ChatGPT And Education
Have we ever wondered how ChatGPT can be used in the school education system?
ChatGPT stands for Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer.
Well, one obvious thing a student can do is having interactive and conversational question and answer sessions with ChatGPT. The student writes a prompt to ChatGPT and ChatGPT will give a response — and most of the time a pretty logical one too — and quite instantaneously.
These are personalized sessions as they are according to what the student wants to know. They are customized, so to speak.
It can be their virtual tutor. For those who are not so privileged to have access to a physical personal tutor, ChatGPT is a viable alternative.
We may then ask:
“But then isn’t Google already taking care of that through its Search platform? Students are able to query anything on Google.”
Well, Google does help students by providing answers to queries — albeit in an unstructured format. The information comes in the form of a listing of links to resources that students then have to click on and individually seek specific answers.
Conversely, ChatGPT presents information only after it has gathered together what it knows and then carefully organizes such information in the form of a specific answer to the question posed to it.
ChatGPT’s technology is based on its deep learning models. That is what the “P” in ChatGPT does — it “Pre-trained” itself through deep learning. This allows it to be able to mimic very close to how a human will give an answer to a question.
Compare this to Google’s Search platform which lacks this learning process. Google’s Search basically ranks web pages according to its set of criteria and then displays them in that order.
Having said that, it is absolutely also true to say that students will learn better when they are compelled to seek specific answers themselves rather than have the complete solution presented to them lock, stock and barrel.
While ChatGPT will not always provide the best or accurate answers to the questions posed to it, let us not forget that no humans or other platforms have the ability to do that too.
We need to be aware that AI language models like ChatGPT have made a quantum leap most recently. The progress in this field has been quite astonishing.
The future definitely lies in exploiting this amazing potential of AI language models. The algorithm that drives these large language models (LLMs) and the neural networks concept behind it are truly innovative breakthroughs.
While all technologies are subject to misuse, let us not forget that the benefits that AI offers us will probably far outweigh everything else. There are unlimited potential areas that these technologies can help us learn better, live better, and work better.
Whether it is ChatGPT, Google Search, or for that matter a human teacher — each has their distinctive role to play in a different way. They are here to complement each other more than anything else.
It is imperative to note that over-reliance on technology in learning entails the student being deprived of the human interaction with a human teacher and the enriching learning experience in a classroom setting with other classmates.
A human teacher can monitor not just a student’s progress — it can give emotional support to the student which technological tools can’t. An AI tool is what the name suggests — artificial intelligence and not a human with emotions.
However, a physical teacher is not available 24/7. But technology has enabled us to learn at any time — and anywhere.
Be it human or whichever technology — let us embrace all of them.
Cheers everyone!
As I write, I am sharing and disseminating what I know. I am also learning what I don’t know. And I am also realizing that there is so much that I still don’t know and I want to know.
