A fake video of Queen Elizabeth giving the finger and fleeing a police officer. Or having ChatGPT write a book report. AI has become an indispensable part of our society. High school students at Olympia, a pre-vocational secondary school in Eindhoven, are also gratefully using artificial intelligence. It’s not without its risks, though. “We have to teach them that not everything that comes out is good.”
Anyone needing a book report or a term paper no longer has to spend hours slaving over it. A simple query to ChatGPT can yield the desired result. However, according to Hilde Weerts, AI expert at TU/e, using “Google on steroids” does have its pitfalls. “You shouldn’t just accept everything as truth. It’s important that young people learn skills, like how to check sources.”
In a classroom in the school building on Botenlaan, teenagers are taking a lesson in AI for the occasion. “Normally, I teach you math, but today we’re going to learn how we can use AI to learn,” explains teacher Melis. He’s not only a teacher but also part of a working group that develops Olympia’s policy plans for artificial intelligence.
Falling behind
According to the math teacher, it’s important that schools don’t lag behind technological developments. “We need to teach them not only how to use AI, but also, and more importantly, how to use it correctly. Otherwise, things will go wrong.”
The reality is that high school students are already busy with AI, as evidenced during class. “If I want to buy clothes, I ask if they’re still available,” one student explains. This also applies to homework. “Sometimes it looks very AI-like (robotic, etc.), so I ask if they can write it as if a thirteen-year-old were writing it.”
To predict
There is a downside to this, according to a fellow student: “I think it makes you a bit lazy, because it kind of prompts the answer.”
And prompting isn’t allowed in secondary school. Should AI therefore be banned in schools? Bas Melis disagrees. “It’s much more important that you use the right tools to produce the best report possible. So that’s something we need to consider in education. How do we test students, and what else do we want to ask of them?”
Source: Studio040
For Eindhoven News: Lila Mehrez
