Teachers define ethics of their own AI use
Artificial intelligence has emerged into the education system quickly. Many students argue that it is unfair that teachers can use AI freely but they can not. What are Minnehaha teachers actually using AI for? What do they encourage, and where do they draw the line within the education system, even for themselves?
Math teacher Wendy McDonald shares how AI has been incorporated into her classroom.
“I’ve encouraged them to use AI when they’ve tried a problem, and they don’t understand it, and they’re really stuck or frustrated,” she says. “Not just to give [students] the answer but explain how to do it.”
On her own time, McDonald finds AI helpful when she has thought carefully about what material and types of questions she wants on a test. AI can generate new questions for a retake of a similar complexity as the original test.
“I’ve already thought through what I want, so I’m using it to do the busy work for me a lot of times,” she said.
She adds a moral line she holds herself to: stay away from using AI for tasks that require personal thought.
“I wouldn’t want AI commenting on my student’s work,” she said. “That’s a personal thing. I would want that to be coming from me, and my heart, and my mind, and my love for the student, which AI is never going to have.”
McDonald responds to argumentative students, saying she believes teachers are using AI to relieve themselves of time-consuming tasks that don’t take independent thought.
Science as a process
In the science department, physics teacher Tim Swanson says there isn’t a place for AI in his classes other than cheating. It will give the answers to the content of the course.
Similar to McDonald, Swanson uses the same policy concerning students using AI.
“Put the problem into AI and have AI give them clues. If they’re at school then they should come see me,” he said.
Swanson used AI for his new AP Physics course this summer to help analyze which math skills would be important. He finds it helpful for organizing instead of doing his job for him.
“What I enjoy about teaching is knowing how kids explore things and how to create materials that help them access that,” he said. “I don’t want AI to do the part of the job I love, which is creating, crafting and sharing [materials].”
Regarding grading, Swanson does not trust AI to put students’ work into it. “If there’s any room for error or interpretation, I would prefer to do it myself,” he said. “I don’t think it’s fair to them.” Swanson’s philosophy is “don’t shortcut the learning.”
He touches on how AI should not be doing the brain work for him or his students.
“Our goal is to have brains that are strong,” he said. “I wouldn’t have AI do my workout for me.”
He responds to the students’ argument with that same philosophy.
“Generally teachers aren’t using it to shortcut to some kind of answer,” he said. “They are using it to make something connect better with brain science.”
Social Studies: Minds in development
In the social studies department, AP Human Geography and AP European History teacher Nathan Johnson has a different approach to AI use in the classroom.
“I would prefer that students, at this point in their life, develop their thinking skills,” he said. “It’s possible that AI could help you produce something better than what you can do in my class on your own, but I don’t really care because I am interested in growing your skills.”
Johnson practices doing things in a way that AI is irrelevant, like assigning in-class essays and annotations. When it comes to homework, his policy is that students shouldn’t use it. A question he believes is good for all ages to ask themselves is, “Is this something that I could talk to a person about?”
“I think whenever a teacher or student is tempted to go to AI for something that you could go to a person for, I think it is better to go to the person,” said Johnson.
Johnson doesn’t stand firmly against students’ arguments about teachers’ AI use.
“On one hand, that is valid. Adults and teenagers should hold themselves to the same standards,” he said. “On the other hand, there are some differences between how teenagers’ minds are developing and how adults’ minds are developing.”
Johnson continues to talk about the common reason teachers are against students using AI is that teenagers’ minds are brains in training. Teachers are trying to develop students’ thinking skills, and to shortcut that is detrimental.
English: Never let tech impede relationships
In the English department, Kristin Henderson, who teaches both Honors English 10 and English 12, uses the Minnehaha “Stop Light” to help students understand when AI is appropriate for an assignment.
“My policy is that students must have permission before they engage AI for idea generation or writing feedback,” she said. “This policy is intended to preserve the relationships of teacher-student and peer-to-peer collaboration, and the messy, fruitful work of thinking.”
When incorporating AI into her lessons, she finds it helpful for big-picture planning, formatting documents, and creating examples for her class assignments.
“Students often do best when they have a model of the work being asked of them,” Henderson said. “When I give a new formative assignment, it can be helpful to have AI provide a simple example or non-example for students to work from.”
Henderson believes each staff member needs to use their own morals and professional goals when deciding the line for themselves.
“If using AI will stunt my craft as a teacher or inhibit an opportunity to build a relationship with a student, that’s a line I won’t cross,” she said. “I won’t use AI to grade student work because I love getting to know individual student voice through writing.”
Henderson encourages students to keep asking questions about AI. She believes that is the best way to navigate its place in classrooms responsibly. Her main counter to the students’ argument is that humans learn through physically doing, making mistakes, and evaluating.
“Deep, meaningful learning takes time and might be a little humbling,” Henderson said. “Young adulthood is an important time to build awareness of this powerful reality. I think it’s a grave mistake for young people to sacrifice this learning for the sake of efficiency. Adults have more self-awareness of this human phenomenon, but we also need to be mindful about what we lose and what we gain by employing AI.”