In the digital era in which we live, technology is advancing by leaps and bounds, opening up a world of possibilities in all areas of our lives, including education. One of the most recent tools that has captured the attention of both educators and students is GPT Chat in education. An artificial intelligence capable of generating text autonomously. However, is this innovation a blessing for teaching or a potential risk?
What is the GPT Chat?
For those of you who still do not know what GPT chat is and what has been its impact on education, we explain it very briefly.
Chat GPT, short for Generative Pre-trained Transformer, is an artificial intelligence tool. It is designed to generate text on its own and autonomously. It mimics the style and content of the data it has been trained on and operates using a neural network-based language model. In this way, it processes and understands sequences of words to generate coherent and contextually relevant responses. Using large amounts of textual data, Chat GPT is able to learn linguistic patterns and generate new text based on what we ask it to do.
What does it all mean? For practical purposes, it is like having a conversation with a computer that can understand what we say and responds as if it were a real person. For example, if asked “What is the capital of France?”, the GPT Chat might answer “The capital of France is Paris”. It’s like having someone smart online who can give us answers to all our questions.
The Internet already offered solutions to all our questions, but we had to search and contrast information to find the answers. Chat GPT streamlines the process of searching for information, directly showing us the correct answers and writing longer or shorter texts depending on what you ask for.
Advantages: GPT Chat in education
- Instant access to information: With GPT Chat, students can get quick and accurate answers to their questions, facilitating self-directed learning.
- Encouraging creativity: By interacting with Chat GPT, students can develop writing and expressive writing skills, exploring ideas in innovative ways. The tool can offer different points of view to approach a topic that one might never have thought of on one’s own.
- Supporting personalized learning: Chat GPT’s ability to adapt to the individual needs of each student can enhance the educational experience by providing personalized resources and explanations.
Disadvantages of GPT Chat in education
- Risk of dependency: Ease of access to instant information can foster student dependency rather than promote research and critical thinking. Therefore, it is important to emphasize that GPT Chat should be used as a tool and not as a substitute for critical thinking. Moreover, this intelligence does not produce new research or never-before-seen content, but relies on information already contributed to the network.
- Possibility of bias: As Chat GPT is trained with large amounts of data, there is a risk that it reproduces existing biases in language and information. These data may contain biases or prejudices present in the language and information. As a result, there is a risk that GPT Chat will reproduce and reinforce these biases when generating new text or responses. For example, if the data used to train GPT Chat contains cultural biases or stereotypes, these tendencies are likely to be reflected in the responses generated by the tool.
- Lack of human interaction: Excessive use of GPT Chat could reduce opportunities for face-to-face interaction between students and teachers, which is essential for social and emotional development. Again, it is important to emphasize that this is a tool and not a substitute for a professional. In education, there are more important factors to take into account when teaching students, such as values education or social and emotional development.
How do we translate all this at Casvi International American School?
Despite these challenges, the key lies in teaching students to use Chat GPT responsibly and critically. That is why recently, both our teachers and students of Casvi International American School, have participated in a masterclass on the educational use of Chat GPT, given by Professor Victor Rodriguez of the Polytechnic University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This educational session provided valuable information on the importance of using Chat GPT ethically and responsibly. It was highlighted how this tool can be effectively leveraged in the educational setting.
In conclusion, Chat GPT can be both a powerful educational tool and a potential risk, depending on how it is used. By fostering a critical and balanced approach to its application, we can take full advantage of its potential to enhance our students’ learning experience, preparing them to face the challenges of the digital world responsibly and wisely.
