Educator’s Notebook #459 (September 8, 2024)
INTRODUCTION
September starts, soft skills assessments, teacher time, and more
September has begun with a burst of activity.
In our features today, you can take a big step back at the macro objectives of education in a lengthy and thoughtful essay coauthored by Kent Maguire from the Hewlett Foundation. The essay looks at the role education can play in increasingly contentious times. Also in the features, find an excellent FAQ that highlights the various laws over the years that have set boundaries and expectations for the role of religion in public education in America.
Also this week, the Assessment section offers different ways of measuring soft skills and engagement. In Adolescence and Tech, the discussion about the great cell phone correction continues on. And in the Safety section, find helpful reflections on safety, following the recent school shooting in Georgia.
Last, in the workplace section, find a survey from two years ago by Merrimack College examining teachers needs and wants at this time. The survey has been repeated in 2023 and 2024, but the 2022 results offer more information about what teachers most want to be doing. I found the chart below surprising: when asked what they would most like to focus on in their work, a greater percentage or respondents list planning and preparation ahead of even actual teaching time.
As always, also find a host of developments in the AI section at the end.
These and more, enjoy!
Peter
PS. Do you have new faculty or new leadership who would benefit from this newsletter? Let me know, or invite them to subscribe here.
From the 2022 Merrimack College Teacher Survey
FEATURED
A Deep Look At A Renewed Purpose For Education
“This article attempts to reframe education’s purpose away from the recent market-based assumptions of neoliberalism and toward a renewed civic purpose for education in a changing society. We try to make the case for why public schools still matter to democratic preparation, what kinds of shifts are needed to equip young people to be full participants in our society, and how this effort might be carried out across the country’s diverse contexts. These categories form the basis of an agenda for large-scale positive change, which we hope will spark more organizations and individuals to engage in similar work.”
“Religion In Public Schools, Explained” - Via Laws And Court Cases
"Here are answers to some frequently asked questions about religion in school, the separation of church and state, and school prayer.”
ADMISSIONS
ADOLESCENCE
Is It Harder Being A Teen Today? Parents And Kids Chime In.
How Students Are Requiring More Support Post-Pandemic
“These days, she thinks, students either want to do all of their work online, at their own pace, or they want everything to happen face to face. They don’t want to have to do both.”
ARTS
Fellowship Applications For Artists
An Extraordinary Look At Prince, The Artist And Person
“When the screening ended, after midnight, Questlove was shaken. Since he was 7 years old, he said, he had modeled himself on Prince — his fashion, his overflowing creativity, his musical rule-breaking. So “it was a heavy pill to swallow when someone that you put on a pedestal is normal.” That was the bottom line for him: that Prince was both extraordinary and a regular human being who struggled with self-destructiveness and rage.”
ASSESSMENT
On “Engagement Scores” As A Reimagined “Participation Grade”
How To Measure Soft Skills Quickly And Scientifically
“In the traditional education system there is a strong tendency to focus on hard skills (knowledge) like reading, writing, maths, languages, science and technology. However, when we know that 65% of students will be doing jobs that do not exist, soft skills development is a critical part of being ready for job success."
CHARACTER
CURRICULUM
DIVERSITY/INCLUSION
A List Of 200+ Colleges Affected by Anti-DEI Legislation
“DEI Is Not Working On College Campuses. We Need A New Approach.”
How Students Protests Are Evolving
HEALTH
“Sleepmaxxing” And The (Surprising?) Quest For Perfect Sleep
“Top 6 Questions Answered About Fall Vaccines”
Why Is Loneliness So Hard To Cure?
5 Ways To Feel More Connected (From Dr. Ruth)
HIGHER ED
HUMANITIES
How Restrictions On Teaching Elections Are Surfacing In One State
“A survey from the council found 42 percent of council member respondents reported that building administration, school boards or community members lodged complaints or put restrictions on lessons related to politics, an election or current events, Kopplin said on WPR’s “Wisconsin Today.”"
How Some Colleges Are Trying To Teach Free Speech And Civil Discourse
On Being An Arabic Literature Professor Today
On T. S. Eliot’s Prufrock
LANGUAGE
LEADERSHIP
Endowment Taxes: What Are The Economics?
Tom Brady's Seven Principles For Team Leadership
“5 Ways Teachers Want Administrators To Support Them”
"Skills Training Links Psychological Safety To Revenue Growth”
LEARNING SCIENCE
The Brain Science Of Outrage, And What To Do
“Teachers are the linchpin in helping students develop intellectual humility, both in how they respond to being wrong or challenge themselves and in the tone and structure they set for classroom discussions. Students develop more openness and resilience in classes where teachers readily admit to their own mistakes and maintain a class climate encouraging students to react respectfully when peers disagree or make mistakes.”
PD
5 Misconceptions New Teachers Might Hold
A Nanoscience Summer PD Opportunity For Middle School Teachers
PEDAGOGY
READING/WRITING
Should Chatbots Be Permitted For NaNoWriMo?
“For over 20 years, writers around the world have participated in National Novel Writing Month, or #NaNoWriMo, as it’s known online. The challenge is simple: Write 50,000 words in the month of November. Well, as simple as writing 50,000 words can be. (That’s 1,667 words per day, for those of you doing the math at home.) Of course, using a generative artificial intelligence platform, like ChatGPT, could make those words go by much quicker. But is that really ethical? In the spirit of the event? Good for the craft of creative writing in general?”
“In Praise Of Reference Books”
“Curated well, organized logically, illustrated with appropriate diagrams and maps, reference books can be a joy. And I suspect they’re a joy that many of us share, even if we are loath to say so publicly for fear of being labeled midwitted.”
What Is The Role Of The Writing Center In An Age Of AI?
In Praise Of The College Essay
“I’ve had this experience with reluctant writers again and again — when a topic clicks with a student, an essay can unfurl spontaneously.”
“Umberto Eco: A Library Of The World - Official Trailer”
“Why Your Unread Books Define You” [Video]
SAFETY
“Why Responding To Student Threats Is So Complicated”
How A Panic Button May Have Helped Save Lives In Georgia
2023 Was A Record Year For Ransomware Attacks On Schools
STEM
SUSTAINABILITY
TECH
“The Case For Causality” Between Phones And Adolescent Anxiety
Why Are So Many EdTech Companies Going Private?
WORKPLACE
1st Annual Merrimack College Teacher Survey (from 2022)
“Meeting The Core Human Needs Of A Teacher”
“Belonging… Autonomy… Competence… Self-Esteem… Trust… Purpose”
Americans’ Satisfaction With US K-12 Education Improves
School In West Michigan Makes Houses Like In Hogwarts
“Talking Politics At Work: A Double-Edged Sword”
GENERAL
“Why Teaching Is Harder Than Surgery”
Everything You Wanted To Know About: Chalk
What Machine Learning Surfaced From 14.5 Million Yearbook Pictures
“English Teacher” - A New TV Show About School
A.I. Update
A.I. UPDATE
Social AI, revised AI assessment scale, surprising use cases, and more
With the northern hemisphere school year starting, writing on AI and education has spiked again. Find excellent posts on assessments with AI, uses of AI in learning, and more in the Education section.
In the features, find an excellent exploration into the directions human-to-human relationships might take in an age of relational AI. Michelle Culver charts out four possible futures and explores the conditions and implications of each. This is an extraordinarily important conversation, especially for schools. My sense is that the effects of AI on our social lives will be even more significant than the effects of AI on our learning lives. In the other feature, Yuval Noah Harari dives into the risks of social AI. His essay is an important warning — Culver’s essay offers paths forward.
Elsewhere, find developments in Claude, commitments by organizations as formidable as the Mayo Clinic to launch AI programs, and even an exploration into using AI as a board member.
Also, Common Sense Media’s AI Principles Assessment offers a rating system for evaluating AI models for safety. See a sample below, and check it out to compare different AI models against each other. Below are ChatGPT’s ratings, which contrast Claude’s.
These and more, enjoy!
Peter
Common Sense Media’s AI Principles Assessment (see Ethics and Risk, below)
TECH/AI: FEATURED
“Yuval Noah Harari: What Happens When The Bots Compete For Your Love?”
“To foster “fake intimacy,” bots will not need to evolve any feelings of their own; they just need to learn to make us feel emotionally attached to them… What might happen to human society and human psychology as algorithm fights algorithm in a battle to fake intimate relationships with us, which can then be used to persuade us to vote for politicians, buy products or adopt certain beliefs? A partial answer to that question was given on Christmas Day 2021, when a 19-year-old, Jaswant Singh Chail, broke into the Windsor Castle grounds armed with a crossbow, in an attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II. Subsequent investigation revealed that Mr. Chail had been encouraged to kill the queen by his online girlfriend, Sarai.”
“Will AI Strengthen Or Erode Human-To-Human Relationships?”
“I’ve created a resource to proactively envision how young people might relate to and utilize chatbots, with different impacts on human connection. The framework below maps four different possible futures, each representing the most common chatbot experience for young people.”
TECH/AI: EDUCATION
"Six AI Ideas We Need To Let Go Of”
“Six AI Use Case Families Of Instructional Design”
“Creative Ideation… Research & Analysis… Data-Driven Insights… Adaptation & Localization… Content Generation… Intelligent Assistance.”
How A Harvard Physics Professor Tailored An AI Tutor For His Class
How Does GenAI Change The OER Landscape?
Using AI As A Crutch Can Harm Learning—AI As Support Can Increase Efficiency
Dan Fitzpatrick’s Back To School AI Guide
“Why AI Isn’t Going To Make Art”
“Does AI Really Encourage Cheating In Schools?”
“Students seem to cheat a lot, generally… but they cheated at the same rates before the advent of A.I. What has increased is the number of teachers and adults who seem convinced that all the kids are cheating… Opinions in education, as a rule, move very quickly and oftentimes in a reactionary way. But the actual implementation of any consensus can take decades to complete. This inefficiency can be harmful—it’s taken far too long to remove phones from schools, for example—but it also allows for little panics like the current one around large-language-model cheating.”
“Updating the AI Assessment Scale”
“One of the most significant changes in our revised AI Assessment Scale is our perspective on assessment security and assessment validity… It is a potentially disruptive but absolutely necessary perspective which understands that permitting any use of AI effectively permits all use of AI, and since it is undetectable and sophisticated across domains, the distinction between previous Levels 2, 3, 4, and even 5 is somewhat arbitrary. In the revised version, we take the stance that assessment security, in the traditional sense, is only possible at Level 1, but that assessment validity is possible throughout. We will discuss this further in a forthcoming journal article.”
TECH/AI: ETHICS AND RISK
When A Data Center And A Town Are Vying For The Same Water
New Common Sense Media AI Safety Ratings For GenAI Companies
The Scientists Are Saying We Need Philosophers Working On Questions Around AI
TECH/AI: GOVERNMENT AND LAW
TECH/AI: INDUSTRY DEVELOPMENT
“OpenAI Says ChatGPT Usage Has Doubled Since Last Year”
Artifacts Are Now Free On Claude
The Top 100 GenAI Consumer Apps (3rd Edition)
TECH/AI: USES AND APPLICATIONS
“Mayo Clinic Launching AI Education Program For Its Staff
AI May Not Be All That Great At Summarizing Long Documents
“Reviewers told the report’s authors that AI summaries often missed emphasis, nuance and context; included incorrect information or missed relevant information; and sometimes focused on auxiliary points or introduced irrelevant information. Three of the five reviewers said they guessed that they were reviewing AI content.”
On Using AI As A Board Member
“Claude and ChatGPT-4o’s performance was breathtaking. AI returned 90% of the same comments or insights our human board made (we compared notes). They were able to suggest the same priorities the board did (with the associated tradeoffs) — including driving enterprise value, balancing growth and cash runway, and taking on more technology risk… Think of what this could mean for any of your high brain power work. Less stress, knowing you didn’t overlook obvious angles or issues. A quick gut-check to anticipate questions and develop decent answers (which you will improve). And a thought partner to point out your blind spots — risks you forgot to consider or unintended consequences you didn’t think of. Whether interviewing for a job, admissions to a business school, or trying to obtain asylum … I can’t imagine not having the AI role play to better prepare.”
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