Should I Use AI For Feedback?

Let me give you a scenario: a student uploads your assignment details and rubric to ChatGPT and asks it to create an "A" assignment. They copy and paste it and turn it in without changing anything. As a teacher...do you feel like that is academic dishonesty? Silly question, right? Of course it is dishonest and of course the student should have consequences. Now let me give you a different scenario: a teacher uploads assignment details, rubric, and student work to AI and asks for a grade and feedback. They copy and paste the feedback into Google Classroom, use the grade AI suggested, and return it to the student. Is THAT academic dishonesty?

Students are recognizing that teachers are using AI tools to provide feedback on their work and they are (understandably) frustrated. But tools like Brisk and SchoolAI make it SO easy to provide feedback without even leaving the students' documents! True as that may be, just because tools exist that can do something unethical doesn't mean we should use them unethically. Just like there are ways for students to use AI to support and enhance their thinking and writing, there are ways for teachers to use these tools to support and enhance their assessment and feedback.

I wrote before about using the Brisk Chrome extension for student feedback. I also wrote about using SchoolAI's essay grading feature and Chrome extension. Today, I'll show you quickly how you can use SchoolAI's Chrome extension to get feedback (similar to Brisk), and next week, I will show you how you can empower students to use guardrailed AI to get their own feedback prior to submitting work.

Just like Brisk, the SchoolAI extension works on any Google Document. It even works within the Google Classroom Student Work page. Once you have installed and logged into the SchoolAI extension, you should see the little "S" button (which can be moved anywhere on your screen):

When you click it, you will see a variety of options for how to interact with the document. You could simply ask a question in the chat box or you can click one of the options - Writing Analysis, Create a Resource, Create a Space, and Content Adaptation. For this example, we will focus on Writing Analysis. From there, you can choose between Summary Feedback (paragraph), Inline Comments (actual comments on the document), and Revision History Viewer (a video playback of the writing).

This is what you see with Summary Feedback - it's like a chatbot for this specific document:

In my example, I did not give a rubric, I just gave the context of it being a research paper for an honors US History class and said I wanted it to be rigorous and include criticism where needed. Here's what I got:

Now, there is an option to copy and there is an option to "Add to Document". DO NOT DO THIS!! Read. Read the paper. Read the feedback. Do you agree with the feedback? For me...I'm not going to tell a kid to use "Furthermore" or "Moreover". That's just silly. Maybe there are things I agree with and things I disagree with. I can use this as sort of an essay grading assistant, NOT an essay grader. Something cool about the SchoolAI extension is that you can edit the text right in the chat so that you can THEN copy and paste it into Google Classroom if you want. You can also close the generated feedback and ask for additional feedback or clarification.

The other option for feedback is "Inline Comments". This adds actual comments to the assignment. This makes it VERY tempting to just click the button to add the comments to the document, but don't do it! Again, read through them and delete them if you don't like them or change them. In this option, you can also chat to say what you want the feedback to focus on AND you can tell it specifically how many comments you want it to add:

Another thing to look for with this technology is to make sure the comment is in the correct place. For example, I got this clarifying question comment, but the text it highlighted was my page number, not an actual sentence:

I've spent a lot of time in the last 3 years learning about AI and how it can be used (and abused) in school settings, and it doesn't matter if you are a student or a teacher or just a random person in the world...my mantra is simple: YOU ARE SMARTER THAN AI. Trust yourself. BE yourself. Let the technology tool support you, don't let it become you.

Disclaimer: I use AI for a lot of things. Absolutely NONE of the content of my posts use AI at all (sometimes I ask for help with a title). I don't ask for feedback or suggestions or editing. This is me.