Daniel Herman, teacher at Maybeck High School in Berkeley, CA, writing about the impact of AI on writing for The Atlantic:
I believe my most essential tasks, as a teacher, are helping my students think critically, disagree respectfully, argue carefully and flexibly, and understand their mind and the world around them. Unconventional, improvisatory, expressive, meta-cognitive writing can be an extraordinary vehicle for those things. But if most contemporary writing pedagogy is necessarily focused on helping students master the basics, what happens when a computer can do it for us? Is this moment more like the invention of the calculator, saving me from the tedium of long division, or more like the invention of the player piano, robbing us of what can be communicated only through human emotion?
Not too long ago, the ability to effectively communicate through writing was a critical differentiator in the job market. However, with the rise of AI, this will soon no longer be the case. The new differentiation will instead be between those who can simply produce coherent text and those who can skillfully leverage the technology to enhance their own creativity and produce truly exceptional writing.
As educators, we must now ask ourselves: How can we best prepare our students to work hand-in-hand with AI, using it to augment their writing process and push the boundaries of their creativity, instead of letting it replace their originality altogether?