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I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

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Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#121

Post by falcolas »

lucianbr wrote: post #103
chx wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. We as educators can show the interesting parts, the wonders of a field but more we can't do. The author of the article seems to have not managed to get through. Truth to be told, such happens every day in schools because most schools use completely outdated ways to teach -- frontal pedagogy itself is such -- and so ChatGPT is not their biggest problem but it…

> You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. This must have been a problem before the invention of LLMs. How was it solved before? Why didn't teaching go out of fashion when TV was invented, or why didn't math disappear when calculators were built? You yourself highlight problems that existed before LLMs, different problems in teaching. Obviously not all teachers quit because of those, and we still h…

> why didn't math disappear when calculators were built?

Because you can see a child using a calculator.

> Why didn't teaching go out of fashion when TV was invented

Laws (which put students in classrooms) and a lack of TV use in classrooms. TV use in classrooms was generally driven by the teachers.

> "ChatGPT is different than anything that has come before, and will change everything"

It's effectively undetectable when used, unless you have students write essays in your presence and on paper. That's what makes it so much harder to counter than previous aids.

WRT writing large essays on paper - it's a skill that's not useful and is thus not emphasized in any class - a trend that's existed longer than ChatGPT. Reversing it now would impact all grades, and face major pushback from parents.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#122

Post by Der_Einzige »

ReverseCold wrote: post #54
djcooley wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is terrifying. Our ability to think has been our biggest differentiator as a species. LLMs threaten this, and I'll die on that hill.

> [Writing] will create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves. The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence, and you give your disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will…

Thank you. Luddite tendencies are as deep within humans as the desire to kill is. It is a personification of the death-drive and all self-destructive tendencies within humans.

It's also the tendency towards the "precautionary principal" AKA Nietzschian "last-man" style thinking applied to the world infinitely.

We should root this kind of thinking out aggressively, at least from the academy.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#123

Post by adamc »

lucianbr wrote: post #103
chx wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. We as educators can show the interesting parts, the wonders of a field but more we can't do. The author of the article seems to have not managed to get through. Truth to be told, such happens every day in schools because most schools use completely outdated ways to teach -- frontal pedagogy itself is such -- and so ChatGPT is not their biggest problem but it…

> You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. This must have been a problem before the invention of LLMs. How was it solved before? Why didn't teaching go out of fashion when TV was invented, or why didn't math disappear when calculators were built? You yourself highlight problems that existed before LLMs, different problems in teaching. Obviously not all teachers quit because of those, and we still h…

I don't think chatgpt created the problem, although it may contribute to it.

Here's a hypothesis: The problem is that thinking analytically, rigorously, is hard work. People do not often seem to come to it by accident. It's something we have learned to do, and schools/teachers are one of many mechanisms we have used to culturally transmit these skills. Until (pick a date -- 1950, say) it was assisted by the fact that one of the most widespread forms of entertainment was reading. Yes, even by then movies were a thing, but most people couldn't afford to go to a movie every night, and they were limited to what was currently showing. So most people in western countries, where literacy was high, spent a fair amount of time reading. Reading, by its nature, tends to focus the mind. You learn to spend long periods ingesting and contemplating information.

We also taught writing -- and we still do -- but it benefits hugely from all that time spent reading. It is much easier to learn to write if you read a lot. And writing further develops your thinking skills.

The modern era has given us wonderful technologies, but there is a lot of evidence that people are struggling to focus in the way we once did. People read less, write less, and spend more time on other media. I'm not slagging on film or games or cell phones -- conceivably, other useful skills are imparted, and people enjoy them. But our ability to focus seems to be declining. Chatgpt is just another time-saver that makes it easier to avoid learning critical thinking skills.

It's not impossible that teachers will find a way to compensate. I think there are some things working against that: 1) we don't fund schools in a way that is going to allow them to spend additional time per student. 2) societal expectations seem to be that teachers magically pour knowledge into children, rather than learning, fundamentally, being something the child has to do, and which requires a large parental investment. 3) a lot of what lead to focus in the first place didn't come from the schools, but from the social environment -- i.e., reading was the most practical source of entertainment -- and so we are expecting schools to compensate for a problem they didn't create and for which we may have no totally satisfactory solution.

I suspect that's only part of it. The pace of life is very different than it once was. Even an illiterate in 1800 probably worked on fewer things per day and perhaps had more chances to focus. But that's sheer speculation.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#124

Post by adamc »

lucianbr wrote: post #110
adamc wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most teachers have large classes. Their ability to monitor each kid and prevent them from using chatgpt or similar tools may be limited. I come from a family with many teachers. The harsh reality is that teachers can provide a conducive environment, but they just don't have enough time per kid to make nearly the impact that people expect, which is why your home environment is so critical. Teachers don't really teach.…

> Most teachers have large classes. Their ability to monitor each kid and prevent them from using chatgpt or similar tools may be limited. I'm not a teacher, and I very well may be missing your point due to my own shortcomings. But I have to ask, would this sentence not apply to people not wanting to learn math because it's hard? (or learn anything at all) > Most teachers have large classes. Their ability to monitor…

Math is usually assessed via quizzes and tests where you have to show your work, which makes it easier for the teacher to tell if you are getting it. It's a lot harder to assess whether a student has read a novel -- you basically have to make them write a paper on it (and be aware of what they would get from Cliffs notes). Grading papers is a ton of work, and that limits that technique.

Also, it's easy to see if someone is using a calculator. But needing to show your work makes that less of an issue anyhow.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#125

Post by inerte »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #37
adamc wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can already see it in people who cannot navigate their automobile without google maps or some equivalent.

I think what is more readily apparent is that younger folks cannot reverse their car without looking at the camera. Older folks still turn around and look.

For 13 years I drove stick and for 18 years I drove without a backup camera. Nowadays I don't turn around and look back. Automatic and camera are so much better.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#126

Post by SoftTalker »

doctorpangloss wrote: post #31
smokel wrote: post #15

The real problem seems to be with the testing and grading system, and the fact that some people game them to receive some title or other credentials. If one is really interested in learning to write well, or to understand what good writing is, then this particular teacher might still have liked their job. That approach probably doesn't make much money though.

I don't know. When have you heard a single student or educator in a class suggest, "All submitted papers should be available to be read by everyone in the class"? Think deeply about the impacts of that. Other than a creative writing class, I can't recall a single time when I could read someone else's papers without their express permission. I'm bringing this up because you're talking about a tired trope, that making…

In 10th grade English, once a week we as a class reviewed one student's writing (without being told who the student was). By the end of the year everyone had a "peer review" of his or her writing at least once.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#127

Post by chx »

lucianbr wrote: post #103
chx wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. We as educators can show the interesting parts, the wonders of a field but more we can't do. The author of the article seems to have not managed to get through. Truth to be told, such happens every day in schools because most schools use completely outdated ways to teach -- frontal pedagogy itself is such -- and so ChatGPT is not their biggest problem but it…

> You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. This must have been a problem before the invention of LLMs. How was it solved before? Why didn't teaching go out of fashion when TV was invented, or why didn't math disappear when calculators were built? You yourself highlight problems that existed before LLMs, different problems in teaching. Obviously not all teachers quit because of those, and we still h…

Of course it has been a problem, I provided you with books from the 60s and the 70s to show a better way to educate people.

See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEmuEWjHr5c for why TV or anything else didn't obsolete teaching.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#128

Post by indigo0086 »

Would he have this problem with smaller classrooms of kids that elect to be in the class rather than having an academic obligation to. There will be always kids who skate by, it just seems like a is exposing that there is a limitation of choices for students in higher education.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#129

Post by kibwen »

rectang wrote: post #40
malfist wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really see that as a bad thing. Einstein famously didn't memorize phone numbers because you could look it up in book. Quick external lookups are a huge productivity boost since you don't have to spend all the time memorizing something.

A conversation between Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson from A Study in Scarlet , by Arthur Conan Doyle: > That any civilized human being in this nineteenth century should not be aware that the earth travelled round the sun appeared to be to me such an extraordinary fact that I could hardly realize it. > "You appear to be astonished," he said, smiling at my expression of surprise. "Now that I do know it I shall do my b…

This is a very inapropos quote, because A Study In Scarlet was the first Holmes story, and Conan Doyle later retconned this because it turns out to be very important for a detective of Holmes' sort to be able to draw on seemingly-useless knowledge in order to make serendipitous leaps of logic.

Re: I Quit Teaching Because of ChatGPT

#130

Post by eesmith »

lucianbr wrote: post #66
adamc wrote: post #39

I read this and it struck a chord. A decade or more ago, a friend of mine teaching English in a major state university told me that he was getting lots of students who couldn't seem to read a novel. They could read the words on the page, but they couldn't focus enough to really understand it. My experience is that writing things out always improves my understanding of the subject. It's similar to forcing yourself to…

> If the result of chatgpt is even more kids skating through life without really picking up these skills... it may have tragic consequences. Learning to think well is the single most important thing I got from education. Do teachers have no role here? "If many kids make a certain choice, there will be big trouble". Maybe teach them to do better? Is the role of educator reduced to giving assignements and grading them…

> Maybe teach them to do better? Is the role of educator reduced to giving assignements and grading them in a mindless way?

Please don't present a strawman point when link is written by a teacher who is clearly not doing that.

"As an experienced teacher, I am familiar with pedagogical best practices. I scaffolded assignments. I researched ways to incorporate generative AI in my lesson plans, and I designed activities to draw attention to its limitations. I reminded students that ChatGPT may alter the meaning of a text when prompted to revise, that it can yield biased and inaccurate information, that it does not generate stylistically strong writing and, for those grade-oriented students, that it does not result in A-level work. It did not matter. The students still used it."

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