As much as I’ve come to rely on AI, I’ve learned that it isn’t going to solve all my classroom conundrums.
For example, it won’t comfort a crying student because he or she did poorly on a test and fears her parents will ground her. AI isn’t going to help me decide when a student is sick enough to visit the school nurse. It’s not going to help me figure out why a student understands one concept of math but can’t grasp another.
But given all the complexities and challenges of being an educator right now, I’ll take the help, even if it means double-checking all of the facts.
I’m leaning into AI, but cautiously
I still feel a little guilty when I ask AI to check a sentence’s grammar or to eliminate redundancies in my writing. I’m not sure if it’s because I asked for help or because the work is often great.
Still, ChatGPT has made me more efficient as a teacher. I can easily whip up study guides that benefit my students and tailor lesson plans to them. All of this frees up time for me to connect with my students more easily and focus on other tasks.
I’m glad I took a leap of faith, and I plan on exploring AI as it continues to grow.
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