March 1

Everything You Need to Know About ChatGPT – Written by ChatGPT

What Is Chat GPT, How Does it Work, and How Can It Be Used to Cheat?

Chat GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) is a large language model developed by OpenAI that uses machine learning algorithms to generate human-like text. It is trained on a vast amount of data and can generate text that is grammatically correct, coherent, and sometimes even persuasive.

While Chat GPT can be a useful tool for many applications, including language translation, text summarization, and chatbot development, it can also have a negative impact on student work. One of the most significant concerns is that students may use Chat GPT to generate essays or other written assignments without actually understanding the content or doing the necessary research.

This could lead to students submitting work that is plagiarized or contains inaccurate information, which could result in disciplinary action or academic consequences. Additionally, students who rely too heavily on Chat GPT may miss out on the critical thinking and research skills that are essential for academic success.

Furthermore, Chat GPT may also perpetuate biases that exist in the data it was trained on. For example, if the training data contains a disproportionate amount of text from certain sources or perspectives, the generated text may reflect those biases. This could lead to problematic or offensive content being generated by the model.

Overall, while Chat GPT can be a powerful tool, it is important for students to use it responsibly and in conjunction with other learning strategies to ensure that they are developing the skills they need to succeed academically.

What Can Teachers and Parents Do?

As an AI language model, Chat GPT generates text that can be difficult to distinguish from text written by a human. However, there are a few clues that teachers and parents can look for to identify Chat GPT generated work:

  1. Unnatural phrasing: Chat GPT may generate text that uses phrasing or sentence structures that are not commonly used by humans. If the text sounds stilted or awkward, it may be an indicator that it was generated by an AI language model.
  2. Repetition: Chat GPT may sometimes generate text that repeats itself or uses similar phrases or sentences multiple times. While humans may sometimes repeat themselves, AI-generated text may do so in a way that seems unnatural or excessive.
  3. Lack of coherence: Chat GPT may generate text that lacks coherence or doesn’t seem to follow a logical progression. This may be a sign that the text was generated by an AI language model rather than a human who is able to organize their thoughts more effectively.
  4. Unusual errors or mistakes: Chat GPT may make mistakes that are unlikely for a human to make, such as spelling errors that are consistent throughout the text or mistakes that seem to follow a pattern. These errors may be an indication that the text was generated by an AI language model.

Overall, while Chat GPT generated text can be difficult to identify, a combination of these clues may suggest that the work was generated by an AI language model. It’s important for teachers to be aware of these clues and to exercise caution when evaluating student work to ensure that the work is authentic and accurately reflects the student’s abilities.

This Post Was Written by AI

Could you tell that this post was completely written by AI?  You could if you know my writing style or if you know me personally.  This post has a much more formal and technical writing style than anything I would normally write.  That is the most important tip I have for teachers and parents – know your kids.  Is the work in their voice?  Learn to notice when something sounds way too good.  At higher levels academically, this could become extremely challenging and would likely require AI detecting software.

Asking for a comprehensive bibliography is also a great way to catch AI generated work.  Where is all of this information coming from?  Can you see the clear links between the student work and the sites and books used in the bibliography?

There are many saying that schools need to find a way to live harmoniously with ChatGPT as it is here to stay.  How can we learn to use it as a tool instead of designating it as a threat?  Can we redesign lesson plans to incorporate using ChatGPT to create outlines for essays which we then write in class?  Can we use it to generate helpful ideas?  This technology is so new that we don’t yet know all of the possible benefits or disadvantages.  But one thing is certain, we need to talk about it with our students and clearly define our expectations when it comes to student work.  It will take time for all of us to learn to coexist with these incredible new AI tools.

 

Here are a few other articles that could prove helpful;

From EdWeek – ChatGPT Cheating – What to Do When it Happens

From the NYT – Don’t Ban Chat GPT in Schools, Teach With It

April 16

The News Literacy Project’s Checkology Program

I wanted to take a moment to highlight an incredible program for our students that is available online.  I have been both impressed and amazed by the work that The News Literacy Project is doing to help build critical thinking skills in students.  The News Literacy Project is a non-profit and nonpartisan organization that is working to educate the public about how to separate fact from fiction in the news and how to assess news credibility.  They have developed an incredibly comprehensive online program called Checkology for middle school  and high school aged students that can be tailored for each classroom.

Checkology consists of about a half a dozen units per grade that cover the essentials of news and media literacy.  These units are often presented by actual news anchors and heads of news or media organizations.  Each unit includes lots of activities for students to test their newfound knowledge through the sorting of video, media, and other content into appropriate categories of information.  It also helps them to understand what makes some content credible and other content not.  And they do all of this while being simultaneously entertaining and engaging!  The clips that they use as examples are timely and relevant and students will feel right at home with the content.


Checkology will become an integral piece of my library programming here at the OJCS.  Media literacy is a key foundation of digital citizenship, and this incredible program can help our students get there.

November 16

Learning to Assess Information Credibility with my Favourite Tree Octopus

A Fun Lesson for our grades 3-5 students

Each student will need a device for this activity.  You will share the link to the following site with your students.

https://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/  

Teachers will then need to print the web evaluation checklist.  Click the button on the upper right hand corner ‘pop out’.  Only print page 1.  Students will fill it in to determine if this website is credible or not.

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When they have formed their conclusions, you can explain that the last step, lateral reading, is often the fastest way to fact-check information and can be your FIRST step.  Running a Google search on the topic and or the author or site name can often provide you with everything you need to know.  And following the rule of three, checking information against two other sources, is also a wonderful strategy to use.

Finish by sharing this great video!

October 7

The Sad Little Fact – Being a Fact-Finder in the Age of Misinformation

A fake fact is otherwise known as MISINFORMATION…

Misinformation is ‘false or inaccurate information, especially that which is deliberately intended to deceive.’

Where do we hear this misinformation?  Unfortunately, the online world is absolutely full of it.  From youtube videos, to tiktok, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media, people are bombarded with fake facts and fake news.  Here is an example of misinformation that I found on youtube.

If you saw this video online you’d be terrified.  You might tell your friends about it and spread this information further.  So how do we verify if it is true or not?

Now it’s your turn to give this a try.  I need you to be a fact-checker and find out if this information is true or not using the techniques we just learned.

  1. Check the source – run a Google Search on the publisher or author of the information and try to find out more
  2. The Rule of Three – check three other sources of information
  3. Check a good fact-checking website like Snopes.

So here is the information I want you to check.  It was posted thousands of times on Facebook and Twitter by regular people so there is no author to check.  You will need to rely on method 2 and 3 here.

 

 

June 1

Life Hacks That Seem Impossible Likely Are

There has been a rise in the past year of viral video ‘life hacks’ or ‘kitchen hacks’ depicting recipes or experiments that create impossible results.  These videos have kids rushing to try out these sometimes dangerous experiments thinking that incredible things will happen, only to be left disappointed that it didn’t work for them.

What’s wrong with posting these kind of hoaxes online?  They contribute to the growing problem of misinformation.  That is, spreading information that simply isn’t true.  In some cases, they are also putting children in danger.  Bleaching strawberries, making popcorn with a clothes iron, microwaving things that shouldn’t be microwaved, playing with hot glue, plugging random things into electrical sockets are just a few examples of potentially dangerous hacks.  One woman in England ended up in hospital after trying a life hack where you boil eggs still in their shell in the microwave!  In the following video, Chris Foxx tries out some recipe hacks to see if they work.

In this video Lifehacker explains what is wrong with creating pointless hack videos.

This video, made as a joke, shows how silly and simple making these types of videos can be. He uses a lot of squishies to make it look convincing.

YOUR ASSIGNMENT:  Make a fake life hack or kitchen hack video!  Yes, you heard right.  The best way to learn about the ridiculous nature of incredible and untrue hack videos is to make one yourself.  Maybe you will use baking soda to transform an apple into an orange.  Or put toothpaste in chocolate chip cookies to make them mint chocolate chip.  The sky is the limit with this assignment.  If you would like to share with me, I will post your fake hacks on this page.  Send your videos to b.ruel@theojcs.ca.

Our student lifehack videos!  Amazing work.

May 19

Media Violence and Reality

Part 1 – Movies versus real life

 

In a superhero movie, you often see the superhero killing or hurting the bad guys and you feel happy about it.  Your good guy is winning the fight or saving the world, right?  But if the movie was real life, what would happen if a good guy hurt or killed a bunch of people (even if they were bad!)  Would the good guy get arrested?  Would he have to go to court?  Maybe go to jail?  How would he feel about what he had done?

Movies, tv shows, and video games do a really good job of helping us to forget about the real world for a little while by telling us an exciting story.  But it is easy to forget that the way violence happens in the media isn’t the way violence happens in real life.  In real life, the consequences of violence are very serious!!

In school, if we pretend to be Spider-man and punch our friend because we are pretending he is Venom, what would happen to us?  How much trouble would we be in, from our parents and our teachers?

QUESTIONS – Choose just ONE to answer in the comments on this blog page

1.In video games you are often shooting or fighting other players to try to defeat them.  This is how you win the game.

What would happen if you used violence to win something in real life?

2. Every action movie seems to have have a crazy car chase, car explosion, or car crash scene.  

In real life what would happen if there was a big crash like this on the road or highway?  

3. In superhero movies the hero always kills a whole lot of villains and bad guys.  

In real life what would happen to someone who did these things?

4. In video games and movies when people get shot or injured they bounce right back and keep fighting.  

In real life what happens if you get seriously hurt?

Part 2 – Violence and Our Feelings

Here is a very violent scene from a movie you’ve all probably seen, Beauty and the Beast.

Watch this scene and then pay close attention to how it makes you FEEL.  Does it make your chest get tight?  Your heart race fast?  Your stomach turn?  Did you close your eyes?  All of these feelings and reactions are your body feeling stress from what you are seeing, and it is important that we learn to notice these kinds of feelings.  I know that watching things that are violent make me nervous and it’s hard for me to sleep at night when I watch them, so I avoid them.  That is an easy solution.  Another solution is to remember that what we are seeing in movies, tv, and video games is not real.  That can be very reassuring to remember.  The people are actors.  Writers have written everything that happens in the story.  In this clip Gaston and the Beast are just drawings made by artists.

If something that you’ve seen really bothers you, always talk to your parents about it.  They can have helpful advice for handling those feelings.

Next time you notice violence in media, remember that it is made to entertain people but is a far cry from how things are done or should be done in the real world.  It is important that we always use our words and not our fists to solve problems in the real world.

 

April 21

House Hippos and Cabbits

First we are going to watch a video about the North American House Hippo…

When this video started, for a moment did you believe that this could be real or did you know immediately that it was not?  What were some of the reasons you did or didn’t believe it?  How could we be sure?

Some of the most important skills we need to be a great digital citizen are our critical thinking skills.  A big part of critical thinking is our ability to find out if what we are seeing, reading, or hearing is true or not.  There are some easy quick tricks we can use to verify (which means to check out or investigate) information.

So let’s try one of the easiest tricks.

Here is a picture that I found online a Cabbit.  Online it says it is a cross between a cat and a rabbit.  Isn’t it adorable?

So let’s run a Google Search on the information we want to verify.  So open up Google and type the word cabbit in the search box.  Or, if you’re on an ipad or have a home assistant, ask it out loud what a cabbit is.  What did you discover from a simple search?  Is it real or fictious (not real, imaginary).  Type your answers in the comments on this page.

This shows us that the fastest way to check if information is true or not is to look around… look in other places!  Check a couple of different websites.  See if what else you can find out.  Websites we use to find information are called our sources.  Always check more than one source, especially if something sounds fishy!

Here is a video that offers you a few more special tricks you can use when you are choosing websites and videos to use for your research projects.  Write down the 5w’s so that you can remember them when you need them!

April 21

Seeing Should Not Always Mean Believing… Especially Online!

Here is a picture that’s been floating around online.  It is a photo of a Sea-Rex.

What is your first reaction when you see this picture?  Do you think it’s real or fake?  Why?  What are some of the reasons you think people might post a photo like this online?  This is actually a photoshopped piece of art called SeaRex by Rastroboy.

It is not hard for people to use special photo editing software to change photos into something that isn’t real.  This is called digitally altering a photo.  There are lots of times when changing pictures this way is just for fun or to be silly.  But sometimes pictures are changed to make us believe something that isn’t true.

Look at this photo which was used as an ad for cologne.  Why do you think George Clooney was digitally altered?

Did you notice that the wrinkles were taken off?  That the hair was made darker and less grey?  That there are no shadows under his eyes?  These are all ways that digitally altering a photo can make someone look younger or better looking.  Another word for this type of photo editing is called retouching.  This is done in most magazines and advertisements to make people look perfect.  Especially when trying to sell face creams and cosmetics so that you believe that they work!  It is even done in our school photos!

But we need to understand that this isn’t real life.  Nobody looks that perfect.  It is impossible to look at yourself in a mirror and see this kind of flawless image (until they invent mirrors that do this electronically and that is my million dollar idea!)  Understanding that these images are not real is one way that we can be kinder to ourselves when we look in the mirror.  We can’t compare ourselves to what we see in magazines and online because almost every celebrity has used a special filter or had their photos professionally altered.

Sometimes people post photos of themselves online that have been heavily edited to make them look perfect and sometimes it doesn’t even look like the same person!  It only took me a minute to alter my own photo on my phone.  Bigger eyes.  Slimmer face.  No dark circles.  If I post this version of myself online, do you think my friends would notice?  Most of my friends, especially women, tend to do this for every photo they post up.  But what does this say about the kind of high standards in beauty we hold ourselves to?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Editing faces in videos has become extremely simple too.  You may have seen examples of this with the app Snapchat.  You can record a video of yourself as an old person, as a hamburger, or even as a celebrity!

Here is a ridiculous video that has been edited to look like the little girl is Donald Trump!

These kind of videos are called Deepfakes.  Sometimes they are harmless and funny.  But often they are posted to make people think that someone did or said something that they didn’t do or say!  That can lead to the person’s reputation to be ruined or worse.  Imagine there was a video out there of a kid saying bad things about his/her teacher and someone put your face over it and posted it online!  This could get you in a lot of trouble.

Here is one of my favourite videos about the importance of not believing everything you see and hear online.  You may have seen it on TV.

This video was made to educate students about the importance of critical thinking.  Critical thinking is our ability to find out what’s true and what’s not.  It is really important that we always think about what we are seeing.  Seeing should not always mean believing… especially when you’re online.

Your assignment this week is to drastically edit a photo of yourself!  Send them to b.ruel@theojcs.ca and I will post them on this page.

March 31

News Made Just For Kids!

Even though you are a kid, you can be exposed to a lot of serious and scary world news through social media, overhearing parents watching television or listening to the radio, or even listening in on adult conversations that aren’t intended for you.   Hearing bad news can cause us to feel a lot of fear and anxiety.  Sometimes you will want to share bad news with your friends even if you haven’t fully understood it.  This can cause something called MISINFORMATION, which is when news is shared that isn’t factually correct.  It is important that we get our facts straight before we start spreading news around!

There are many current events and news websites available online for kids in which news articles are written sensitively and clearly so that you can understand it.  It is news made just for kids and can help you to know what is happening in the world right now.

Here is a list of kid-friendly sites.  Take a quick peek at them now to see what they are like.  And feel free to visit them whenever you want to know more about what’s happening in the world.

 

www.cbc.ca/kidsnews/

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.dogonews.com/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://newsforkids.net/

 

 

 

 

 

https://teachingkidsnews.com/

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a video by another school librarian, Marina, reading a book about news called On The News – Our First Talk About Tragedy by Dr. Jilian Roberts.  This book will help you to understand more about the news and talks about some feelings connected to hearing about bad things in the news, and how we can cope with those feelings.  Click on the video link and then click ‘watch it on youtube’.  You can’t watch it on this page.

In the comments on this page, let me know what kids news website you liked the best.  Also let me know what you thought about the book On The News.

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