Recently, The Guardian reported that a survey conducted by the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) found that more than half of British undergraduates admitted that they usedAI(AI) assistance.
The survey of more than 1,000 undergraduates found that 531 TP3T students used AI to generate material for assignments that were to be graded, with a quarter using apps such as Google Bard or ChatGPT for topic suggestions, while one in eight used AI to generate content.
However, only 51 TP3T students admitted to copying and pasting unedited AI-generated text into their assignments, suggesting that students are wary of how AI can be used in their writing process.
In addition to students, teachers are also beginning to seek to use AI to simplify their work. The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) is conducting a new research project to test the use of AI in the classroom to generate lesson plans, teaching materials, and exams and model answers. This initiative aims to reduce the workload of teachers and improve the quality of teaching.
Dr Andres Guadamuz, a reader in intellectual property law at the University of Sussex, said he was not surprised by the widespread adoption of AI by students and suggested that institutions should explicitly discuss howmostHe stressed the importance of having mature conversations with students about how they can use AI.
However, Dr Guadamuz was also concerned by survey results showing that a third of students using AI were unaware of how often it “hallucinated” – that is, might make up statistics, academic citations or book titles when filling in knowledge gaps.
As the use of AI spreads, surveys have also found that fewer and fewer students are willing to use it. In response, Dr. Guadamuz said educators need to develop clear guidelines and policies while designing more challenging assessments to adapt to the evolving world. However, this is a difficult task in an environment with limited resources and overburdened scholars.
The Education Endowment Fund's proposal states that the use of AI could help reduce teachers' workload while improving the quality of their teaching. British Education Secretary Gillian Keegan said AI could take on the "heavy lifting" of marking and planning for teachers.
In the EEF project, half of England’s 58 schools will receive a toolkit to create assessment materials such as practice questions, exams and model answers, and tailor lessons to specific groups of students. The AI-generated lesson plans will be evaluated by an independent panel of experts.
Professor Becky Francis, chief executive of the Education Endowment Foundation, said: “There has been great excitement about how this technology might change the role of teachers, but there has been relatively limited research into its actual impact. The results of this trial will make an important contribution to the evidence base, bringing us closer to understanding the ways in which teachers can use AI.”