I co-teach AP Computer Science A through Microsoft’s TEALS program. The classroom runs on Chromebooks, Google Classroom, and code.org (AWS). Corporate infrastructure top to bottom. This year I added an AI tutor. That’s apparently the controversial part.
The research is interesting: a Wharton study found students using standard ChatGPT performed 17% worse on exams—the “crutch” effect. But students using AI with pedagogical guardrails showed no negative effect. The problem isn’t AI in education. It’s unguided AI. So I built a tutor that asks probing questions instead of giving answers. I’m sharing the prompt I use and how to set one up yourself.
While, China made AI education mandatory for six-year-olds this year. We’re still deciding whether to block ChatGPT.
“Using” AI is not well defined. I assume the one that showed no difference is because the students found it useless.
Eactly! The cohert that showed no difference didn’t provide guidance of any sort, just provided GPT-4 as a resource. The cohert that benifited had a tutor agent setup and the students were instructed to treat it like a tutor. Like calculators, computers, and the Internet before, we need to design curriculum with AI in mind for it to be useful.