Skip to Main Content

Faculty Resources: ChatGPT

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is a form of artificial intelligence that can understand and generate natural language text. It is trained on large amounts of text data and uses an algorithm to learn how to generate text that is similar to human conversation.

ChatGPT works by being fed large datasets of text. It then uses the data to learn the structures and patterns of speech and language. Once it has gained this knowledge, ChatGPT can generate its own text to create an answer after being given a prompt. 

Responses provided by ChatGPT are formed in full sentences and are curated from the internet. ChatGPT has a limited amount of knowledge - most notably, this AI has limited knowledge of events that occurred after September 2021. This knowledge gap is the result of how ChatGPT was programmed and what updates have been added. 

Explore ChatGPT

Please Note: An account is required to use ChatGPT. You will need to provide an email address and password to create an account and log in.

A Teacher's Prompt Guide to ChatGPT

A Teacher's Prompt Guide to ChatGPT aligned with 'What Works Best'

Welcome to this short instructional teachers guide to using ChatGPT. ChatGPT is a powerful tool that can help teachers enhance student learning - remember to keep asking it questions to refine the outcome. Sometimes, when you're close to getting exactly what you want, it's helpful to restart the conversation with your newly clarified prompt.  By following this guide, you will learn how to effectively incorporate ChatGPT into your teaching practice and make the most of its capabilities. We will provide specific examples and strategies aligned with CESE NSW's "What Works Best" to help you get started.

Resources & Further Reading for Educators

Educator Considerations for ChatGPT
From OpenAI, this document walks educators through various considerations for using ChatGPT, academic integrity, and more. 

Understanding AI Writing Tools and their Uses for Teaching and Learning at UC Berkeley
University of California Berkeley's Center for Teaching & Learning created a resource focusing on ChatGPT and how it can be used to assist in teaching and learning. Also included are additional readings and links about ChatGPT and education. 

Why Banning ChatGPT in Class is a Mistake
Written by Thomas Mennella and published in Campus Technology, this article looks into why educators shouldn't ban ChatGPT in their classrooms, and discusses what ways ChatGPT can be used to enhance the classroom and student's learning. 

My Class Required AI. Here's What I've Learned So Far
Written by Ethan Mollick and published in One Useful Thing, this article looks at one instructor's use of AI and what he has learned and the challenges he has encountered. 

ChatGPT. Chatbots, and Artificial Intelligence in Education
From Ditch That Textbook and written by Matt Miller, this resource looks at ChatGPT and other AIs from the perspective of instructors, the classroom, and education as a whole. 

Learn More About ChatGPT

ChatGPT Quickstart:
This guide from ChatGPT's parent company OpenAI walks you through ChatGPT.

ChatGPT Frequently Asked Questions:
Learn more about ChatGPT through its FAQ page.

ChatGPT Homepage:
Visit ChatGPT's homepage, powered by OpenAI.

EdSurge: What Will ChatGPT Mean for Teaching?

Teaching with ChatGPT

ChatGPT, when used with purpose, can be a great tool to have in your teaching toolbox. Below are a few ways that you can use ChatGPT within your instruction. 

  1. Run Your Questions and Prompts Through ChatGPT
    • Use ChatGPT to determine if your questions are too simplistic and do not require deep critical thinking. If a chatbot can answer your question and receive a "good" or "passing" grade, you may need to rewrite your questions, assignments, and prompts to encourage deeper thinking. 
  2. Provide Suggestions for Grammar, Vocabulary, and Sentence Structure
    • Input your own text, or the text of students, to receive feedback and suggestions to improve the spelling and grammar of a select amount of text. As a tip, input short amounts of text (1-2 paragraphs at a time) so ChatGPT is not overwhelmed and will be less likely to hallucinate answers. 
  3. Give Feedback on Student Essays 
    • Much like the statement above, ChatGPT can be used to provide feedback on student work. It is best to have ChatGPT look at the structure of the writing, and spelling and grammar mistakes. Do not use ChatGPT to evaluate and provide feedback on the content of the writing and research. 
  4. Generate Classroom and Instruction Ideas
    • Use ChatGPT to help you brainstorm ideas for discussion prompts, classroom activities, and more. You can also have ChatGPT brainstorm topics for debates and other discussions within the course.  
  5. Create Quizzes and Study Guides
    • You can create a bank of questions for quizzes, exit tickets, and even study guides. As a default, ChatGPT will provide multiple choice, and other simplistic, questions that can easily be Googled. You can prompt ChatGPT to create reflection questions to increase the deep thinking required to answer questions. 
  6. Create Writing and Question Samples for Revision
    • Have your students use their critical thinking skills to revise writing samples provided by ChatGPT. Students can evaluate sources, arguments, writing style, and more. You can also have students write their own arguments and have them compare the two writing samples. 
  7. Explore the Limitations of Technology
    • Have students explore and evaluate the limitations of ChatGPT and similar technologies. Discuss the bias in the algorithm and what implications that has on both the searches and the answers. Finally, have your students search for what experts in your field of study are saying about ChatGPT and other AI models. 
  8. Discuss AI Tools without Banning Them
    • By bringing ChatGPT and other AI tools into your instruction discussions, you will help students to determine when and where they can use ChatGPT in their lives. Have students come up with scenarios where using ChatGPT in the workplace and outside of the classroom will be beneficial and where it will be harmful. 

A Quick Chat with ChatGPT

The McGovern Librarians talked with ChatGPT to get a few answers, and here is what ChatGPT had to say. 

McGovern Librarians: What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT: ChatGPT is a large language model developed by OpenAI. It is based on the GPT-3.5 architecture, which stands for Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3.5, and it is designed to engage in conversational interactions with users. ChatGPT is trained on a vast amount of text data from the internet, allowing it to generate human-like responses to a wide range of prompts or questions. It can be used for various tasks, such as answering questions, providing explanations, generating text, and engaging in dynamic conversations with users. ChatGPT is a powerful tool for natural language processing (NLP) tasks and has numerous applications in customer service, content generation, language translation, and more.

The McGovern Librarians talked with ChatGPT to get a few answers, and here is what ChatGPT had to say. 

McGovern Librarians: What can ChatGPT do?

ChatGPT: ChatGPT is a versatile language model that can perform a wide range of tasks, including but not limited to:

  1. Answering Questions: ChatGPT can provide informative and detailed responses to questions on various topics, such as general knowledge, science, history, technology, and more.

  2. Conversational Engagement: ChatGPT can engage in dynamic conversations, simulating human-like interactions by providing contextually relevant responses and maintaining conversational context over multiple turns.

  3. Content Generation: ChatGPT can generate text content, including articles, stories, summaries, and more, based on given prompts or specifications.

  4. Language Translation: ChatGPT can translate text from one language to another, facilitating communication between users who speak different languages.

  5. Sentiment Analysis: ChatGPT can analyze the sentiment of text, determining whether it is positive, negative, or neutral, which can be useful in understanding customer feedback, reviews, and social media posts.

  6. Text Summarization: ChatGPT can generate concise summaries of longer text passages, making it useful for condensing information or generating abstracts.

  7. Personalized Recommendations: ChatGPT can provide personalized recommendations based on user preferences or previous interactions, such as recommending books, movies, or products.

  8. Programming Assistance: ChatGPT can assist with programming tasks, providing code snippets, explanations, and guidance on programming languages, libraries, and frameworks.

  9. Education and Learning: ChatGPT can serve as an educational tool, providing explanations, examples, and tutorials on various subjects to aid in learning.

Please note that the capabilities of ChatGPT may depend on the specific implementation and context in which it is being used, as well as the data and training it has received.

The McGovern Librarians talked with ChatGPT to get a few answers, and here is what ChatGPT had to say. 

McGovern Librarians: What can ChatGPT not do?

ChatGPT: While ChatGPT is a powerful language model capable of many tasks, there are certain limitations to its capabilities. Some limitations of ChatGPT include:

  1. Contextual Understanding: Although ChatGPT can generate responses based on context, it may not always fully understand the nuances of context or accurately interpret ambiguous queries. It may generate responses that are contextually incorrect or nonsensical.

  2. Real-time Knowledge: ChatGPT's knowledge is based on its pre-training data, which has a cutoff date. It may not have access to the most up-to-date information, news, or events that have occurred after its knowledge cutoff date.

  3. Critical Thinking and Judgment: ChatGPT lacks human-like critical thinking abilities and may not always provide the most accurate or appropriate answers. It may generate responses that are plausible-sounding but incorrect or biased.

  4. Emotional Understanding: ChatGPT may not fully understand or respond appropriately to emotions, tone, or subtleties of human expression, and its responses may lack emotional intelligence or empathy.

  5. Verification of Information: ChatGPT does not independently verify the accuracy or reliability of information it generates. It may provide information that is not factually correct or outdated.

  6. Domain-Specific Expertise: While ChatGPT has knowledge across a wide range of topics, it may not have deep expertise in specific domains or industries, and its responses may lack specialized knowledge.

  7. Legal or Professional Advice: ChatGPT should not be relied upon as a source of legal, financial, medical, or other professional advice. Its responses are generated based on patterns learned from data and should not substitute for expert advice.

  8. Ethical Decision-Making: ChatGPT does not have moral or ethical reasoning capabilities, and its responses may not always align with ethical guidelines or social norms.

It's important to use ChatGPT's responses critically and independently verify any information it provides, especially for sensitive or critical tasks. It's not a substitute for human expertise or judgment in certain domains.

The McGovern Librarians talked with ChatGPT to get a few answers, and here is what ChatGPT had to say. 

McGovern Librarians: How does ChatGPT affect education? 

ChatGPT: ChatGPT can have a significant impact on education in various ways:

  1. Enhanced Learning Resources: ChatGPT can serve as an educational tool, providing explanations, examples, and tutorials on various subjects, which can supplement traditional learning resources. It can offer additional information, explanations, and perspectives to students, helping them to understand complex concepts and deepen their learning.

  2. Personalized Learning: ChatGPT can provide personalized recommendations and adaptive learning experiences based on individual student preferences, learning styles, and performance. It can offer tailored content and feedback to students, allowing them to learn at their own pace and in their preferred format.

  3. Homework and Assignment Help: ChatGPT can assist students with homework and assignments by providing guidance, explanations, and examples. It can help students with research, writing, and problem-solving tasks, serving as a reference or a tool for brainstorming ideas.

  4. Language Learning: ChatGPT can aid in language learning by providing translation assistance, pronunciation guidance, and language practice. It can help students learn new vocabulary, sentence structures, and cultural aspects of a language.

  5. Critical Thinking Development: ChatGPT can encourage critical thinking skills by engaging students in discussions, debates, and interactions. It can provide prompts for students to analyze and evaluate information, supporting the development of critical thinking and reasoning abilities.

  6. Accessibility and Inclusivity: ChatGPT can improve accessibility for students with visual, hearing, or learning impairments. It can provide text-based content, transcripts, and alternative formats, making educational resources more inclusive and accessible to a diverse range of learners.

  7. Professional Development: ChatGPT can support professional development for educators and teachers by providing resources, lesson plan ideas, and pedagogical guidance. It can assist in curriculum development, instructional design, and teacher training.

However, it's important to note that while ChatGPT can be a valuable tool in education, it should not replace human teachers or critical thinking skills. It should be used judiciously, with a critical mindset, and in conjunction with other educational resources to ensure a holistic learning experience.

© 2023 McGovern Library, Dakota Wesleyan University

Email: library@dwu.edu | Phone: (605) 995-2618 | 1200 W. University Ave, Mitchell, SD 57301