Artificial Intelligence (AI)

• Gemini is Google's experimental, conversational, AI chat service. It is meant to function similarly to ChatGPT, with the biggest difference being that Google's service can pull real-time information from the web.  

• To get to Gemini go to https://gemini.google.com/app.

• Gemini has several useful features:

  • It keeps a record of its responses, but it does not save your data.

  • It creates more than one draft of its responses.

  • Questions can be spoken and responses can be listened to.

  • Responses can be copied directly from Gemini.

  • It can communicate and generate text in over 40 languages.

  • Responses can be modified to be shorter, longer, simpler, more casual, or more professional from a drop down menu.

  • Responses can be "checked" directly from Gemini with Google results.

To get the best output from AI, it is important to input a strong prompt. Adding more information and perimeters to get the best results.

• Define who the "author" should be. i.e. "Answer as a teacher" or "Write the response as an 11th grader".

• Tell Gemini what you want it to do, i.e. "Summarize this article" or "Write a caption."

• Provide Gemini what type of style or tone you want, i.e. "create with a friendly tone."

•  Identify the type of output you want, i.e. "Create a paragraph" or "Put the results in bullet points."

• Include any extra instructions that you think may be useful, i.e. "Use scholarly research" or "Explain your thinking".

• After you get the results, adjust the outcome if it isn't what you want. For example, "Rewrite in a lower lexile level."

This "How To" gives guidance and examples of AI prompts to get specific results.

First off, despite what you may have read or seen on TikTok, there is NO magic bullet that will detect AI writing. The detection sites can give you false positive and false negative results AND should not solely be used to accuse a student of cheating.

That said, there are some ways to mitigate the use of AI in your assigned work to students.

Talk about AI with your Students

• Point out & discuss the updated District plagiarism policy to the students.

• Discuss in class some of the pitfalls and fails of AI.

• Have a discussion with your students about some ways it can be used responsibly when doing research (i.e. using it as a springboard to find specific terms related to the topic or the experts in the field, getting research ideas). NOTE: Students under 18 are not supposed to be using ChatGPT (although they obviously are) so this isn't an activity that you can do in class together, but you can display your results on the overhead. Gemini is allowed to be used by 13 and up but the students do not have it available in their school accounts.

Rethink your Assessments & Processes

• Do you need to rethink your assignments or how students “show” their learning? More authentic learning perhaps?

• Ask your students (and include in the rubric) to include specific information learned/results/data from class in their responses or things specific to their lives.

• Focus on the process and fundamentals of writing with your students–have multiple check-ins, drafts, peer review, etc. 

• Require citations/bibliography for your assignments.

• Periodically, ask random students to explain their thinking/responses in their assignments.

• Use paper and pen in class sometimes.

• Get a handwritten writing sample in the beginning of the school year.

Fight Technology with Technology

• Run your own prompts through ChapGPT and Gemini to see what kind of responses you get.

• Try the extensions Classwork Zoom, Brisk Teaching, and/or Draftback.

  • Classwork Zoom is a Chrome extension that creates a dashboard that visualizes the information about student work in Google Drive assigned through Google Classroom, including how long a student has worked on an assignment and whether there is pasted text in it. NOTE: The paid version is less than $2 a month if you buy it for the year (although we don't usually recommend paid apps--you may want to check this one out.)

  • Brisk Teaching is a Chrome extension that does several things including doing an analysis of the likelihood of the writing to be AI generated. This is NOT foolproof but can lead you to look at version history, etc. It also now shows you the version history in key strokes, similar to Draftback.

  • Draftback is a Chrome extension that lets you play back the revision history of any Google Doc you can edit (i.e. an Assignment turned in on Classroom).

• Turn on the originality reports for all Assignments. NOTE: We have UNLIMITED originality reports in Classroom now.

• “Make a copy” for every assignment you post in Classroom and inform students that they must do ALL work in that file.

You can ask generative AI to create:

• rubrics using specific point values, categories, and criteria

• modifications to text for specific reading levels and grade levels

• alternative assessment ideas for specific objectives

• multiple choice and free response questions

• lesson plans based on specific standards and objectives

• emails to parents, students, and other stakeholders (and ask it to check the tone of an email for you as well)

• alternative explanations for a concept

• code

• steps required to complete a task

Some education friendly AI tools include:

• TeachMateAI

• Twee

• Conker.ai

• Brisk

• Diffit

• MagicSchoolAI

• Goblin Tools

• Eduaide

NOTE: The above sites have a mix of free and paid festures; please use at your own discretion.

• Here is a dipository of AI tools for educators, curated by Dan Fitzpatrick: https://aieducator.tools/

• AI is not always accurate. Care should be taken to verify the information it presents.

• AI can not express emotions or give opinions on a topic.

• Users under 18 need parental permission to use AI.

• Artificial intelligence is not good at giving creative responses. It's not very good with thinking "outside the box"

• AI responses tend to be only as good as the prompts used to generate the response. Not getting useful responses? Reword the prompt and add more detail.

• Take a look at this example of a lawyer who was not careful with their use of AI! 

• ChatGPT: Educational Friend or Foe?

• When AI makes a mistake, who's responsible?

• If you're not already doing these 10 productivity hacks in ChatGPT, you're definitely missing out

• Get the best from ChatGPT with these golden prompts

• 5 Ways to use AI tools to meet students' needs

• The AI Index Report from Stanford University