Recently, advocacy for educators to fully embrace Artificial Intelligence (AI) as a key part of how students learn has increased.

Ohio State University, for example, will now require AI training for students.

As a literacy educator for over 40 years, specifically as a teacher of writing, I have stated a solid “no AI” policy both in my courses and as a public stance.

While I am certainly not anti-technology, I am a technology skeptic and have acknowledged that popular technology used in education tends to be quite bad—for example, Turnitin.com.

My core reason for a “no AI” policy in my courses, specifically my writing courses, is that AI such as ChatGPT tends to do for students the very behaviors they need to be practicing in order to learn.

As a comparison, I have a “no AI” policy for the same reason I reject rubrics and writing prompts for teaching writing since rubrics and prompts, again, are making decisions for students that they need to be making as developing writers.

I recommend, then, a new analysis of ChatGPT: Your Brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation of Cognitive Debt when Using an AI Assistant for Essay Writing Task.

Here are key findings that support my “no AI” policy:

I want to stress that my experience with students is that they often either fail to use useful technology (such as the grammar and spelling check in Word) or they are quite bad at using technology, despite being seen as technology natives.

That students need help in formal education with being better at using technology is a given, but it is not a contradiction to acknowledge that some technology is counter-educational; and that is the case with AI/ChatGPT.

Recommended

CAUTION: Technology!

ChatGPT and a New Battle in the Citation Gauntlet for Students and Teachers

Technology Fails Plagiarism, Citation Tests

It’s the End of Writing as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

The Training Wheel Fallacy for Teaching Writing

More Than Words: How to Think About Writing in the Age of AI, John Warner