First Education

Encouraging Students to use AI LLMs (HSC chem)

Post Image

Teaching my students to use AI properly to assist their studies can be very beneficial, especially when working on their depth studies / reports and for marking/solving past exam answers.

Regarding depth studies, this usually involves constructing a practical investigation which involves a lot of steps including choosing a topic / planning the whole method/equipment/quantities, doing calculations, analysing results, etc etc. AI can be very useful in this process by bouncing off ideas of what exactly is feasible to perform in classroom setup and time frame.

In addition, using these LLMs as a grader once the student is already finsihed a draft of the report (when LLM is given the Marking guidelines as well as context that the task is for Year 12 NSW HSC) can help significantly at finding calculation errors in their work, as well as sections that are maybe missing information or not explained very well which the students should use to then improve their own work.

Also for depth studies/reports I notice students usually lose marks in their discussion especially when talking about validity, reliability and accuracy, as their answers are too general. AI can help students check whether they have discussed all the main key points and students can ask, “Have I explained how this improves accuracy?” or “What else should I mention for reliability?”

AI also is a great help with referencing, both finding sources as well as formatting references, and most students dont get taught at school how to reference so this can save them a lot of time, as long as they are cautious to check the final references themselves to make sure they were not fabricated.
——–
Finally for exams they are especially useful as graders of students answers to short answer and long response questions, where students a lot of time are not sure if theyve covered everything / answered well enough, even after looking at marking guidelines

Emanuel Kapodistrias