Last week was an energizing week in the world of AI on the Texas A&M campus. We hosted two Faculty Conversation Cafés where we discussed How Embracing AI Can Enhance Learning. The first online session included several faculty who are utilizing AI in their courses, from oceanography to business to engineering. Some faculty are encouraging creativity in AI through writing, while others are taking advantage of the coding capability. The task depends on how the students will be utilizing AI in their jobs when they graduate.
A book recommendation that includes an example of how to have a meaningful conversation with a generative AI agent “Impromptu: Amplifying Our Humanity Through AI" by Reid Hoffman, was offered.
One faculty member incorporated an in-class group discussion (30-40 mins) on how AI could be used constructively/destructively so they could come up with ground rules for the class this semester. She also made it clear that these guidelines applied only to her class. She also commented that, “In our research discipline, someone once mentioned that the best use of AI is treating it as an "agent, secretary, or companion," not as your supervisor -- or even master -- to whom you'd be subject. In doing so, we'd be able to (a) keep the joy of our unsuppressed & free-thinking process AND (b) be aware of what we'd be responsible for.
I say the same thing to my students and let them not become the victim who'd be blamed for what they even don't understand how it occurred but be the leader in the use of AI who can still retain the agency in the process.
A comment from an engineering faculty member indicated that ”the challenge is to target the core skills we are trying to develop and infuse/emphasize a critical thinking approach to them so students use AI as another support skill. For example, for coding (my topic), the real skill is computational thinking which has a set of subskills related to math and electromechanical systems thinking. I am yet to find how AI can support me in developing, for instance 'pattern matching thinking' to find formulas that can be automated...”
As we dive into the usage of Generative AI in education, we invite Texas A&M faculty community to contribute to this blog; learning from each other's experiences and paving the way for innovating teaching methods.
Lastly, we had a ‘Hear from Peers’ session with Dr. Alam on “Adapting AI in Education: Enhancing Learning through Personalized Teaching Materials.” He discussed the integration of course-specific Chatbots, with the functionality as follows: a) Generating multiple-choice questions for in-class quizzes, encouraging class attendance, and active engagement, and b) Providing comprehensive question banks for exams as well as creating and updating the topic-specific problem sets. He has many valuable tools and experiences to share.
We offer weekly 'Hear from Peers' sessions, an AI Learning Community, a workshop series, and the latest...a Friday afternoon open session to experiment with Generative AI. Come and join us!
A book recommendation that includes an example of how to have a meaningful conversation with a generative AI agent “Impromptu: Amplifying Our Humanity Through AI" by Reid Hoffman, was offered.
One faculty member incorporated an in-class group discussion (30-40 mins) on how AI could be used constructively/destructively so they could come up with ground rules for the class this semester. She also made it clear that these guidelines applied only to her class. She also commented that, “In our research discipline, someone once mentioned that the best use of AI is treating it as an "agent, secretary, or companion," not as your supervisor -- or even master -- to whom you'd be subject. In doing so, we'd be able to (a) keep the joy of our unsuppressed & free-thinking process AND (b) be aware of what we'd be responsible for.
I say the same thing to my students and let them not become the victim who'd be blamed for what they even don't understand how it occurred but be the leader in the use of AI who can still retain the agency in the process.
A comment from an engineering faculty member indicated that ”the challenge is to target the core skills we are trying to develop and infuse/emphasize a critical thinking approach to them so students use AI as another support skill. For example, for coding (my topic), the real skill is computational thinking which has a set of subskills related to math and electromechanical systems thinking. I am yet to find how AI can support me in developing, for instance 'pattern matching thinking' to find formulas that can be automated...”
As we dive into the usage of Generative AI in education, we invite Texas A&M faculty community to contribute to this blog; learning from each other's experiences and paving the way for innovating teaching methods.
Lastly, we had a ‘Hear from Peers’ session with Dr. Alam on “Adapting AI in Education: Enhancing Learning through Personalized Teaching Materials.” He discussed the integration of course-specific Chatbots, with the functionality as follows: a) Generating multiple-choice questions for in-class quizzes, encouraging class attendance, and active engagement, and b) Providing comprehensive question banks for exams as well as creating and updating the topic-specific problem sets. He has many valuable tools and experiences to share.
We offer weekly 'Hear from Peers' sessions, an AI Learning Community, a workshop series, and the latest...a Friday afternoon open session to experiment with Generative AI. Come and join us!