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Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

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Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#281

Post by edvardas »

enceladus06 wrote: post #252

LLMs is is here to stay and will change learning for the better (we will be full-scale disrupted 3-5yr from now in EDU), it is a self-guided tutor like never before and 100% Amazing, except for when it hallucinates. I use it [Copilot / GPT / Khanmingo] all the time to figure out new tools and prototype workflows, check code for errors, and learn new stuff including those classes at universities which cost way too muc…

In your situation where LLMs can cover most material better than the university, what benefits does the university still provide you, if any?

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#282

Post by aaplok »

djoldman wrote: post #118
aaplok wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I think the issue is as much that open tasks make learning interesting and meaningful in a way that exams hardly can do. This is the core of the issue really. If we are in the business of teaching, as in making people learn, exams are a pretty blunt and ineffective instrument. However since our business is also assessing, proctoring is the best if not only trustworthy approach and exams are cheap in time, effort…

> If we are in the business of teaching, as in making people learn, exams are a pretty blunt and ineffective instrument. I'm curious: what is fulfilling in your job as a math teacher? When students learn? When they're assigned grades that accurately reflect their performance? When they learn something with minimal as opposed to significant effort? Some combination? I always thought teacher motivations were interestin…

> what is fulfilling in your job as a math teacher?

Many things. The most fulfilling for me is taking a student from hating maths to enjoying it. Or when they realise that in fact they're not bad at maths. Students changing their opinions about themselves or about maths is such a fulfilling experience that it's my main motivation.

Then working with students who likes and are good at maths and challenging them a bit to expand their horizon is a lot of fun.

> When students learn?

At a high level yes (that maths can be fun, enjoyable, doable). Them learning "stuff" not so much, it's part of the job.

> When they're assigned grades that accurately reflect their performance?

Yes but not through a system based on counting how many mistakes they make, like exams do. If I can design a task that enables a student to showcase competency accurately it's great. A task that enables the best ones to extend themselves (and achieve higher marks) is great.

> When they learn something with minimal as opposed to significant effort?

Not at all. If there is no effort I don't believe much learning is happening. I like to give an opportunity for all students to work hard and learn something in the process no matter where they start from.

I only care about the grade as feedback to students. It is a way for me to tell them how far they've come.

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#283

Post by yeyeyeyeyeyeyee »

lotu wrote: post #115
johnea wrote: post #58

One of the most offensive words in the anthropomophization of LLMs is: hallucinate. It's not only an anthropomorphism, it's also a euphemism. A correct interpretation of the word would imply that the LLM has some fantastical vision that it mistakes for reality. What utter bullsh1t. Let's just use the correct word for this type of output: wrong. When the LLM generates a sequence of words, that may or may not be gramma…

Thank fuck for saying this

s/fuck/you/

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#284

Post by halgir »

california-og wrote: post #266
BrenBarn wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see that pressure as well. I find that a lot of the problems we have with AI are in fact AI exposing problems in other aspects of our society. In this case, one problem is that the people who do the teaching and know what needs to be learned are the faculty, but the decisions about how to teach are made by administrators. And another problem is that colleges are treating "make money" as a goal. These problems exist…

I totally agree. I think the neo-liberal university model is the real culprit. Where I live, Universities get money for each student who graduates. This is up to 100k euros for a new doctorate. This means that the University and its admin want as many students to graduate as possible. The (BA&MA) students also want to graduate in target time: if they do, they get a huge part of their student loans forgiven. What has…

> Some thesises had hallucinated sources, some had AI slop blogs as sources, the texts are robotic and boring. But should I fail them, out of principle on what the ideal University should be?

No, you should fail them for turning in bad theses, just like you would before AI.

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#285

Post by obscurette »

bongodongobob wrote: post #172
eru wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't see why this is so hard, other than the usual intergenerational whining / a heaping pile of student entitlement. You know that grading paper exams is a lot more hassle _for the teachers_? Your overall point might or might not still stand. I'm just responding to your 'I don't see why this is so hard'. Show some imagination for why other people hold their positions. (I'm sure there's lots of other factors tha…

Why can't the teachers use LLMs to grade?

In general – why I'd put my effort into visiting (and paying for) a school and learning in such case? That's not what schools are for. I can get any amount of grades I want from LLM myself.

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#286

Post by thih9 »

math_dandy wrote: post #28

I teach math at a large university (30,000 students) and have also gone “back to the earth”, to pen-and-paper, proctored and exams. Students don’t seem to mind this reversion. The administration, however, doesn’t like this trend. They want all evaluation to be remote-friendly, so that the same course with the same evaluations can be given to students learning in person or enrolled online. Online enrollment is a huge…

Higher ups say yes to remote learning and no to remote work. Interesting to see this side by side like this.

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#287

Post by baq »

sien wrote: post #77
math_dandy wrote: post #28

I teach math at a large university (30,000 students) and have also gone “back to the earth”, to pen-and-paper, proctored and exams. Students don’t seem to mind this reversion. The administration, however, doesn’t like this trend. They want all evaluation to be remote-friendly, so that the same course with the same evaluations can be given to students learning in person or enrolled online. Online enrollment is a huge…

In Australia Universities that have remote study have places where people can do proctored exams in large cities. The course is done remotely but the exam, which is often 50%+ of the final grade, is done in a place that has proctored exams as a service. Can't this be done in the US as well ?

nope. too much impact on profit.

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#288

Post by baq »

aaplok wrote: post #272
2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many of them are neurodivergent who do miserably in exam conditions Isn't this part of life? Learning to excel anyway?

I don't think so? I teach maths, not survival or social pressure. If a student in my class is a competent mathematician why should they not be acknowledged to be that?

real life first, math second. taking tests is a skill that must be learned, especially now with AI faking quite literally everything that can be shown on a screen. (unless your students are learning purely for the joy of it and not for having a chance to get hired anywhere.)

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#289

Post by baq »

doug_durham wrote: post #234
math_dandy wrote: post #28

I teach math at a large university (30,000 students) and have also gone “back to the earth”, to pen-and-paper, proctored and exams. Students don’t seem to mind this reversion. The administration, however, doesn’t like this trend. They want all evaluation to be remote-friendly, so that the same course with the same evaluations can be given to students learning in person or enrolled online. Online enrollment is a huge…

Hand written essays are inherently ableist. I would be at a massive disadvantage. I grew up during the 60's, but handwriting was alway slow and error prone for me. As soon as I could use a word processor I blossomed. It's probably not as bad for mathematical derivations. I still do those by hand since they are more like drawing than expression.

> Hand written essays are inherently ableist.

yes.

> I would be at a massive disadvantage.

yes.

...but.

how would you propose to filter out able cheaters instead? there's also in person one on one verbal exam, but economics and logistics of that are insanely unfavorable (see also - job interviews.)

Re: Trying to teach in the age of the AI homework machine

#290

Post by vintermann »

MrDarcy wrote: post #89
baby_souffle wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I expect the system will only catch a small fraction of the cheating that occurs. It'll depend a lot on who/where/how is doing the screening and what tools (if any) are permitted. Remember that bogus program for TI8{3,4} series calculators that would clear the screen and print "MEMORY CLEAR"? If the proctor was just looking for that string and not actually jumping through the hoops to _actually_ clear the memory th…

Was I at university in a small window in time when a TI-89 and TI-92 was allowed? In the years since, I’ve only ever heard mention of older models, not newer ones which makes me wonder if this is a special case and situation where technology is frozen in time intentionally to foster learning.

I was in such a window. TI-89 was allowed by mistake, we were allowed to keep using it since it was expensive. Next year they were back on TI-83s.

Oh yes, they're frozen in time, but since the people who pay for them are not the same people who demand they must be used, they're not frozen in price. It's the most expensive kilobytes you'll ever buy.

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