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Original poster

Chat GPT -Homework now pointless?

107 replies

mids2019 · 23/11/2023 06:59

My daughter was given an essay to write on reincarnation as part of religious studies homework.

All the class basically used AI write the homework leading to presumably a teacher spending hours marking the results of an algorithm. Is this a good use t of time? Can teachers identify the use of AI? Do we need a new model of teching/in term examination that will be meaningful going forward in this new AI world?

OP posts:
Twasthenightbefore · 24/11/2023 06:33

Its my last day in education today and this was one of the factors that pushed me to leave. I am regularly marking work that is very clearly AI generated but I can't say it's plagiarised as its not 'copied' from a source. Really grey area at my place of work. We had a training session on it recently and whilst it's evidently a fantastic tool it's going to change education drastically. We were encouraged to use it for marking and to 'help with workload' and encourage our learners to use it. The lady teaching the course was very open about using it to write her essays for her PhD. Learners not using it would surely then be at a major disadvantage the way work is currently marked. It's made me feel so uneasy.

Stopsnowing · 24/11/2023 06:33

I know a private school which has already stopped setting essay homework for this reason. I presume they write essays in class which is a waste of time.
AI is developing fast. I don’t think you can always tell if something has been AI generated and AI will only get better.
There is a skill and art in essay writing which is the foundation of learning which will be lost. It is very sad.

Nellodee · 24/11/2023 06:30

My solution would be for students to hand their work electronically. Teachers would then use AI to set the students three short questions specifically based on their own solutions, which they would answer in pen and paper in class. Teachers would then mark these, not the essay itself.

Meadowgrasses · 24/11/2023 06:26

Teachers are starting to find it useful though - in drama they are using it to write little scenarios for lesson starters, saving them loads of time.

Meadowgrasses · 24/11/2023 06:24

I no longer set essays as homework, we do times essays in class and Will continues to do so until the exam boards change. As a school we are working on how we teach kids to use AI - getting our heads round it first though!

Original poster
mids2019 · 24/11/2023 06:23

Sorry for the typios

OP posts:
Original poster
mids2019 · 24/11/2023 06:22

@MrsHamlet

At.least for basic stuff is there a danger of an AI checked identifying human out as SO output as AI output? This may result in pupils being falsely accused of cheating?

Also where the answer may be well known due to the question being asked a great deal in the past does AI produce something distinctly non human? I asked chatGPT why hamlet delayed killing his uncle and the answers given were a reasonable set of bullet points. Admittedly copying from decision guided might have given similar results but AI might allow subtle variations . If your cover about it AI could be used to ask demeaning of individual groups of lines from Shakespeare for instance and so I can see it being a useful tool for the more innovative srudent.

OP posts:
wishingiwas20something · 24/11/2023 06:17

mids2019 · 23/11/2023 07:15

@RubySunset82 .

Good point but is that obvious? ChatGPT can put together some pretty coherent answers to questions like 'describe the battle of Agincourt'. OK SO don't perfect but some of the kids are editing the AI output and it looks quite reasonable especially when you have a teacher marking multiple bits of work. I don't think it is that easy to call out to be honest without proof of use.

Yes it’s very obvious to anyone with eyes and command of the English language. Why don’t you ask Chat GBT to write something for you? What it is good for is applying structure to your document, however you have to do lots of rewriting to get the words to sound non-robotic.

Ggttl · 24/11/2023 06:16

I am astonished that there are teachers on here that think they can always tell. I know from my own children that many enjoy the challenge of getting it past teachers and never get caught. At least the teachers at their school realise that they can’t always tell so they are thinking of ways of tackling it. Perfect punctuation is probably a bit of a giveaway but teenagers are capable of adding mistakes deliberately.

MrsHamlet · 24/11/2023 06:10

The problem may arise when students edit SO output so it is a hybrid of SO and their own work. It would be interesting to see if such work passed plagiarism software.

It doesn't pass on Turnitin. That tells me what is plagiarised AND what it thinks is AI generated.

Original poster
mids2019 · 24/11/2023 06:07

The problem may arise when students edit SO output so it is a hybrid of SO and their own work. It would be interesting to see if such work passed plagiarism software. I noticed with basic question a like 'what is an electron' then a chat GPT answer easily could be conceived as being human produced (though a copy from wiki may yield they same result).

Do companies need to take responsibility as they are going to makeovers profits in both producing the AI software and the checking software?

OP posts:
Hols24 · 24/11/2023 05:50

In fact I've just checked and it has already: www.turnitin.com/solutions/topics/ai-writing/

Hols24 · 24/11/2023 05:43

Elvanseshortage · 23/11/2023 18:52

I am a university lecturer teaching undergraduate and post graduate students. This is a really big problem. No, you can't tell whether it's human or AI and there is no programme to detect it. The only reason it's obvious is because the essays don't match the lectures and certainly don't match the students' normal contributions.

However, there is very little we can do. Plagiarism is detected by turnitin, which has been around for years and works really accurately and gives us the evidence we need to penalise students. However, there is very little we can do about chatGPT. It is incredibly frustrating, even upsetting. It makes you distrust all submitted work and I imagine the students are far less interested in the lectures or seminars because they don't think they have to fully engage with it.

Our solution is to return to exams and other modes of assessment like presentations. However, this means that students are not getting the experience they need in academic writing and this will have a knock on effect with PhD students who will be lacking in research and writing skills they need to do research and write a thesis/publish generally.

There are already effective AI checkers such as the one @AdultLounge shared above:

https://contentatscale.ai/ai-content-detector/

I imagine it's only a matter of time before Ai checking is incorporated into Turnitin.

AI Detector Tool Checks ChatGPT, GPT-4, Bard, Claude & More

Free AI Detector checks if your text is from ChatGPT, GPT-4, Bard, & Claude (with 98% accuracy). Use our pro version to convert to undetectable ai text.

https://contentatscale.ai/ai-content-detector

AllProperTeaIsTheft · 24/11/2023 05:36

Does that make best use of your time as a teacher effectively having to invigilate mini exams? Do you think this is going to be the new normal?

It's not so bad for us tbh. I'm an MFL teacher. We don't need to do spend thar much time doing full written pieces in class, as they only represent 25% of the whole exam, and are not very long. Tbh letting them do them at home was already a bit of a problem before AI due to online translators, which are much more frequently used than AI, especially at GCSE.

mumda · 23/11/2023 22:45

Tell them to use bing chat as it gives reference links too.

Original poster
mids2019 · 23/11/2023 22:27

@AllProperTeaIsTheft

Does that make best use of your time as a teacher effectively having to invigilate mini exams? Do you think this is going to be the new normal?

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AllProperTeaIsTheft · 23/11/2023 22:24

We just give them other types of homework and make them do essays/writing pieces in class instead.

It's not always obvious when something is written by AI. I got Chatgpt to write a model literature essay for my Y12 MFL class. It was bloody great. Concise, well written, top grade standard, but certainly not implausible for a decent Y12 to have written it.

Original poster
mids2019 · 23/11/2023 22:21

At what point do you make the accusation if AI though to a child? It is quite a heavy accusation to make that of plagiarism.

I worry about essays that will eventually slip under the radar and teachers lauding students in error

OP posts:
MrsHamlet · 23/11/2023 22:17

Flibbertigibbettytoes · 23/11/2023 22:16

I teach at UG and it stands out a mile because obviously I run any prompts through GPT myself. I imagine secondary teachers arwe doing the same and wondering how those kids will do in an exam

I'm not wondering. This child will fail.

Flibbertigibbettytoes · 23/11/2023 22:16

I teach at UG and it stands out a mile because obviously I run any prompts through GPT myself. I imagine secondary teachers arwe doing the same and wondering how those kids will do in an exam

Original poster
mids2019 · 23/11/2023 22:14

My concern is that as the technology develops we will be reliant more on exams and we were moving on a path which was less reliant on them to some extent.

Will those children that shone through coursework now be unduly penalised?

On another note is everyone absolutely sure that can detect AI easily? I suspect with a little amendment AI might be hard to spot and even if it is spotted how do you prove a child in effect has cheated?

OP posts:
MrsHamlet · 23/11/2023 22:14

I was given an essay to mark today which included quotations from the text.
Unfortunately the student concerned didn't bother to check the work they handed in. The quotations are entirely made up... and that's only the start of the problems.
A cursory glance told me it was AI generated. Turnitin did the rest for me.

FusionChefGeoff · 23/11/2023 22:11

I like the cut of your jib @Icedlatteplease.

Rather than trying to beat AI, we should accept it can do 90% of the syllabus so that means we don't have to teach / learn it! We don't memorise logarithm tables anymore do we?

Imagine what humans could and should be doing with their time and intellect if AI has all of this covered?!

IHeartKingThistle · 23/11/2023 22:10

We've stopped setting written homework entirely for this reason. Our homework is revision sheets on paper that they have to fill in by hand. Old school but it works. Long answer written pieces have to be done in front of me.

Even then I've had a chat GPT assessment handed in (cover teacher in for 30 mins while I had an appointment and in that time they got out their phone 🤦‍♀️). But like previous posters said, it is sooooo obvious.

Chgl92 · 23/11/2023 22:07

Until students type their exams or there is an overhaul of written exams, students need to write legibly and be able to construct an argument on paper in a coherent and linear way. Whether or not they should be handwriting exams is another matter entirely.

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