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Earlier this semester I wrote about my decision to go "old school" in the classes I teach. This meant no phones, no computers; nothing but a writing utensil, paper, and book. I did this because in spite of all the workshops and advice from so-called experts who have told me I should incorporate AI into the classroom, I have found AI to be an impediment to critical thinking, conversing, and individual, creative, analytical writing: the skills I am supposed to teach in college English.
It is not that AI renders void the need for these skills. I would argue such skills are needed now as much as they ever have been, and maybe more. The problem is that AI prevents the skills from being acquired. You cannot grow the necessary pathways in your brain to be able to do these things if you don't, well, do them. Part of the magic of education is that hard work and discipline create brains that are good at these skills and can apply them in all sorts of areas. Kinda like training for a friendly jujitsu competition hones skills that might keep you alive if attacked in a dark parking lot.
Critical thinking and writing clearly keeps you from becoming an automaton and helps you communicate. Both should be hallmarks of an educated citizenry. It is not midterm yet, but it is close, so I thought I would take inventory on how a return to learning without AI is going.
I am happy to report that learning without AI seems to be actual learning. My students acted scared of my old-school ways at first, which reaffirmed to me how accustomed they have become to using AI. But what is interesting is that once they got over the shock, most of them seem relieved. It reminds me of what my daughter once told me about certain social media apps: "I wish they didn't exist, Mom. If no one was on them it would be great. But since everyone is, when I am not, then I get left out."
I am also relieved. Even encouraged. Teaching is such a struggle sometimes with the missing "soft skills" kids don't acquire from being on screens all day. I had some worries about whether they would be able to do the work. I braced myself for going back and teaching very basic concepts. And there is some of that. But for the most part, my students have risen to the occasion. Turns out that when they are required to, they can think critically. And they all have unique human voices and perspectives we can't get from AI.
I thought I was going rogue in barring AI from my classroom. It was a last resort after trying several different ways of trying to incorporate it. But it turns out the rest of the academic world is also catching on. In that weird way our phones seem to listen to our conversations and generate things to put in front of us, I started seeing articles about this.
My favorite--the most accessible/least academic--is by Clay Shirky, a vice-provost at New York University. He wrote an opinion in The New York Times under the long title "Students Hate Them. Universities Need Them. The Only Real Solution to the AI Cheating Crisis." It is basically an ode to the Blue Book. Shirky says what I am thinking when he writes, "Learning is a change in long-term memory; that's the biological correlate of what we do in the classroom ... we need new ways to require the work necessary for learning. That means moving away from take-home assignments and essays and toward in-class blue book essays, oral examinations, required office hours and other assessments that call on students to demonstrate knowledge in real time."
Turns out the new ways are really the old ways. Shirky notes, "The shift is already happening: The Wall Street Journal reported on booming sales of blue books last school year."
Perhaps the best part about returning to the old school is the interpersonal reward, something I see as sorely lacking in students' lives. Shirky is also optimistic about this. He writes, "Contrary to much popular opinion, college is not in the information transfer business; we are in the identity formation business. Our medieval turn will not be a wholesale reversion. Blue books and viva voce testing will live side by side with modern innovations like active learning and authentic assessment. But a return to a more conversational, extemporaneous style will make higher education more interpersonal, more improvised and more idiosyncratic, restoring a sense of community to our institutions."
As of near-midterm, my hopes are high.
Gwen Ford Faulkenberry is an author, teacher and award-winning columnist from Ozark. Email her at [email protected].