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A Student's Guide to Writing with ChatGPT

(openai.com)
323 points timbilt | 5 comments | 13 Nov 24 19:26 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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joshdavham ◴[13 Nov 24 20:06 UTC] No.42129395[source]▶
I'm really curious to see where higher education will go now that we have LLM's. I imagine the bar will just keep getting higher and more will be able to taught in less time.

Are there any students here who started uni just before LLM's took off and are now finishing their degrees? Have you noticed much change in how your classes are taught?

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cmontella ◴[13 Nov 24 20:16 UTC] No.42129501[source]▶
I teach at the university level, and I just expect more from my students. Instead of implementing data structures like we did when I was in school, something ChatGPT is very good at; my students are building systems, something ChatGPT has more trouble with.

Instead of paper exams asking students "find the bug" or "implement a short function", they get a takehome exam where they have to write tests, integrate their project into a CI pipeline, use version control, and implement a dropbox-like system in Rust, which we expect to have a good deal of functionality and accompanying documentation.

I tell them go ahead and use whatever they want. It's easier than policing their tools. If they can put it together, and it works, and they can explain it back to me, then I'm satisfied. Even if they use ChatGPT it'll take a great deal of work and knowledge to get running.

If ChatGPT suddenly is able to put a project like that together, then I'll ask for even more.

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bondarchuk ◴[13 Nov 24 20:25 UTC] No.42129579[source]▶
Wouldn't it be unfair towards the students who want to learn without LLMs?
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idopmstuff ◴[13 Nov 24 20:31 UTC] No.42129652[source]▶
Why does that matter? LLMs are going to be increasingly important tools, so it's valuable for educators to help students understand how to use them well. If you choose to exclude modern tools in your teaching to avoid disadvantaging those who don't want to use them, you disadvantage all the students who do want to use them.

To put it another way, modern high school level math classes disadvantage students who want to learn without using a calculator, but it would be quite odd to suggest that we should exclude calculators from math curricula as a result.

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bigstrat2003 ◴[13 Nov 24 20:41 UTC] No.42129753[source]▶
> but it would be quite odd to suggest that we should exclude calculators from math curricula as a result.

That wouldn't be odd at all. Calculators have no place in a math class. You're there to learn how to do math, not how to get a calculator to do math for you.

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1. Der_Einzige ◴[13 Nov 24 21:25 UTC] No.42130162[source]▶
Math class has no place without calculators. You're there to learn how to do math in the real world, not how to do math in a contrived world where we pretend that the ability to do calculations isn't ubiquitous. There are almost certainly more calculator capable devices on earth than people today. Ludditism is the human death drive expressed in a particularly toxic fashion.
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2. dmonitor ◴[13 Nov 24 21:31 UTC] No.42130212[source]▶
When speaking of Math class, are you ignoring everything up to pre-calculus or do you think everything from addition flashcards, times tables, and long division is useless? I'd argue those exercises are invaluable. Seeing two numbers and just knowing the sum is always faster than plugging into a calculator.
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3. casey2 ◴[13 Nov 24 23:24 UTC] No.42131348[source]▶
This is the same fallacy that people make when they learn a new language, so they pick up anki spend a ton of time on it and most burn out, some don't, but neither see any real benefits greater than if they just spent that time on learning the language. The fallacy comes from the fact the goal of learning isn't to finish problems quickly, but to understand what is trying to be said or taught.

For example you claim that addition flashcards and times tables are invaluable, but you don't specify a base, in base 2 you have 4 addition flashcards, in base 100 you have 10,000, clearly understanding addition isn't related to the base, but flashcards increase as base increases, thus there is a relation, implying of course that understanding addition isn't related to the number of addition flashcards you understand. Oh but of course they aren't invaluable in understanding addition, they are invaluable in understanding concepts that use addition, cause ... why exactly? You saved 1 second finishing the problem that you may have understood before you completed that addition step? You didn't have to "context switch" by using a calculator? Students who don't know the sum often give unused name and go back at the end of the problem and solve it later. This behavior is of course discouraged since students can't understand variables until much later if ever and not knowing something you were taught represents the failure of the student and thus the teacher, school, government and society.

Infinitely better is learning from someone who speaks the language. A 30 minute solo tutoring session once a week for a month, in a no distraction environment (aside from a snack), even just working through homework, is more than enough for most students to go from Fs to As for multiple years.

4. cmontella ◴[13 Nov 24 23:27 UTC] No.42131369[source]▶
Personally I have dyscalculia and to this day I need to add on my fingers. Still, I ended up with degrees in physics and computer engineering. I don't think those things you mention are useless, but they never worked for me so I don't view them as invaluable.
5. bokoharambe ◴[14 Nov 24 02:05 UTC] No.42132414[source]▶
Incredible username. And as a current math student, I agree with you completely, for the simple fact that I can do proofs far easier than I can do arithmetic. Students like me who are fine at math generally but who are not great at arithmetic in particular really suffer in our current environment that rejects the use of machine assistance.