Unless you’ve been on a desolate island for some time, you would have heard of ChatGPT, the AI-based language model developed by Open AI, the same people that made Dall-E (Dall-E draws images based on a text prompt.) ChatGPT has been a rage not just among adults and teens but also in my school community. Which is not surprising since we rate ourselves to be the most tech-savvy generation yet. For us, it’s like having our own personal oracle - ask any question and await an answer instant answer.
As a pre-teen, I find ChatGPT - for that matter any sort of AI tech - fascinating. With its non-judgemental responses, it’s almost like something out of a sci-fi movie.
What makes ChatGPT different?
ChatGPT understands our natural language and responds in a ‘human’ language, as if we are having a conversation with another person. Such instant responses make learning interactive and quite a bit of fun, come to think of it. Suddenly, my old ways of searching the internet seems impersonal and inefficient.
I have found that the ability to get “an” answer as opposed to many possible answers helps keep me engaged in the topic. From what I can see - so far - most teachers have taken ChatGPT in their stride, but with reservations. We have to agree with one of their concerns of limiting creativity as the answers are easily available, with students not making an extra effort research through multiple resources.
An improved learning experience
My friends have unanimously liked the ChatGPT ways, which is an achievement in itself when we can’t agree even on simple things like what to eat and what to play). ChatGPT is so in-the-moment that the ‘South Park’ series made a whole episode about it.
I feel the study we do in school is mostly focused around researching on a topic for long periods with limited time left for problem-solving and critical thinking. With tools such as ChatGPT, the research side of things can be quicker. This can make learning much more fun, advanced and relevant to current issues rather than engage with 100-year-old topics.
However, I’m mindful that the answers we get from ChatGPT are accurate and emotionally ethical. One of the other limitations in ChatGPT I encountered was the model currently doesn’t have any information past 2021 - but this hardly takes away from the practicality. For most of us, this is a good enough.
OpenAI and Microsoft have just launched ChatGPT-4 where images and videos can be included. All I can see is that ChatGPT is just the beginning of our learning…
