Pardon the dated analogy, but it's stuck in my head like an earworm (00:21-00:35).
We don't have to start from scratch - AI can be designer's little helper.
Overview & Learning Outcomes
By providing a recent faculty team with sample project instructions generated by ChatGPT, we were able to overcome the paralysis of the “blank page” and get working quickly. Because ChatGPT allowed me to immediately translate what I wanted into the faculty’s disciplinary language (or at least get close enough), I think this method is superior to providing examples from other disciplines, my own previous work, or empty templates.
Participants will:
- Discover how ChatGPT or other generative AI tools can jumpstart productive work with faculty
- Explore how ChatGPT can be used to communicate clearly across disciplines
- Share other ways that generative AI might streamline work.
Design Problem
- About the project: DATA 1501 Intro to Data Science for Non-Majors; cross-campus team of teaching faculty and admin partners
- Lack of time: Needed to knock out designing 3 major course projects in 4 weeks
- Lack of expertise: I know nothing about coding; they didn't have experience with assessment frameworks like TILT
I needed to get us all on the same page and actually doing work QUICKLY.
AI Solution
I used high level (1-2 sentence) project descriptions from the syllabus and known course context (course title, college level, non-majors, approximate position in course sequence) to engineer a prompt for ChatGPT to create sample projects.
I further adjusted the prompts to get ChatGPT to create project instructions using the TILT framework (purpose, tasks, criteria).
Results
I used the projects generated by ChatGPT to create working documents for the team. I was transparent with them about what I'd done, and they were impressed (although not surprised) with the quality ChatGPT's work. We completed 2 of 3 projects in the first month of our project.
Our finished products looked very different than ChatGPT's drafts, but the scaffolding the drafts provided were essential to our speedy success.
Why did this work so well?
Reduces distractions (e.g., trying to understand/critique sample)
TILT provides so many great samples from a variety of disciplines, but in my experience, faculty inevitably get bogged down by imperfect examples and struggle to move on to designing THEIR assessment.
Facilitates skill transfer (e.g., applying framework to their own work)
TILT provides great worksheets, but I've still found that faculty struggle to get started from scratch or suffer possibilities paralysis.
Provides neutral sample for critique
When revising existing materials (either provided by the faculty or drafted by the designer), offering criticism often feels like a dangerous dance. Working with a team of faculty compounds this issue. ChatGPT as author frees everyone up to rip the thing to shreds.
Partner Feedback
What was this experience like for you? Was it helpful?
BA: It worked as expected (probably with your correct prompts). There is a vast amount of data science courses related content in those text corpuses, so it is expected to give us a really good starting point. I was pleasantly surprised with the detailed rubrics it created. I should note here that for a less commonly taught/novel course (say a new directed study doctoral course on Womens' Movements in Civil War Era) we might get utter nonsense. To summarize I wasn't surprised but it was a fairly convenient starting point.
JM: Well, I’m probably biased since I increasingly use Chat GPT as a starter for many tasks, but in this specific case, I found the project template provided a helpful framework for initiating our work. Even if we ended up making multiple changes to the model provided by the system, many components persisted.
Did it introduce any obstacles?
BA: It didn't introduce any obstacles per se, but it probably gave a bit more than needed. We even used a dataset that it offered, but once again, this course is probably the perfect fit.
Did it help you understand what we were trying to accomplish any better or differently than if I had just opened a blank Word document?
BA: It made things streamlined. For sufficiently large groups of people in online settings, you (or indeed I) often need some hook to get engaged and some organizer (like you) to keep being engaged. If you just opened a blank document, we would most likely waste extra 2-3 hours, which is 2-3 weeks in our meeting regime.
JM: As long as we don’t accept the template as the final version, then it's foolish not to at least see how the system responds to appropriate prompts.