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A high schooler writes about AI tools in the classroom

(www.theatlantic.com)
222 points dougb5 | 2 comments | 04 Sep 25 02:37 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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alphazard ◴[04 Sep 25 22:47 UTC] No.45133107[source]▶
The lesson here is adapt or die. The things they thought were important or difficult or impressive are no longer any of those things. Regurgitating information on a test or generating prose from the notes you took in class are tasks which are easy to stereotype, and now readily automated.

Rather than framing this as destroying education, it should be interpreted as proof that these tasks were always shallow. AI is still much worse than humans at important things, why not focus on those things instead?

The school systems are clearly not keeping up. Any kid who isn't doing project oriented creative work, aided by an LLM as needed, is not preparing for the the world they will likely inherit.

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Loughla ◴[04 Sep 25 23:38 UTC] No.45133475[source]▶
I have to present to a group of pissed off college faculty tomorrow. They're pissed because we ended our contract with the AI checking software.

We ended it because it checks not for AI but for professional writing, good grammar and spelling, and professional non-conversational word choice. WHICH ARE THE THINGS WE'RE TEACHING THESE STUDENTS IN OUR CLASSES.

I have to look at a room of mostly out of touch faculty and tell them to be better at their jobs. I have to tell them that they simply cannot do what they've done for the last 30 years (which is only being forced because of AI, but should've been a thing the entire time). I have to, in five minutes, explain pedagogy and modern instructional design.

And I have no idea what to say that won't make this situation worse.

I'm thinking of leading with an explanation of what adaptation and evolution are as concepts. That should go well. I'm pretty excited.

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1. alphazard ◴[04 Sep 25 23:47 UTC] No.45133531[source]▶
Were I in your shoes, I would make a point of explaining what "style transfer" is. It was one of the first things LLMs were really good at. e.g. "Write a rap battle between Shakespeare and Plato".

Academic prose is just style transfer. Academia filters pretty heavily for humans that can do this particular kind of style transfer well. Everyone on the college faculty will be 2 standard deviations of good at writing academic prose. That skill is no longer valuable. It is now a cheap commodity measured in flops.

The silver lining is that the content of one's writing is now paramount because the field has been leveled as far as style is concerned.

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2. Loughla ◴[05 Sep 25 19:36 UTC] No.45142725[source]▶
Update: I just cited 15 studies from prominent institutions indicating that these tools are ineffective and then explained that while they were not communicated with the way they want, there were 4 avenues they could've received that information if they were involved in shared governance on campus at all.

I decided just to close every door for a complaint. Not sure if it landed but no one said anything.