Should ChatGPT be banned from use in schools?

Posted on February 5, 2023 | Leave a comment

The New York City schools thinks so.  It has banned the new artificial intelligence writing tool from its school computers.  So have the Seattle Public Schools, the Los Angeles Unified School District, Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia and Montgomery County Public Schools in Alabama.  All fear ChatGPT will be used by students to do their assignments.

Before we continue, what is ChatGPT?  It is a form of artificial intelligence (AI) launced in November by OpenAI, a San Francisco-based company.  ChatGPT, a free service,  can write essays on demand, solve problems, code, generate discussions and offer students tips on how to revise their writing.  It can compose paragraphs in the style of a fourth grader or write sonnets in the style of Robert Frost so well that experts can’t tell that AI wrote them.  And that is the problem.

If students use this AI tool to do their school work, will students learn?  But perhaps that is not the best question to ask.  ChatGPT is free, it’s out there, and more and better tools like it are in the works.  Can schools really stop students from using such AI?  Should they?

I think it is a hopeless pursuit.  Here’s why.

  • Though schools can ban or disable ChatGPT on school computers, they can’t ban it on students’ personal computers or cell phones or tablets. Outside of school, students can use ChatGPT to do school assignments.  How is a teacher to know?
  • Programs claiming to be able to detect AI-written work so far aren’t foolproof. And with more AI-programs in the pipeline, will such programs be able to keep up?
  • English teachers—who already work some of the longest hours of any teachers—will not want to add to their burden by checking student assignments for AI-composed paragraphs, essays, arguments, and data.

Since AI is here to stay, instead of banning ChatGPT and tracking down cheaters, schools better might invest in how to use it to teachers’ advantage. Since the technology is so new, accommodating it (rather than banning it) this semester will be difficult for most school districts.  However, if schools designate personnel to study ChatGPT, and develop practices teachers can use during the next school year, schools can use AI as another teaching tool, one tech-savvy students will embrace.

If you want to try ChatGPT,

  • On your computer,  go to chat.openai.com  You will be asked for your email and phone number to which codes will be sent in order to proceed.
  • On your Android smart phone, go to your web browser and key in chat.openai.com.
  • ChatGPT is not available on Apple phones since OpenAI is a Microsoft-backed enterprise.

 

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Posted in ChatGPT

A lily by any other name. . .

Posted on January 17, 2023 | Leave a comment

The other day I heard Prince Harry refer to his daughter as “Lily,” the nickname for her legal name, Lilibet, which is itself a nickname for her namesake, Queen Elizabeth II.  The origins of the word Lily refer to a flower, while the origins of Elizabeth refer to “oath” and “God” in Hebrew.  Interesting, isn’t it, how one name leads to another?

Lily’s grandfather, Charles, is known as Carlos in Spanish-language countries and Karl in German and Russian-language countries.  Prince William is Guillermo in Spanish, Guillaume in French, and Wilhelm in German, but William in Russian since there is no translation of William into Russian.

Many European countries refer to the British family members by their English names even if there is an easy translation.

Prince Harry is usually called Harry in the European press, even though his formal name, Henry, can be translated into Henrique in Spanish, Enrico in Italian and Henri in French.  His wife, Meghan, has no equivalent for her English name in most other languages.  Camilla is a tough one to translate, too.

In my own family there was a quandary about what to call me.  My mother wanted to name me after her mother, Catherine, but she wanted to honor my father’s Irish heritage.  So I was named Kathleen.  If I made the news, would I be called Catalina in Spanish, Caterina in Italian, Ekaterina in Russian, or Catherine in French?  Happily, a moot point.

Writers should be aware of names we choose for our characters.  J. K. Rowling certainly thought about Harry Potter’s name:  both Harry and Potter are common, under-the-radar long-time English names perfect for a boy who lives in a closet under the stairs.  Snape, a sinister character, has a name sounding like “snake.”  Malfoy means bad (mal) faith (foy), ideal for the student who tries to thwart Harry.  And Valdemort, derived from vol (flight) de (from) mort (death), perfectly fits an evil wizard fighting to stay alive.

Jane Austen chose solid English names for most of her major characters (Charles appears over and over, as do Jane and Elizabeth).  Shakespeare chose Mercurcio for his hot-headed, walk-away-lover in Romeo and Juliet.

Sometimes editors choose names when authors’ choices seem off.  Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind was originally called “Violet,” too sweet and timid a name for the firey heroine in Margaret Mitchell’s classic.  Mitchell named her male lead character aptly though:  Rhett brings to mind “rat.”

 

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Posted in naming characters

Two typical writing problems for middle schoolers and how a tutor overcomes them

Posted on January 12, 2023 | Leave a comment

Problem 1:  A seventh grader is writing a narrative about the first day of the new semester.  She starts her story by recounting how her alarm rang.  Then, lying in bed, she worries about two new teachers she would meet that day.  Next, she writes that she goes downstairs, eats breakfast, dresses and takes the bus to school.  Once in school, she grabs her texts from her locker, talks to a friend,  heads to her first class, and meets one of her new teachers.

“Do you need that part about going downstairs, eating, taking the bus, and going to your locker?” I ask her.

“Well, yeah.  How else do I show that I go to school?”

“Could you write about waking up and being nervous to meet your new teacher, and then jump to the part where the teacher meets you, saying ‘Welcome to our math class, Cara.’?”

“No, because how will the readers know who is talking and that it is later that day?”

“Okay.  Could you say, ‘Cara, is it?’ my new teacher said as I walked in the classroom an hour later.”

“You mean I don’t need to say all the in-between stuff?”

“That’s right.”  I suggest she cut and paste her paragraphs about eating, riding the bus and going to her locker to the bottom of the narrative for now while she thinks more about it.

She does, hesitantly.  A little later, she deletes that part.  “I guess I don’t need it after all.”

Problem 2:  But I can’t write, “’Cara, is it?’” my new teacher said as I walked in the classroom an hour later” because it’s only one sentence, and every paragraph needs five sentences.”

“No, it doesn’t.  Look at any book and count the number of sentences in each paragraph.  Lots will have only one sentence, and others will have seven or ten or even a fragment.”

She picked up a book and opened it and counted sentences.  She closed the book.  “But then why do my teachers say I need to write five sentences in each paragraph?”

“That’s to encourage you to write more.”

“You mean there’s no rule?”

“No.”

“Oh.”

She left the one-sentence paragraph on her page, and followed it by another one-sentence paragraph.

* * * *

Sometimes working with a writing tutor means dispelling myths, like the five-sentence paragraph or needing to write a “before” to a story instead of jumping right in.  Sometimes working with a writing tutor means making mistakes repeatedly, like forgetting to use apostrophes or using texting abbreviations, and asking for help.  Sometimes working with a writing tutor means trying stylistic changes, like adding dialog or figurative language.  Sometimes working with a writing tutor means experimenting with vocabulary the student has not written before.

Do you know a student who could use one-on-one writing instruction?  Tell that student’s parent about me.  I tutor writing to students, second grade to high school,  online.  Together students and I plan, organize, write first drafts, and revise, noting why each step in the process is important.  Writing well is like playing the piano well or kicking a soccer ball well.  It takes practice.  And with a knowledgeable coach or tutor, a student improves faster.

 

 

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Posted in five sentence paragraph, how to teach writing, narrative writing, omitting unnecessary information, teaching writing, tutoring for writing

Learning cursive—what’s the point?

Posted on January 2, 2023 | 1 comment

I learned to print in first grade and to write in cursive in third grade.  I used cursive for all my written school work—spelling tests, homework, and exams—everything.  But  eventually, I used a combination of styles for hand writing—printing for capital and some lower case letters, and cursive for the rest.

Most of my incoming Christmas mail is addressed using printed labels.  But those friends who handwrite my address fit into three categories:

  • They print everything, sometimes in all caps.
  • They use a version of my hybrid style.
  • They write in cursive. (But that method is rare since the advent of  computerized mail sorting machines.  My neighbor, who handwrites in gorgeous cursive, had her outgoing Christmas mail returned as “unreadable” two years ago.  So now she prints on her envelopes.  I guess the Post Office’s machines don’t read cursive.)

Cursive has been eliminated from the curriculum in many elementary schools.  The common core curriculum instead focuses on learning the keypad—fingering optional.   This decision is controversial.

Arguments abound for learning cursive:

  • People need to be able to read old family letters and historical documents.
  • “I learned it, Sonny, and by golly, you will too.”
  • Cursive is an art form used by previous generations, and we should appreciate it.
  • People can handwrite using cursive faster than they can print.

Likewise, arguments abound for abandoning cursive:

  • People today rarely need to read cursive. Printed versions of old documents are online.
  • There isn’t time to learn everything, so less important skills must be abandoned.
  • The curriculum must stress what is important for students’ futures, namely, keyboarding and using computer software like Google docs and Zoom.

Another argument favoring cursive is that serious writers write better when writing in longhand.  (Three times using the word “write” in that sentence—hmm.)  Some excellent writers today write first drafts in longhand, revise in longhand, rewrite in longhand, and only then put their work into a typewriter or computer.  But I suspect many others—a majority—compose on their iPads or laptops without a loss in creativity.

More disturbing to me than the loss of cursive skills is the incursion of text messaging forms into non-text writing.  I teach a high school student who does not use capitals and who abbreviates every other phrase.  I suspect this way of writing will become the norm in years ahead.  And just like resurrecting cursive, there’s little we can do about it.  “What works” will win.  Methods of writing evolve.

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Posted in cursive handwriting

Annotating: why, what and how

Posted on December 12, 2022 | Leave a comment

Why should you annotate?

  • Annotating saves time later on. When you need to study a text, annotating creates a shortcut way to review a text and its graphics.
  • Annotating helps you understand now. When you initially read a text, annotating helps you understand it better.  You mark what’s important.  You connect ideas.  You paraphrase.  You sequence information clearly.
  • Annotating helps you retain information. The more senses you use to learn, the more likely you are to remember.  With annotating you don’t just read a text with your eyes (one sense—sight).  You write, underline, number, color code, and draw arrows with your hands and your eyes (two senses—sight and touch), and if you speak aloud to yourself as you work, you use another sense (listening).
  • Annotating makes the source material and your notes one document. If you write on your text, your notes and the text are forever together.  You can go back and forth as needed to check the original and to add more notes, more depth as you become aware.
  • Annotating makes you aware of your own learning. Sometimes you read on automatic pilot, and after a while, you realize nothing went in.  With annotating, you have to think about the material.  You stay focused.
  • Annotating puts difficult ideas or vocabulary into your own words. By paraphrasing, you learn whether you understand a text or not.

What do you annotate?

  • Main ideas. Often you can find these in the first sentence, in the last sentence of the first paragraph, in the last paragraph, and in titles, headlines and subheadings,
  • Subtopic ideas. These are often the first sentences of the body paragraphs.
  • How a text is organized. Chronological?  Most important to least important?  Sequential?  Something else?
  • Findings for scientific texts.
  • Evidence in persuasive and argumentative texts.
  • Themes, symbols, motifs, main characters, inciting action, problem to be solved and climax in fiction.
  • Ideas which when linked form a summary.
  • Vocabulary that seems important or that you don’t know.
  • Inferences, both obvious and suspected.
  • Figures of speech.
  • Patterns.

How do you annotate?

  • Identify important words or ideas. Usually these are verbs and nouns.  Underline them with clearly visible ink or highlight them with a light enough color so they are easy to read.  Limit your underlines to only important information, not details.  If you underline almost everything, the underlines are wasted.  (See these paragraphs as examples.)
  • Use margins for your words. Draw conclusions, define words, ask questions, make inferences.
  • Number ideas. Some labels become buried in the midst of paragraphs. Make them obvious by numbering ideas boldly or drawing arrows from one idea to the next.
  • Draw question marks in margins. Box or bracket confusing information, and then put a question mark in the margin. Ask your teacher to explain that part.
  • Use abbreviations.  Use text message short cuts.  Or develop your own.  For example, I write the words “most important” or “very important” as “VIP” when I take notes.  If I hurry, I don’t cross t’s or dot i’s.  I write “about” as @.

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Posted in annotations, English Writing Instruction