I’ve been alarming my wife again, but it’s not what you think, unless what you were thinking was that I’ve been having banal conversations in bad Italian with an AI chatbot on Duolingo. Duolingo is one of a host of language learning apps that utilise the power of AI to tailor a user’s educational experience. In all honesty, I was unimpressed with the chatbot as a tool for improving my Italian speaking – and by the expression of the sullen chatbot ‘Lily’, she was unimpressed with my attempt to tell her that I like to take walks in the countryside.
We are endlessly being told that AI is going to completely revolutionise education. In fact, when ChatGPT first exploded onto our screens in late 2022 and early 2023, a number of leading educators in the UK, lead by Sir Anthony Seldon, decried AI as a “clear and present danger to education”. 2 years on and the education apocalypse hasn’t quite transpired. However, my disappointing dialogue with Duolinguo got me thinking: how is AI affecting our children’s education now?
Homework / marking
Teachers at many schools are already setting homework on platforms that use AI. Any child who has done their homework on Atom Learning, for example, has saved their teacher the hassle of marking. This should be having a positive effect, freeing up more time (from time poor teachers) for contact hours and planning, rather than the drudgery of marking. It is not just primary level either, BOFA and Century Tech offer a range of AI learning tools for GCSE Maths and Science.
The GCSE English offering from Century is less convincing, focusing too heavily on spelling, punctuation and grammar. This is a problem that we’ve seen for a while on the ISEB pretest; the test has gravitated to skills that can be auto-marked, rather than skills should be auto-marked. Similarly, I am still unconvinced by the personalised learning element of these tools; they will highlight weaknesses by topic and feed more of those questions back to a student, but they cannot currently work out why a mistake is being made (misreading the question, knowledge gap, misapplication of technique etc.).
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There are a plethora of new apps that use AI to track a child’s reading, test eye movement, trigger prompts, vary the way the letters are presented to help with decoding and even prevent skim reading and even train hyper-focus, helping with both dyslexia and ADHD. Dysolve and Lexy are market leaders. And we’re speaking with a company called Tempo Reading next week; we’ll let you know what we think of their presentation and their product.
Teaching our kids to harness AI
We must teach our kids how to use AI to make their learning – and in particulate their revision – more effective. I tutor English Literature at GCSE and I would always advise my students to use AI to build quotation banks. See the example below for Macbeth; the AI spat out 10 quotes in seconds that would have formed the basis of a very strong essay.
Or it could be for History. I asked ChatGPT to write a 10 mark answer for a specific question for a specific exam board. The answer is below:
The Treaty of Versailles, signed in 1919, was highly controversial, particularly in Germany, where it was viewed as excessively harsh. There are several reasons to agree with this statement. Firstly, the treaty placed full blame for the war on Germany through Article 231, the War Guilt Clause. This not only humiliated Germany but also justified severe reparations of 132 billion gold marks, which crippled the German economy and led to hyperinflation in 1923. Additionally, Germany lost 13% of its land, including the economically valuable Saar region and Upper Silesia, as well as all its overseas colonies. The reduction of the German army to 100,000 men, the ban on conscription, and the loss of its air force and navy left Germany militarily weak and vulnerable. These harsh terms created resentment and instability, which later contributed to the rise of extremist groups like the Nazis.
However, some argue that the treaty was not excessively harsh. The treaty was based on the need to prevent future wars, and Germany itself had imposed severe terms on Russia in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (1918), taking vast territories and resources. Furthermore, France and Belgium had suffered devastating losses during the war, and their demands for security and compensation were justified. The treaty also allowed Germany to recover, as seen in the 1920s with American loans under the Dawes Plan (1924), which helped stabilize the German economy. Additionally, some of the territorial losses, such as Alsace-Lorraine returning to France, merely restored pre-war borders.
In conclusion, while the Treaty of Versailles was harsh on Germany, it was not entirely unjustified given the damage caused by the war. However, its severity led to economic hardship and political instability, which ultimately contributed to the outbreak of World War II. Therefore, it can be argued that while the treaty was harsh, its long-term consequences made it counterproductive.
Level: High-scoring response (8-10 marks)
This answer presents both sides of the argument, provides specific historical evidence, and offers a balanced conclusion, all of which are essential for a top-grade answer in CIE GCSE History.Let me know if you’d like any refinements!
The eagle eyed among you will have noticed a couple of small mistakes – email us! – but this response not only summarises the material, it summarises why it is a top level answer. I would also get the student to then write out the evidence the AI uses, as this can be the most time consuming part of the revision. Do get in touch if you would like some advice in this area for your child.
The essay is dead
Although announcing the death of the essay might be a bit premature, institutions and exam boards are adapting slowly. We’ve noticed that Ivy League universities are giving their students either tasks that are so specific in layout that they circumvent AI prompts or they refer obliquely to content covered in the seminar (eg – you should include the scholar / topic / theme we covered in the seminar).
The IB has already shifted to a system of assessments that relies less on essays – with oral presentations, group projects and even video essays now being used. I think we will see more of this from GCSE and A level exam boards.
Photograph by Rog01 (CC-BY-SA)
