A system-wide ban feels like fear instead of curiosity, defense over offense, convention over adaptation.
The most recent iteration of ChatGPT was released on November 30, 2022. ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence bot that was trained on an enormous pool of information to engage in simple conversations with users.
Within a week, the AI bot had acquired over one million clients. And as K-12 schools began winding down for the calendar year, ChatGPT was making headlines around the world.
You’ve likely heard the buzz already, but in case you have yet to try it, ChatGPT is to Google what Google is to a set of encyclopedias.
Google is a master curator and locator of information, but ChatGPT has the ability to quickly aggregate and mobilize that information on a level the world has never seen.
If you haven’t seen ChatGPT at work, watch it perform these school-related tasks [9:48]:
- Design a lesson plan for an 8th grade civics class
- Compare the evolution of protagonists from two different novels
- Describe how the water cycle affects Vancouver, BC
- Calculate triangle side lengths using the Pythagorean Theorem
- Write a campaign speech for middle school president
- Suggest solutions for anxiety and loneliness
- Write a love poem for a special friend (and then make it spicier)
- Write a short story with specific character names
ChatGPT is just the latest manifestation of the growth in AI we’ve seen in recent years. And we know it’s only going to get better.
Enter the NYC Department of Education
Schools across North America were only a few bright days into the new year when the news came down from the NYC Department of Education, the largest school system in the United States: ChatGPT would be banned in all of their schools.
I can understand the fears and concerns about how this technology will impact K-12 education. I think we all can.
Like I said to my wife this week, this technology has permanently changed the way that I read and think about student writing. How can it not?
But I think a blanket ban is the wrong response.
Here’s why.
4 Reasons Why a System-Wide Ban on ChatGPT is the Wrong Call
Let’s start at the most basic, practical level.
1. A ban on a particular website is practically impossible.
NYC can only blacklist websites on school wifi networks, so students will still be able to access ChatGPT when they’re at home, off-campus, or using any device with access to a data network. Since students can obviously still use ChatGPT for homework, a school wifi ban doesn’t mean too much.
One has to wonder if a ban is actually more counter-productive to its own aims by simply raising the profile of the forbidden fruit in question.
2. Whack-a-mole isn’t sustainable.
ChatGPT has certainly grabbed the headlines, but there are plenty of other similar tools out there. And more are appearing all the time.
Quillbot.com is an AI paraphrasing tool that appears to render classic plagiarism checkers useless. TinyWow.com offers a whole suite of free AI writing tools.
Premium (paid) AI writing services such as Jasper.ai, Shakespeare.ai, and Rytr.me all claim to be able to deliver spectacular results to marketers.
The point: if the district strategy is to ban these tools as they appear, there will be another new tool to ban every month. That doesn’t feel like a strategy that will age well over the years to come.
3. Like wifi, Google, and YouTube before it, ChatGPT is just another step forward for learning tools.
It wasn’t long ago that schools were banning YouTube on their wifi networks rather than leveraging the world’s largest library of video resources to support learning. They opted for the safety of zero exposure rather than do the work of teaching best practices and applying skills of discrimination.
Even before the arrival of YouTube, many schools wrestled with the question of having a wifi network at all. As silly as these questions seem today, they were important conversations at the time.
Of course, Google itself has become a much smarter search engine over the years, prone to serving up large-font answers to closed questions (“How far is the sun from Earth?”) before listing any search results.
Because of this Google Effect, schools and educators have been moving away for some time now from a focus on strictly “Googleable” information to a more nuanced approach to critical thinking.
For example, instead of asking students to memorize the names of all 45 presidents (content which is very Googleable), we ask them to critique the legacies of particular presidents based on currently relevant policy issues.
Content is still important for students to learn. We know that a mass of knowledge forms a necessary foundation in order for students to learn more, make distinctions, draw conclusions, and establish new theories about their world.
But the power of Google has put downward pressure on the importance of content memorization — of that, there can be little doubt.
Like YouTube and Google before it, ChatGPT is just the latest application that will change the way we think about teaching, learning, and assessment.
These powerful technologies are here to stay. Let’s embrace them.
4. The biggest reason: a ban sends all the wrong signals about learning and mindset.
In December of 2022, ChatGPT forced the world to reckon with an AI tool that could complete complex tasks in seconds. There’s no doubt that things will never be quite the same.
Who will be the most excited to play with this tool? Our young learners.
Students of all ages will share our child-like fascination with the possibilities. And well they should: this is clearly a technology that will only grow in significance throughout their lifetimes.
Sadly, I fear that a school ban sends all the wrong signals about technology and the nature of learning. It feels like fear instead of curiosity, defense over offense, convention over adaptation.
It looks like head-in-the-sand, I-hope-this-goes-away kind of thinking. And that’s not the approach of a lifelong learner.
I’m not suggesting that every teacher should give their students unfettered access to these tools. There will be times to close computers and show evidence of learning and critical thinking using pencils and paper, just as there are in classrooms today.
But there should be other times to play. To experiment. To learn together — teachers and students, sitting side by side, engaging, thinking, and talking about what it will look like to leverage ChatGPT and similar tools in constructive, powerful ways.
Closing thoughts
Whenever I come up against a difficult decision in our schools, I run it through this tried-and-true filter:
- What is best for our kids?
- What is best for learning?
Banning the latest technology from our schools just doesn’t feel like a great answer to either of those questions.
Listen, there’s no doubt that the path ahead will be challenging, and these tools will require new approaches.
But growth doesn’t happen in the comfort zone. Let’s lean into uncomfortable spaces and do what we do best: learn.
Together, let’s shape the nature of thinking and work in 2023.
Teachers on Fire 