ChatGPT: When artificial intelligence touches the imagination

The new software will thrill the school community during this exam period as ChatGPT Artificial Intelligence enables students to access the entire text by entering only a few words.

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The software has been online since November 30 and while it has raised concerns, teaching staff have no choice but to adapt.

With ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence developed by American research firm OpenAI, it is possible to write a literature review or research in a few minutes. The results were surprising.

“ChatGPT is a conversational robot. We can ask him questions and he will answer us. He draws from the knowledge base he has already acquired, he makes connections and gives us the best answer he can give us. For some it has sparked fears, for others curiosity,” said Patrick Giroux, an educational technologies specialist and professor of education at the University of Quebec at Chicoutimi (UQAC).

The computer process can also provide suggestions for school assignments, journalistic articles, cover letters for job interviews, and even film scripts. We can use it in many different ways, just give a few instructions and the turn will play.

“He can separate theories, bring out similarities and even differences. It’s a simple tool but its knowledge base is huge. You can throw problems at him in science and he can answer,” explained Mr Giroux.

“It touches the imagination of education”

Patrick Giroux states that this tool can be used by high school students as well as university students. You need to know how to use it.

“It is very easy to use tomorrow morning, if he knows the book, any student can ask him to do the summary and he can ask him for the second version of the summary for his friend. It affects all levels of education,” he said.

He remembers that when Google entered the Web, the first reaction of people in schools was to block access.

But this time, instead of restricting access to these, teachers thought how to use them wisely.

“There are a lot of things you can’t ask them to do at home because they have a tool to do it. A Facebook group was created and teachers started exchanging strategies for assessment, they started discussing how to use it in the classroom,” said an expert in educational technologies.

However, it should be noted that this artificial intelligence is not infallible and has some limitations. She is also not connected to the internet, which means she is not aware of new events related to current events, for example.

“He has a limited knowledge base so as long as it’s within his knowledge base it’s fine,” Mr Giroux said.

Some may fear plagiarism, although we cannot control it completely. There is also software to recognize the text written by the robot.

“Theft has always been there and always will be. I think there’s a lot of prevention that we can do and a lot of education and we’ll eliminate most of the piracy,” Mr. Giroux said. Other tools like this exist on the Internet, he says: “We’re starting to see more and more of them. It’s A small revolution, this could change,” he observed.

A tool that allows students to learn more or better understand a subject by asking ChatGPT to explain is also very useful. And for teaching staff, there are positives as well.

“I have colleagues who have used chatzip to create new versions of their tests. There will be work in the coming months and weeks to find out how we can use it,” concludes Patrick Giroux.

So prevention and education work is essential.