alt Hacker NewsThank you for the first hand feedback. I am assuming that you did similar assignments at the same age. Yet, you did not have the same tools. When I think back on my own LLM-free educational experiences, brainstorming was a hard mental skill to master. Some might argue it is one of the hardest as it requires some imagination, then critical thinking skills to filter the ideas. Can you comment about this? To be clear, I am trolling/baiting with my question.
Baiting accepted :-)
Well not all types of assignments are alike, I was not required to write nor hold a speech at school, as my eldest was at 13. I would be absolutely terrified to present in front of more than half my class, and they now speak to their whole school. But on the other hand, learning how to brainstorm effectively both alone and in groups is such a rewarding skill to have. And since brainstorming is something taught from elementary school all the way up to university level (I had it as part of a master’s degree), I would assume this means some pedagogs think it is both important and difficult. If you have learned about ‘anchoring’ in negotiations or brainstorming contexts, you would know how important the initial ideas or suggestions or proposals are for the rest of the process and the outcome. So I believe that it is very negative to be outsourcing the initial stage of using your own creativity. There have been studies showing negative effects on performance, learning and memory when outsourcing the initial stage or getting help from AI in this stage, while the opposite is true when using AI for review later. Do not remember the exact source, was something that popped into my feed. So I think you are correct.
Secondly, I started learning programming in elementary school at the age of 10 in the late 90s, we had a couple of hours in the computer lab a week doing creative open-ended projects. Today the local school teaches how to use an iPad with OneNote and Kahoot in 1st-4th, and performing predefined recipies for MicroBit or BlueBot in 5th-6th grade. Not sure how that is an improvement.
So in conclusion, I support the policy to restrict the use of tech in school. The tools should support the higher goals, and sometimes doing hard work is actually required.