Blog 3: Man vs. Machine or Man + Machine?

Thoughts on quote inspired by Ou et al. (2024): "With AI increasingly shaping higher education, it is essential for universities to acknowledge students’ AI-assisted learning identities. Rather than solely preventing academic misconduct, AI policies should focus on enhancing student learning experiences. Research suggests that most students use AI ethically, perceiving it as a virtual teacher rather than a tool for cheating. Educators can harness this perspective by integrating AI into classroom interactions, designing activities where students engage with AI tools for discussions, critical reflections, and peer-like exchanges. By embracing AI as a learning resource, institutions can foster more meaningful academic engagement and prepare students for AI-driven educational landscapes."

There is a the saying: "The fear of the unknown" and many have likely felt it firsthand. One of the current prominent example of something "unknown" appearing out of no where and taking the world by storm, would be the integration of AI in education and new visibility of generative AI.

Image generated by AI

When ChatGPT was released in 2022, AI quickly became a hot and controversial conversational topic. I remember hearing from people in awe about how amazing it was, how you could have a conversation with it and generate content out of a simple set of words. At the same time, I also heart concerns that AI was the scariest innovation yet, as it had the capabilities to impact the job market and store personal information.

In the world of academia, I constantly hear negative comments towards AI use in education, often along the lines of "Students are using AI to cheat, plagiarize, and pass off work as their own". While this may be true in some cases, as educators, we risk assuming the worst of our very own students. I find that this is a very negative outlook to have towards our students and that these types of preconceived notions can unfairly generalize all students, disregarding their ability and potential to use AI responsibly.

To make a simple analogy for comparison: Imagine that one of your students finds a wallet on the street containing $40 cash. They open the wallet, find an ID and the phone number of the owner of the wallet. Some may feel inclined to take the money and walk away, but others may do their best contact the owner and return the wallet with everything intact. While ethical principles do play a key role in their decision, the key idea remains- do you believe that every single one of your students would take the money and run? Why do we immediately assume that bringing AI into education will automatically result in students academic dishonesty? Why are we assuming that students will use AI to lie and cheat?

Image generated by AI

To be clear, I am not naive and I understand that the situations differ greatly but why are we always assuming the worst out of our students? Instead of banning AI completely, perhaps a better approach would be to educate students about AI's affordances, ethics and the implications of its use.

People who want to steal, will always find a way steal. People who want to plagiarize, will find a way to plagiarize. Our job as educators is never to police students' every move and every possible form of misuse of AI, but rather to guide students in using AI ethically. In helping learners explore how AI can support and how it can hinder their learning, we empower them to make informed decisions about how or even if they would like to continue engaging with its uses in the future.

If you would like to learn ways in which you can integrate AI in your classroom, please visit my prior blog here: To integrate or not to integrate AI?

After reading this article what are your thoughts? Which outlook are you likely to adopt?

• Change Image

  Man vs Machine
• Change Image

  Man + Machine

I look forward to hearing your perspective on this post and the comparison I presented in the article above. Keep an eye out for a future blog post where we will discuss some preparation steps and things to think about once/if you have decided to bring AI into your classroom!