Generative AI in the classroom

Artificial intelligence is here to stay and is in the early stages of reshaping education as the internet did in the late ’90s. 

This is the resounding message from industry officials, including Montana Digital Academy, the statewide program providing online courses that may not be available in all public schools. 

The academy also serves as an authority in informing and training teachers and legislators on navigating AI in education, namely generative AI which can generate high-quality text, images and other content based on what it’s been trained on.  

With generative AI exploding in the mainstream roughly around 2022 (in part due to the release of ChatGPT) some local educators are dipping their toes into using the technology in the classroom. 

This is where depth will become increasingly important over breadth in how curriculum is taught and tests are designed, according to Jason Neiffer, Montana Digital Academy executive director. 

“AI is going to force the issue for sure,” Neiffer said during a phone interview with the Inter Lake. 

“In our instructional models, we are only scratching the surface of any concept. Really with AI in the picture, we’re doing a disservice to our students. Many would argue that’s been a problem for a long time and what we really need is a deeper understanding of concepts,” Neiffer said at a January presentation on AI in education to Montana legislators on the Modernization and Risk Analysis Interim Committee. 

He said that both curriculum and tests need to include “critical thinking at every level,” where students demonstrate their understanding of a subject and to instill in students that generative AI is not a replacement for good research skills. He used career technical education as an example model for the type of hands-on, engaged learning that results in a final product or project demonstrating a student’s knowledge of a subject.  

WITHOUT AI-specific policies in area schools, Neiffer recommends schools integrate AI in some capacity that is meaningful and adds value rather than an outright ban. To assist schools in that process, Montana Digital Academy spearheaded the creation of a framework and planning guide for schools to integrate AI in the classroom and develop policies and guidelines in partnership with the Montana School Boards Association, School Administrators of Montana, Montana Federation of Public Employees and The Rural School Advocate.  

“What I would say on the inclination to ban the tools is there are a lot of open questions about data privacy and how we embrace them. But in the long term, these tools are already sitting in our students’ pockets. It’s best to teach children how to use them and not ignore them,” Neiffer said. 

From a teacher’s perspective, he said AI has the potential to give educators “superpowers” to analyze student data to customize instructional materials, for example. 

“For better or worse, every major technology company is trying to get in on the AI discussion,” he said. “But we need to keep the good science on how students learn in the forefront.” 

IN JUNE, educators from around the state gathered at Flathead High School for the Doris Mountain Personalized Competency Based Education Summit. Among a slate of breakout sessions, one was an overview on AI to help teachers identify a plan or approach to AI before the start of the school year. 

Presenter, Peterson Elementary Principal Tracy Ketchum echoed Neiffer in emphasizing that a meaningful education in the age of AI needs to encourage deeper-level thinking. Ketchum said teachers need to be direct with students about “why they are learning and what they are learning.”  

Educators provided examples where they are already using AI in the classroom to save time including making rubrics to “unpack learning standards,” and differentiate learning for students. One educator uses AI to embed videos and student notes into presentations.  

Ketchum and the participants discussed various applications of AI in education, while acknowledging ethical implications. One of the challenges is defining cheating and plagiarism in the age of AI, with educators encouraged to rethink pertinent policies. 

She discussed ways educators can talk with students before an assignment to clearly define when it’s OK and not OK to use AI.  

She also cautioned teachers about using “plagiarism checkers” currently on the market, which have been shown to flag text revised by AI-based grammar checkers in popular word processing and email programs. She also emphasized the need to prioritize student privacy and agency while integrating AI, highlighting the potential for AI to support teachers and enhance student learning experiences.  

With the concern of spreading misinformation, educators are encouraged to try and find AI programs that are transparent in the source materials it’s trained on. 

AS RAPIDLY as AI moves into the classroom with students as a driving force in the programs they use outside of school, Flathead Valley Community College associate instructor Dawn Rauscher has already incorporated AI into her instructional technology course teaching students who will one day become teachers how to integrate technology into the classroom. 

“AI has started to be a little bit more prevalent in education because of its use and ease, typing out a prompt, getting something back. And so, as teachers, I'm teaching them how to use AI to speed up some of their daily tasks,” Rauscher said. 

Rauscher’s class collaborated with Kalispell Middle School English language arts teacher Kristi Sanders’ seventh-grade class.  

College students worked with the seventh graders on a Valentine’s Day story project using AI. Outside of spellcheck and grammar check, Sanders said the 2023-24 school year was the first time she used AI to this extent, allowing students to experience how it can help them in their writing. 

Before jumping straight to using AI programs, the seventh graders learned about the elements of a narrative story (plot, character development) and storyboarding. Then, students broke into small groups to brainstorm settings and themes with the prompt, “Love is …” 

“They had to write a mini graphic novel that highlighted a positive life-bringing encounter between two characters,” Rauscher said. 

Both the college students and seventh graders went through the same process. The college students wrote and illustrated stories to use in YouTube tutorials for the seventh graders to follow.  

“What basically happened is these students pretended like they were teachers creating a student sample of the projects that the students at the middle school were going to work on. Because if you’re going to integrate technology in the classroom, you have to try it out first,” Rauscher said.  

“We were each given some prompts about what the stories we wrote were supposed to be. With the stories that we each wrote, we used to put into a slideshow,” FVCC student Kristen Neumann said. “Then we put the sentences, or the premise, of each page into Adobe Firefly to generate images for each page of our story and did tutorials on that for students to watch in the classroom and learn how to do that themselves.” 

"All three of them went into the class while the project was going on and helped the students bring their stories to life through the AI-generated photos which was really fun to see,” Rauscher said.  

For college students, the project was an opportunity to combine the skills they’ve learned in how to teach along with a practical application of using AI in the classroom. 

For the seventh graders to see the text they wrote generated into finished illustrations was a magical moment. 

“That part, AI was super powerful because it actually went with their writing and when they presented their stories to their class the kids were just so engaged and excited. I mean you could have a pickle flying through the sky and that’s hard, for a regular web search, to actually find something that looks believable, but they were able to put together their imagination and make it reality,” Sanders said. 

As with art, she said it helps students who have difficulty expressing their ideas and thoughts through writing. She said in the ways she’s adapted AI into writing — it’s still a student’s thoughts and ideas — just filtered through AI to improve clarity and conciseness. 

“It takes their voice, and it makes it be heard. I have some students who really struggle with just the conventions of writing and so they’re afraid to write it down because when I read it, I’m like what does this even say?” Sanders said.   

AS THE project neared completion, Sanders decided to change the end of her lesson plan after some reflection. Initially, she was going to have students compare the stories they wrote with ones solely written by AI. The initial idea was to figure out which stories were written by students, which were AI, which was more well-written and what components could strengthen their writing, such as transitions, for example. 

However it became clear that the idea was to have students use AI to assist in the project, not complete it for them.  

This raises philosophical questions about what people in general decide to do with AI — equip everyone with the tools to enhance creativity — or increase productivity and let AI take the wheel — or is there a middle ground? 

Sanders continued using AI to help students self-edit a research paper as opposed to the teacher’s red pen. 

“The first one is we just did a paper, a research paper and I had them turn it in and then I had them use AI to edit for spelling, grammar and clarity,” Sanders said. “They have to email me and tell me what they learned from AI about their writings. And they'll say, ‘Oh, I noticed that I don't put commas after introductory sentences, or introductions to my sentence. I noticed that I use way too many ‘ands’ in my writing.’” 

FVCC student Kristen Neumann, who wants to become a reading specialist, said AI may be helpful in teaching students to enjoy reading and writing. 

“Maybe kids have been struggling through it [AI could be] a way to end the project on a fun note so they don’t have a bad taste in their mouth for reading or writing,” she said. 

Sanders said the combination of introducing AI through the college students changed the tone of typically non-motivated writers to be invested in the art of storytelling. 

“I had a lot of my non-motivated students be very motivated to finish this and so proud of their finished products,” Sanders said, especially with the generative AI art program, noting one student who does cosplay was excited to use AI to design costumes. 

Rauscher views AI in its current form as a teaching aid and classroom tool rather than a replacement for teaching or learning. 

How AI is used in education will ultimately evolve in the classroom space, which is why she took on the opportunity for her students to go into the middle school and other public schools.   

“We can talk about technology all day and I can make technology seem like it’s really easy to use and it’s going to help everything and everything is going to be perfect. But in real life, you go into the classroom, and you have 25 students using technology and it’s really hard. To be able to go into the classroom and actually see it being used, and not just coming into class and talking about it,” Rauscher said.  

Rauscher noted that when she started teaching instructional technology 20 years ago, email was the technology tool of focus. The goal is to figure out how technology can supplement a lesson to make it exciting for students, she said.  

“And the goal for all [teaching] students, it’s been this way for 20 years, is that how can you use technology to support your teaching and support student success without technology teaching your class? Because you can’t replace a good teacher. You can’t. But you can take a good teacher and make them better by doing projects that involve technology.” 

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com. 

    Students read over their stories and illustrations created using artificial intelligence software in seventh-grade teacher Kristi Sanders' class at Kalispell Middle School on Tuesday, April 16. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)
   This photorealistic image was created using a generative artificial intelligence program called Midjourney. To generate the image, Montana Digital Academy Executive Director Jason Neiffer entered the prompt: "Photograph of a modern classroom full of engaged students using smartphones, laptop computers, desktop computers, and VR headsets, an AI bot is the teacher. In the style of a hyper detailed photography, photorealistic. Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L III USM lens on a Canon EOS 5D Mark IV camera." (Image provided by Jason Neiffer)

   From left, Maxwell McMenamin, Levi Boone, Jared Kelly and Jeremiah Gardner read over their stories and illustrations created using artificial intelligence software in seventh-grade teacher Kristi Sanders' class at Kalispell Middle School on Tuesday, April 16. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)
 Casey Kreider 

    From left, Wyatt Buckallew, Jimmy Brown, Addy Keller and Bryce Woods read over their stories and illustrations created using artificial intelligence software in seventh-grade teacher Kristi Sanders' class at Kalispell Middle School on Tuesday, April 16. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)      Students read over their stories and illustrations created using artificial intelligence software in seventh-grade teacher Kristi Sanders' class at Kalispell Middle School on Tuesday, April 16. (Casey Kreider/Daily Inter Lake)