How to encourage students to use AI responsibly?
If ChatGPT can complete an assignment for a student in two seconds, it's natural for the student to feel tempted to use it. Who remembers the paragraph on “responsible AI usage” in the syllabus when an assignment is due in an hour? No wonder this is educators' most common concern regarding AI.
When creating or revising assignments, educators should first rethink the learning objectives. According to Dr. Janet Rankin, director of the MIT Teaching and Learning Lab, educators should focus on what they want their students to achieve (Feijo & Ouellette, 2023). AI benefits students only when the students already have three foundations: a strong foundation of knowledge to understand AI's output, an intellectual capacity to think critically about the AI's output, and the integrity to act responsibly with the information they receive.
Assignments can be of at least two types. In some assignments, the goal is for students to learn for themselves a skill that AI can easily perform. For these assignments, educators should emphasize the importance of independent work and align evaluation rubrics with this goal. Educators could say, “You should be able to do this unassisted.” For example, in creative writing assignments, independent writing can be a key skill for students to develop. Similarly, in computer programming courses, learning the basics of coding is essential (something AI can easily do). In such cases, AI tools should be restricted so the students can develop the intended skills.
Today we still are figuring out when exactly it is appropriate to ban these AI tools. Over time, we will develop a clearer vision of putting these AI tools in their place. To a certain extent, Process Feedback, a free online platform our group developed, is a resource that can help educators and students put AI in its place.
On the other hand, if the goal of an assignment is for students to learn higher-order skills, the assignment and rubric may need to be revised. For example, an assignment that only asks students to summarize a book chapter could be revised to require them to apply the knowledge to a real-world problem.
Educators should assess if their learning objectives will be better fulfilled with or without AI usage. What should students be able to do with ChatGPT and without it? If students learn more by using AI, then the rubrics should be revised to capture these objectives.
Image credits: Subodh Dahal (not AI)
The article presents a practical perspective on one of the biggest challenges educators face as AI becomes part of academic work: helping students use these tools without losing the skills they are expected to develop independently. Rethinking learning objectives, evaluation rubrics, and the appropriate role of AI can help ensure that technology supports learning rather than replacing it.
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