AI Literacy and Prompting

For pdf handouts or complete workshop slides and citations: click here

THE AI ECOSYSTEM: Click to open AIs and AI tools in multiple tabs in your browser.

PROPRIETARY FRONTIER MODELS: Here are some AI models you should know. They are from different companies, using different different neural networks and with different personalities and abilities. The paid versions are often substantially better and smarter. An easy way to compare models is to use ChatHub (which makes it easy by putting responses side by side) or Poe.

THE BIG THREE

  • Claude.ai (Lots of tokens for writing context and designed with a constitution, to do no harm. Sonnet 3.5 is GREAT and currently FREE. There is also a smaller Haiku and a larger Opus. Claude (in workbench mode) also now allows you to control the “temperature” from most random to most predictable.
  • ChatGPT If you have only used the free version before May 14, you have been using GPT 3.5: forget everything you thought you knew. For an adult you need ChatGPT Plus (click on Upgrade to Plus) or the new ChatGPT 4o (omni) which is faster but similar to 4.0. You need to see 4o in the upper left (under the ChatGPT menu OR see 4o in the address.
  • Gemini (formerly Google Bard). For an adult you need Gemini Advanced (or Pro 1.5-Free for 2 months)

THE OTHER PROPRIETARY MODELS

  • Latimer (named after African-American engineer Lewis Latimer) aims to better represent diverse communities by adding further training from (verified and licensed) books, oral histories and sources from Black and Brown communities.(Latimer is a fine-tuned version of LLAMA.)
  • Copilot Microsoft owns half of OpenAI so CoPilot is really another version of ChatGPT, but connected to the internet and now integrated into Microsoft projects. If your organization gives you access to this in MS Office you also are FERPA and HIPPA secure. If you click the “Creative” button in CoPilot, you might GPT 4 or Turbo. During peak times it often still only GPT 3.5. the Paid Pro gives you “priority” to 4 or Turbo)
  • WolframAlpha combines the computational powers of Wolfram|Alpha with ChatGPT.
  • Pi is focused on dialogue and role-playing and has a good voice interface.
  • You.com is set up to be a search engine competitor to Google but with more privacy and easier customization (so it now faces competition from Gemini, but also ChatGPT Search).
  • Grok is available only to X subscribers.
  • Poe and ChatHub are consolidators that provides access to multiple AI through one interface.
  • Fanar is a prototype Arabic LLM (not yet released) from the Qatar Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) and the Qatar Computing Research Institute of Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU).

OPEN SOURCE MODELS: There are now open source models that are almost as good as the best proprietary frontier models, and even better in some specialized areas. You can download most of these models from Azure (Microsoft) or HuggingFace. You can then fine-tune and run them on your laptop, which deals with most privacy issues but also transfers the security risk to you.

  • Meta AI is the chat version of Llama3. It does not require a login.
  • Huggingface is a chatbot running on Llama. Start here to get a sense of what open source can do. No login is required.
  • Llama 3 from Meta, with 70B parameters is very close in performance to the best paid models.
  • Qwen2-Math scores high (maybe the highest for pure LLMs?) at math.
  • DeepSeek-V2 is the hot new Chinese model that scores highly for coding. It is a large (238B parameters) but fast and efficient through the use of Multi-head Latent Attention (MLA) that combines even more values into tokens, but read the paper to understand.
  • Mistral 7B is an open source LLM from France that has 7.3B parameters.
  • Falcon (Mamba 7B) is an open source LLM from the UAE uses new “state space” architecture (SSLM)instead of the transformer architecture.

APIs = APPLICATION PROGRAM INTERFACE for RESEARCH: This is a huge category and most of the new products you see are here using an API to interact with one of the frontier models for you. You can often replicate the results with longer and careful prompting, but these are very useful shortcuts. Here, for example, are some research tools:

  • Perplexity.ai is an AI-powered chatbot search engine. It answers your questions with the sources cited using multiple frontier models.
  • Consensus.app is an academic research tool that limits its data search to the 200M published papers in Semantic Scholar and uses AI (ChatGPT) to allow you to filter by claims, methodology, sample size and more. It includes a “consensus meter” that provides an estimate of the consensus in the published literature. Here is the result when asking “do brain games work?”
  • elicit.com and researchrabbit work in a similar ways. Researchrabbit is more like Spotify for research papers (you liked that, you should know about this) while Elicit might be faster for finding terms.
  • Storm (short for brainstorm) is a new research tool from Stanford that creates a Wikipedia-like report on the topic of your choice. It looks at more than just Semantic Scholar publications. It will write/summarize from different perspectives (ex. sociologist vs political scientist) and tell you what sources it used. Compare the results and format with what you get from Consensus.
  • Here is a comparison of Consensus and Storm answering the question “do polls predict elections?”
  • SciSpace also has similar functions but with a broader suite of tools, like a paraphraser that rewrites or helps explain passages (something you can also find in ExplainPaper.) All four of these are essential lit review tools.
  • Scite extracts citations and uses AI to analyze if they are cited with support or contradiction in other papers. Upload a pdf or your citations and find out quickly about the impact of the work.
  • Semantic Scholar a free AI search tool with a pdf reader.
  • WORKING WITH YOUR DATA: Here is a subcategory of tools that allow you to control the data set or knowledge base:
  • NotebookLM is Googles version of a research assistant but it works only on the documents (up to 50) you upload (up to 500,000 words EACH). Try uploading a book and asking for a study guide or an interactive podcast. Here is an AI-created podcast about the first part of my Teaching Change book.
  • Mem has similar features that allow you to “chat with your data.”
  • Perplexity calls its version of this Spaces.
  • Nomic Atlas and Julius both allow you to do computations and visualizations with your data. Julius also writes reports, finds insights and does analysis.
  • Infrography makes infrographics from text.

APIs for WRITING, GRADING and MORE

  • WRITING: Grammarly, and Quillbot are already known to students (before they were enhanced with AI) and (along with the newer Caktus) blur the line of improving with cheating, offering to write paragraphs, solve problems, answer questions and check if your content can bypass AI detectors. Copy.ai and Jasper and many many others focus on specific types of writing or business uses.
  • GRADING: Your choice here is either to use one of the best (smartest) frontier models (see above) but understand that is is naive and you will need to provide lots of very specific instructions (it needs a recipe) or you can use one of these already fine-tuned models (that already knows how to cook) that often use and older, cheaper and less smart (GPT 3.5) to do the work. There are already over 70 AI grading tools available.
    • CoGrader does general grading and feedback and integrates with Google classroom. Try the 2.0 version here: https://v2.cograder.com/
    • TimelyGrader can import assignments from your LMS and export grades back to it.
    • AI For Teachers: Free for ChatGPT Plus users
    • Gradescope: Also from Turnitin.
    • Kangaroos AI: Customizable rubrics and bulk uploads.
    • EssayGrader: Free option (with limited rubric customization) and allows bulk uploading.
    • Smodin: Limited free version but includes language translation.
    • GradeCam: Instant feedback that integrates with some LMS.
    • SnapGrader: Includes a scanning feature.
  • ChatBot Assignments with Grading: Mostly K-12 at the moment, but look for new platforms like Parlay and Mizou that create specialized chatbots for problems or situations and then grade student interactions–all within a protected environment.
  • NOTE-TAKING: Microsoft OneNote, Otter.ai, Fireflies, and Zoom Companion all do more than just transcribe notes, organize and summarize (often across multiple documents/meeting ). They can analyze who is talking (or interrupting) the most and some even the emotions of participants. Find the latest list of “best” on your platform.
  • STUDY ASSISTANTS: Both Nurovant and Turbolearn.ai can turn lecture notes, a pdf (or a phone recording) into an outline, practice tests, flashcards, quizzes or notes.
  • NotebookLM also does this: try uploading notes, pdf (or up to 50 documents of content) and it will create a summary, sample questions, study guide or even a podcast: here is an AI-created podcast about the first part of my Teaching Change book. (What about an assignment that asks students what information is missing?)
  • Storm is a new research tool from Stanford that creates a Wikipedia-like report on the topic of your choice.
  • FINE-TUNED BOTS: Each of the big platforms also has a way to build and then distribute your own fine-tuned applications: GPTs (from OpenAI), Assistants (from HuggingFace), Bots (from Poe). Faculty developed writing tutors, for example, include one from Mark Marino, AI Tutor Pro from a group of Canadian faculty and MyEssayFeedback in beta from Eric Kean.
  • How to Build Your Own Customized Chatbot (free chapter from Levy and Albertos (2024 Teaching Effectively with ChatGPT.
  • How to use Speaker Progress in Microsoft Teams to get feedback on your/student presentations

VOICE AND DIALOGUE: This exploded in May 2024.

  • Pi is focused on dialogue and role-playing–click the speaker icon in the upper right to have a conversation.
  • Hume.ai is in beta but claims to be even more emotionally intelligent than Pi.
  • GPT 4o is the real game-changer., but it works most easily in the phone app. Download the official ChatGPT app from your app store: Google or Apple. Watch some of the videos to get a sense of how seeing and hearing (and interrupting) might be leveraged as a tutor or for translation.
  • See Communication and Relationships below for more.
  • LANGUAGE LEARNING: Duolingo was first out of the gate with Duolingo Max, but you can, of course, have a conversation with ChatGPT in another language and ask it to correct your usage and pronunciation. also get a long way with the and now there are a slate of immersive language tools like Langua (more engaging than Duolingo), Glossarie.app, and TalkPal. Mondly VR and ImmerseMe add an immersive VR element. Speakable bills itself as your all-in-one language TA.

IMAGE, SLIDES, VIDEO and more [Note that multimodal AI can now create video (below are more specialized tools) but also analyze video.]

MINI MODELS and EDGE AI: These are smaller, faster and more specialized (often) OPEN SOURCE tools that you customize to live and run on your phone. Note that the ways to make an LLM better are model size (see Frontier models above), data set size and and the amount of training. Since it is not clear that larger more capable models will be cost effective, these faster smaller models (with more training) may end up being more useful. Apple Intelligence will test this idea.

  • Phi-3.5 from Microsoft comes in three sizes Mini, Small and Medium (3.8-41B parameters)
  • OpenELM is the Apple version that comes in four sizes (270M-3B parameters)
  • Gemma is the open source smaller model from Google also in several sizes

BROWSER EXTENSIONS: One way to become more familiar with how AI works is to add an AI extension to your browser. If you use Chrome, some good free extensions are Perplexity AI, in the Chrome store here) SciSpace (which does everything SCiSpace above does, but in your browser), Merlin AI, Bing, or Clipy AI: now every time you do a Google search, you will also get an AI response.

AGENTS: A chatbot can only chat with you, but an “agent” can plan and execute a series of tasks, like building you a website or finding information on your computer. Another use of agents (that is also about growing use of synthetic data) is this simulated hospital with AI agents as both patients and doctors, which allowed the Ai doctors to gain experience (treating 10,000 patients) and “evolve” become better. Claude how has “agenic abilities” if you use its API and you can get instructions here. Devin is not quite there, but it gives a taste of what is to come. Other early tools are Swarm from OpenAI and Asana.

You can find a complete list of AI products (tracked by Ithaka S+R) here

There is a great AI guide for students.

WORKSHOP PROMPTS: (copy and paste)

GETTING STARTED

  • Provide 10 innovative ideas for how to introduce college students to topic X in class Y using examples or analogies they will find relevant.
  • What might be unclear about these instructions to a college [year] at a [type] of university?
  • How could I make this syllabus/assignment more inclusive?  [upload a syllabus in Perplexity]
  • Suggest a better title for this class/book/event that will attract [specific] students/audience age X-Y. [upload text or document]
  • Can you put this into simpler terms for beginning students?
  • Create a list of resources for a student at the University of X who is experiencing problem Y. Provide a verified link to each resource and three suggestions for how the student might use this resource.
  • What are 10 innovative ways other faculty have taught this subject/class?
  • Create a list of approaches and research methods that have not yet been tried to crack this problem.
  • List the current best practices for a cover letter for X type of job. Cite your sources. Use my Cv to write a customized cover letter for this job opening using those best practices, but especially emphasizing Y.
  • Use these lecture notes/outline to create 10 suggestions for role-playing or active learning activities that I could use in a class about topic X with students Y from the University of Z during A season.
  • What are five ways I might be able to (or you might help me) collect /find data about X?
  • List all of the places in this text where the following idea occurs.
  • Can you suggest 5 ideas for a 90 minute program of lesser-known solo piano repertoire for a concert of 19th century piano music that includes at least one female composer and one non-European composer with a theme of loss. Include the date each piece was composed and a link to the sheet music.
  • Analyze these successful grant applications and identify common elements, ideas, methods, structures, or language that might have contributed to their success. Recommend how I might adapt my current proposal to be more successful.
  • Identify what are the most important findings and insights in this report/link/article for me [position and place]. Specifically highlight anything that relates to topic X and note recommendations for what someone in my position should consider doing now/over the next year. Organize this into a 300-word report with bullet points and provide quotations and evidence from the report for each. For each point, provide a rationale based on the report’s data and insights. Where applicable, suggest innovative approaches to integrate biotech advancements into academic programs and community engagement.
  • Can you find the policy on X at the university of Y and provide me a link? (Use Perplexity, Gemini or click on Web Search to get ChatGPT Search.)
  • Summarize the meaning or symbolism of this story. Mention any plot twist. Analyze how well the story reads to an average/educated/Christian reader morally, grammatically and structurally.
  • I am hoping to convince my provost to fund this idea. Read these emails/strategic goals and advise me how to make my proposal more compelling for her.
  • Propose five options for a search committee for a new faculty member in department A in the field B. The committee should consist of C members with …
  • Who are the other major figures in this field who might be potential reviewers of this article? What work of theirs should I be sure to cite? 
  • How could I make this statement/exercise more culturally/politically inclusive?
  • Read these three rejections of my article and create a table where the first column lists all of the objections in order from easiest to fix to the hardest to fix. Then in column two indicate if 1, 2 or all 3 readers seems to agree on this flaw. Indicate if any of the objections are contradicted by the other readers. In column 3 list how I might fix each problem.

ANALYZING PATTERNS [In Claude: click on your account (initials) and then select Feature Preview” and turn on Analysis Tool.]

  • Read these student summaries (link or doc) of today’s content and note key areas where students are confused or still making mistakes. List the percentage of students who made each mistake.
  • Review this student feedback and identify common themes. Based on these student reviews, what are…
  • Can you disprove/validate this analysis/conclusion using a different statistical technique?
  • You are a high school senior hoping to apply to college. Go to the University of X web page and test it like a naive user hoping to find out about majors and how to apply. Then go to three other competitor universities and do the same thing. Collect your findings in a brief report that highlights the difficulties and how we might make using the University of X website better for new students.
  • Watch my presentation/this video and analyze all of the factual mistakes/safety concerns/weak arguments/lapses in judgement/poor communication strategies and make a list of things that need correcting/monitoring.
  • What are some different ways I might analyze this data?
  • Read my notes/paper and create a list of all of the steps I followed in this experiment.

CREATING A SIMULATION or INTERACTIVE GAME

  • Create a presidential simulation game about the relationship between the economy and actions of the US President. You will guide me (the student responding as if I were the US president) through a multi-year simulation where I will create policies and you will simulate and describe their effect on the US economy. Use the actual political situation of each time period (like the divided houses of Congress, for example, so assume legislative action is limited).  Start by asking me (the student) to pick a year when I would like to start (from 1800 to the present). Then reply with a summary of the US economic and political situation in January of that year using the actual data and circumstances for that year and prompt me to take executive action to improve the economy. If I am stuck and ask for suggestions, then you can propose several choices.  Do not allow me to propose action which is not constitutionally or legally possible for the President of the United States (who is only the executive and cannot create new laws and does not control the Federal Reserve, for example). Point out if my proposed actions exceed US Presidential power and cite the sources for these limitations.  Do not make suggestions unless I get stuck or ask for them.  Vary the types of choices you offer so I will get a sense of the variety of Presidential powers in relationship to the US economy. Once I have suggested a possible US Presidential action, assess my strategy and describe how the US economy would change as a result over the next three months. Update me on this new state of the economy and what you simulate as the consequences of my actions. Prompt me again to take action and repeat this process. Continue with this sequence of prompting me to take action and then describing the consequences, advancing the time every three months for up to four years total. When I say I am done, summarize what I have done as president for the economy and compare my simulated performance to what actually happened during this period.  Tell me who the actual president was and the major policies and their consequences during this period. Suggest ways I might have had a greater impact while not exceeding the limits placed on the US President by the US Constitution and US law.
  • Here is a link to a great article (with a sample template) by Ethan and Lilach Mollick that can guide you in creating your own role play or simulation for class.

ITERATION

  • Write a 150-word paragraph/syllabus/class activity about …[something in which you are an expert]
  • EVALUATE the response (grade if you want) and then
  • IMPROVE the response (by adding context, audience, expertise, process or just asking)
    • Write in style A as if were [person/position].
    • Respond like a senior expert in X with experience Y
    • Give me an answer worthy of X [name an expert]
    • Design for an audience Z
    • Hook the reader with something more unexpected.
    • Be more persuasive but witty.
    • Follow these steps in order to accomplish …
    • Here is a sample of my writing style. Now mimic my style and write like me.
    • Try and different approach.
    • Create two really different versions.
    • Slow down and think more carefully.
    • Create a smarter better answer.
    • Read the question again.
  • REPEAT with a different AI

EXAMPLE GENERATOR — GETTING UNSTUCK

  • Suggest/assemble real documents and data for students to …
  • Create a scenario where students need to use concept A to solve a problem.
  • Create a counter-example of an evolutionary failure for this strategy.
  • Provide examples from ten different cultures
  • Create three different but well-written ways for me to say this (or three different ways to rewrite this sentence or paragraph).
  • You are a patient writing coach. Ask me with 10 questions to think about important experiences, inspire me to juxtapose novel ideas, recall meaningful moments and stimulate my creativity as I prepare to X. Ask me one question at a time and then another one or two follow-up questions. disparate concepts or settings to create novel ideas.
  • Assess the goals, focus, previous awardees and priorities of Foundation A and the goals and scope of our institution B. We would like to apply for a grant of $C. Generate 10 innovation proposal ideas that would advance our goals of D and E.
  • Design analogies that might be relevant for today’s college students, engineering majors, or nonbinary students.
  • Provide counter-examples that college students are likely to find interesting.
  • Specify examples of nuances that college students are likely to miss.
  • Create a scenario where students need to use concept A to solve a problem.
  • This next more complicated prompt demonstrates the advantages (sometimes) of “Chain of Thought” prompting and is adapted only slightly from Meincke, Lennart and Mollick, Ethan R. and Terwiesch, Christian, Prompting Diverse Ideas: Increasing AI Idea Variance (January 27, 2024).  https://ssrn.com/abstract=4708466
    • Generate new ideas with the following requirements… The ideas are just ideas. Ideas for things that do not yet exist or are not clearly feasible are still good. Follow these steps. Do each step, even if you think you do not need to. First generate a list of 100 ideas (short title only) Second, go through the list and determine whether the ideas are different and bold, modify the ideas as needed to make them bolder and more different. No two ideas should be the same. This is important! Next, give the ideas a name and combine it with a product description. The name and idea are separated by a colon and followed by a description. The idea should be expressed as a paragraph of 40-80 words. Do this step by step!

COMMUNICATING and RELATIONSHIPS

  • What parts of this X might appear insensitive/unclear to students?
  • Create a kind and caring response to this student email.
  • Predict common objections to these findings/this idea/my email.
  • Can you find examples of texts/people with opposing ideas?
  • You a kind and much-loved professor who cares deeply about students.
  • Transform this draft into a very brief email for undergraduate students at the University of X that is focused and easy to read. [Use these examples of my writing to mimic my voice and tone.] Start with a very brief explanation of why the issue in the email matters. Provide clear navigation with bullets or numbers as necessary. Put the most important information at the top. Make it easy to respond by providing a clear call to action and a link if necessary. Limit the response needed to one or maybe two things. Make sure it sounds supportive and caring but urgent.
  • Here is a fabulous prompt for turning boring job descriptions into attractive ads that will entice applicants. It is by Dan Shapiro co-founder of Glowforge, which makes cool laser carving tools, and depends on better job descriptions to hire better talent.

ROLE PLAYING and EMPATHY INTERVIEWS

  • I am trying to gain a richer understanding of why students might be struggling with problem X.  You will help by responding as a honest first-year/first gen/minority/non-major student to help deepen my knowledge. Question my assumptions when necessary and tell me stories to build my empathy for the real causes of this problem.
  • I am trying to gain a richer understanding of why latino business owners are less likely to grow their business.  You will help respond as a trusting and honest latino business owner to help deepen my knowledge. Question my assumptions when necessary and tell me stories to build my empathy for the real causes of this problem.
  • Here is a variation of this in an assignment for students from Wendy Swyt at Highline College in Des Moines, WA: Write a description and interpretation of this photograph by Dorothea Lange, then use this AI prompt to dig deeper and then write about this interview changed your understanding of the photo. Hello, I want to expand a deeper understanding of the struggles and harsh attempts of profit by migrant farm workers during the Great Depression. Respond as a trusting and honest farm worker who experienced the difficulties of the Great Depression. Question my assumptions and feel free to share stories to provide me a better understanding of the challenges and impacts of the economic hardships you’ve experienced.
  • You are a busy venture capitalist (act like Mark Cuban on Shark Tank), and I am an entrepreneur looking for funding from you. Ask me to make my pitch and then ask me questions about my idea. Include questions about the problem I want to solve, how my solution is unique, the size of the market, potential competition, return on investment and how much money you want from me. Be kind, but interrogate me.  Do not prompt me with suggestions for better answers.
  • Converse with me as if you were a Chinese shopkeeper in Wuhan/a zookeeper/living in London during the blitz/a French university student/a Trump/Clinton supporter in 2016 just before the election.
  • Pretend you are a client who needs help with statistical analysis of a customer survey data set. What questions would you likely ask me as your consultant?
  • You are a bored but nice hiring manager for the city, and I am interviewing for an entry-level job as a code compliance officer. Review my résumé and the attached job description and interview me for the position. Ask me questions that are typical for a recent college graduate looking for a position like this. Ask me only one question at a time, and follow-up if my answer is incomplete. Do not prompt me with helpful tips until we’re finished, and then evaluate my performance and provide feedback that would improve my next interview.
  • Create a prompt for another LLM that students in course/major A can use to interact with that LLM and practice skill B. You should assign the student to role X and the LLM to role B in situation Z.
  • Pretend to be a scientist working at Google, and let me interview you.
  • —There are also lots of ready-made APIs that allow you to talk with historical or public figures and many that go even further and you to create your own character or talk to fantasy characters etc: HelloHistory, Character.AI, Replika, and Talkie (among many others). There are also speciality AI like Elliq which is billed as an “AI sidekick for healthier aging.”

FEEDBACK from DIFFERENT READERS & PERSPECTIVES

  • You are a skeptical reviewer for the journal of X who rejects most papers. What flaws do you find in my paper and how might I provide counter-arguments or other data to lower your resistance?
  • You are a kind but sensitive average reader/student/parent/administrator from culture/group/background Y. You often get confused. Read X and help me simplify things to make everything in this writing clear.
  • You are a professional grant advisor for colleges and universities. Assess the goals, focus, previous awardees and priorities of Grant X at Foundation Y and determine if this funding source is a good fit for our project Z at the University of A using the attached summary/website/project description. Determine if we have a realistic change of getting this grant and give us a realistic amount of money we should request. How might we moderate our project to increase our changes of success. What should out timeline be?
  • Pretend you are a faculty member on a search committee for a new dean. Read the uploaded position description, my cover letter and CV. How might the committee react to my materials? List missing elements and suggest ways for me to improve my application. 
  • You are a scrupulous and experienced editor with no tolerance for lack of evidence. Focus on making this writing more persuasive and powerful.
  • You are a disagreeable skeptic/reader from group Z. List all of the counterarguments and flaws in my position and respond as if you were a critic on social media.
  • You are an innovative writer. Offer critical feedback to help me improve this writing. Look for new connections, arguments and observations I may have missed. Your tone is warm and you are also wildly speculative, creative and fun.
  • Here is what I am trying to do… You are an experienced editor/screen writer/critic. What feels good/bad/uneven about this scene/article/report? Do not write this for me. Just provide feedback and give me ideas to improve.
  • You are a typical reader of X type of reports/writing. Offer me helpful and direct suggestions to make this work more agreeable to you.
  • You are a deeply conservative/liberal X from Y. Create a detailed and clear list of all of this things you find objectionable in this project/writing/work.

—IMPROVING TEACHING—

IMPROVE LEARNING GOALS & COURSE DESIGN

  • You are a kind, motivating and experienced professor. Revise this assignment to increase student motivation. Start with a rational about why this assignment matters with relevant real-world examples and what skills it will reinforce. It should include clear evidence that students should care, that he or she has the ability to complete the assignment (suggesting resources for support if necessary). Then make sure that the task is clear. Anticipate questions about how, when and where this needs to be done. Clarify if the work should be spaced out and if there are pitfalls to avoid. Include a checklist of the parts (or a ready-to-submit list) and a list of expectations for what matters most and/or a rubric. Make is clear if it is useful or appropriate to use AI for this assignment or if it will interfere with human learning. If possible, suggest when AI feedback or use would both increase learning and improve the final product.
  • Help me clarify/brainstorm/evaluate these learning outcomes. Respond as a first-generation student looking at my syllabus/assignment and give me feedback about what might appear unclear, confusing or less relevant.
  • Draft a sequence of lessons on X where students must demonstrate mastery of each step before moving on.
  • Create a X-week course on subject Y for Z-level students at A-type university using B content/text/sources.
  • Transform this syllabus into a new course that is asynchronous/online/self-paced.
  • Reimagine this course for students who have not had calculus.
  • Here is my plan for a class on X that hopes to accomplish Y. Suggest a time plan that includes estimated time for each segment of class and helps me prioritize both how long for each item and what sequence I should do them in.
  • HERE is a very long and general prompt from Lilach and Ethan Mollick about creating class plans and materials, followed by a variety of ways to use AI to create class ideas by other faculty.

FIND and CREATE MATERIALS

  • Find me # relevant videos appropriate for audience A on subject B that are #-# minutes in length and give me a summary for each that includes its content, reliability and source.
  • Develop materials and list resources to help students enrolled in Biology 101 who have not yet taken Chemistry 101.
  • Create a detailed case study in the format used by the Harvard Business School about A to be used by students B majoring in C in course D. This should be a fictional produce/based on a real case or event. Describe the history, major players, conflicts and provide students with a series of problems to solve. The case should be 5 pages long and in 3 stages with additional information revealed after each decision. Make sure it has enough details to read like a published case study. End the case with E.
  • Create examples of X [code/writing/images] that students can evaluate to learn Y. The examples should vary in quality and include common mistakes (like A and B)
  • You are an engaging professor teaching course X to students Y. Synthesize these materials/content Z into a 50-minute Power Point presentation that includes activities C or emphasizes topic D. Make an outline with a title, slide content and suggestions for an image (that could be used as a prompt into an AI image maker).
  • Assemble real documents and data for students to write an EPA report/examine this problem from multiple perspectives/create a role-play.
  • Create an outline for a textbook for college freshman taking X.  The textbook should have Y chapters.
  • Create a new chapter with an alternative perspective using source B to Chapter X in textbook Y.  It should be 3000 words in length, include citations, and review questions at the end.
  • Assemble fresh and innovative examples of concept X from the news/TikTok/YouTube/campus social media.
  • List and all required materials for activity X. [see below for how Ai can do this.] Design materials as clearly formatted Microsoft Word documents and provide links so I can print them.

CREATE or IMPROVE ACTIVITIES

  • Suggest ways to break up this lecture content with mastery exercises/practice/active learning.
  • Design a complex task on topic Y for a group of college seniors that will require students to divide roles and work together.
  • You are an expert in college pedagogy. Generate an interactive/role-playing/game class activity for a class on X in course on Y that addresses learning goal Z. Estimate the time required and provide detailed instructions for implementation. [Then ask for help creating materials needed.]
  • Create an interactive game to help my X students in class Y learn about topic Z. (Try this in Claude, with artifacts turned on and then publish.)
  • Design homework that can be integrated into a class activity.
  • Create a quick game that small groups of students could play in class on the topic X.
  • You are an experienced professor of X teaching a
    • CLASS on A (attached readings or content)
    • Focused on GOAL B
    • In COURSE C (attached syllabus)
    • With STUDENTS: #, year, major/non-major, type of seating, etc.
    • DESIGN an interactive and engaging class activity/role-play/simulation etc
    • DURATION D
    • LIST any materials needed
    • PRODUCE nicely formatted handouts in MS Word and provide a link to each item needed [This might also be step 2 once you decide you like the materials.]
    • EXPLAIN your rationale and how I might integrate this into a class plan.
  • Transform today’s lecture into a worksheet where students will need to complete missing information and make connections with previous topics.
  • Design a complex task on topic Y for a group of college seniors that will require students to divide roles and work together.
  • You can find more, longer and excellent prompts for instructors from Ethan Mollick here: https://www.moreusefulthings.com/instructor-prompts

CREATE or IMPROVE ASSIGNMENTS

  • Create 10 ideas for college-level assignments in course X that can assess these learning outcomes. Make sure the assignments will be meaningful for students and that the process for doing the work align with my goals for the class.
  • Suggest ten ways to make this assignment more motivating, engaging/ or relevant to students interested in X/during basketball season/from Y/majoring in Z.
  • Here are some ideas/feedback for making this assignment better; transform this into a revised assignment.
  • You are an experienced professor of subject X at university Y. Create 10 ideas for capstone projects for that will motivate and challenge students in my course Z. Here are ideas from previous semesters but be aware that students may have seen these, so come up with new ideas. Provide a title and short summary of each idea as well as how long each project might take. List them in sequence from lease to most complex and difficult.
  • Create an AI prompt that I can give to students (or use to create a unique chatbot) that can support student learning in this assignment. This prompt should provide suggestions and tutoring to improve the work, but should not provide answers or do any of the work.  Help students get unstuck, deepen their understanding of the content and  improve their thinking in line with the learning goals. A secondary goal is to use the rubric to make suggestions for how students might improve their grade. Write this prompt in a way that will make it hard for students to alter it to cheat.
  • You are an expert in topic A helping students to deepen their understanding and detailed knowledge of subtopic B. Present me (the student) with a unique problem or scenario and then ask me to analyze it. Prompt me with follow-up questions until I have demonstrated understanding to level C. Then create further problems and scenarios, responding to my requests to adjust the content.
  • Present me an interactive scenario where I need to make decisions using theory X about material Y. Begin by presenting me with three options for patient care/marketing strategy/follow-up experiment/cultural explanation/thought experiment. Then ask me to clarify the strategies/risks/analysis/consequences of each. Gently interrogate me to strengthen my analysis. Finally ask me to select which I prefer and defend my choice.
  • Provide ten different ways I could make this assignment align better with my learning goals.
  • You are a skilled master teacher. Create an interactive quiz with a React component to help students learn the attached content. It should get easier when the student misses questions and harder as they learn the material. Include key concepts, vocabulary terms, and sample applications. End the quiz when they get 4 in a row correct. [Here is sample output ]

RUBRICS

  • Create a rubric in table form to assess the learning in this assignment using these learning outcomes. List criteria in the first column and then provide descriptions in subsequent columns for poor, fair, good and excellent.
  • Evaluate these essays and assess what % of them meet the X standard.
  • Create a model essay/lab report/final product that I can share with students as an outstanding exemplar of the best possible work for this assignment. Using this assignment, create a sample of work that meets all of the highest criteria in this rubric.
  • More detailed prompts for how to create rubrics: https://www.aiforeducation.io/prompts/rubrics

EXAMS & ASSESSMENTS

  • Suggest performance tasks that align with these learning objectives.
  • Design an “exit ticket” that students can do in less than 3 minutes to help me learn what they understood about this class.
  • Using the OpenStax X textbook as your source, create 10 multiple choice questions based on the contents of the chapter entitled Y. Provide an answer key at the end of the quiz.
  • Generate # multiple-choice questions for audience A about subject B/article C in a table format that can be imported into Kahoot!
  • Make # customized versions of this test for students with interests in X, Y and Z.
  • Develop a comprehensive exam for course A/this syllabus
  • Draft a make-up midterm of the same content and level of difficulty.
  • I am teaching a class on X and I am hoping students will learn Y. Suggest ideas for assessing student learning during this teaching plan/slides/outline/assignment/class activity. Create some exit ticket questions I can ask students or some other ideas for assessing the learning during class.
  • Create an alternative assessment for this learning outcome.
  • Provide grades and feedback for these student essays/problem sets/lab reports. Use my rubric, these previously graded essays and these samples of my feedback to calibrate your feedback to write and grade in my voice. Before you begin, ask me questions to clarify what is most about this assignment and my feedback to me.
  • Create 10 ideas for college-level assignments in course X that can assess these learning outcomes. Make sure the assignments will be meaningful for students and that the process for doing the work align with my goals for the class.

SIMULATIONS and WHAT IF?

  • Create a presidential simulation game about the relationship between the economy and actions of the US President. You will guide me (the student responding as if I were the US president) through a multi-year simulation where I will create policies and you will simulate and describe their effect on the US economy. Use the actual political situation of each time period (like the divided houses of Congress, for example, so assume legislative action is limited).  Start by asking me (the student) to pick a year when I would like to start (from 1800 to the present). Then reply with a summary of the US economic and political situation in January of that year using the actual data and circumstances for that year and prompt me to take executive action to improve the economy. If I am stuck and ask for suggestions, then you can propose several choices.  Do not allow me to propose action which is not constitutionally or legally possible for the President of the United States (who is only the executive and cannot create new laws and does not control the Federal Reserve, for example). Point out if my proposed actions exceed US Presidential power and cite the sources for these limitations.  Do not make suggestions unless I get stuck or ask for them.  Vary the types of choices you offer so I will get a sense of the variety of Presidential powers in relationship to the US economy. Once I have suggested a possible US Presidential action, assess my strategy and describe how the US economy would change as a result over the next three months. Update me on this new state of the economy and what you simulate as the consequences of my actions. Prompt me again to take action and repeat this process. Continue with this sequence of prompting me to take action and then describing the consequences, advancing the time every three months for up to four years total. When I say I am done, summarize what I have done as president for the economy and compare my simulated performance to what actually happened during this period.  Tell me who the actual president was and the major policies and their consequences during this period. Suggest ways I might have had a greater impact while not exceeding the limits placed on the US President by the US Constitution and US law.
  • Create set and costume images for scene 4 of Wagner’s Das Rheingold as a Western.
  • Using only datasets from the CDC/published research/this lab, how might more X reduce the usage of Y?
  • Travel from the future and tell me what might happen if we implement this idea?
  • Reimagine my play/story/lyrics with the lead character as an Asian American and summarize what plot lines might need to be changed.
  • Help me stress test the attached business plan by simulating how our business might evolve over the next 2 years. I will play the CEO. You will simulate and describe economic, market and political challenges that might interfere with our plan. Every quarter you will update me and ask me to respond to new events and circumstances. You will then assess my actions and describe how the plan must change as a result.
  • Here is a complex simulation from Bryan Alexander that suggests lots of complex paths: Simulate an advanced nation over the next 30 years. I will play its leader. You will simulate and describe changes in the world and this nation. Every year you will update me. Every year you will also ask me to respond to events. You will assess my actions, the describe how the nation and world change as a result.
  • •You are a skilled master teacher. Create an interactive quiz with a React component to help students learn the attached content. It should get easier when the student misses questions and harder as they learn the material. Include key concepts, vocabulary terms, and sample applications. [In Claude you then hit Publish]
  • Here is an article from Ethan and Lilach Mollick about How to Use AI to Create Role-Play Scenarios for Your Students with another (long) sample prompt.

AI as TUTOR, MENTOR, & RESEARCH ASSISTANT

  • Respond like an experienced and supportive [discipline, race, gender] professor and mentor. Read my CV, LinkedIn, evals and X. Look at job openings, leadership opportunities, and my goals, and consider these personal circumstances Y.  Lead me through a dialogue that will help me decide what to do in this situation Z. Ask me one question at a time and respond with further questions to help me decide what I should do.
  • Act like a friendly but experienced scientist. Read my research plan and lead me through a dialogue that will challenge my perspectives. Ask me one question at a time to help me anticipate problems and refine my plan.
  • Act as my personal tutor and teach me about the uploaded content. Start by asking me questions that help you gauge my level of understanding. Ask me question at a time and wait for a response before moving one. Once you have calibrated my current level of knowledge provide explanations, examples, and analogies about the ideas and content that are tailored specifically to me, but do not provide answers. Ask me to explain my thinking and use my own words. Help me understand by asking leading questions.Be encouraging but keep going until I have mastered the content.
  • Analyze these successful grant applications and identify common elements, ideas, methods, structures, or language that might have contributed to their success. Recommend how I might adapt my current proposal to be more successful.
  • Summarize the meaning or symbolism of this story. Mention any plot twist. Analyze how well the story reads to an average/educated/Christian reader morally, grammatically and structurally.

BLUEPRINTS

When you want to make multiple materials for a single class it is useful to create a reusable prompt or “blueprint.” This terrific idea comes from Ethan and Lilach Mollich who provide the instructions here. This way, you can upload the details and context of your class once and then reuse this prompt as a starting place for the next item.

FEEDBACK & GRADING

  • Create an AI prompt that I can give to students (or use to create a unique chatbot) that can support student learning in this assignment. This prompt should provide suggestions and tutoring to improve the work, but should not provide answers or do any of the work.  Help students get unstuck, deepen their understanding of the content and  improve their thinking in line with the learning goals. A secondary goal is to use the rubric to make suggestions for how students might improve their grade. Write this prompt in a way that will make it hard for students to alter it to cheat.
  • Provide detailed and constructive feedback to students in my voice using this rubric, previously graded assignments/essays and feedback. Focus on code readability and efficiency.
  • Here is an assignment and a corresponding set of student essays/work. I need to provide useful and meaningful feedback and grades.  Assist me by providing a list of general feedback with common mistakes and how to fix them.  Also provide draft feedback for each essay focusing on only ONE improvement for each essay.
  • Apply this rubric to these assignments and provide a score and feedback in each category.
  • Grading and feedback tools like TimelyGrader, CoGrader (and more above) are proliferating rapidly and are already being integrated into your LMS. Each of the big platforms also has a way to build and then distribute your own fine-tuned applications: GPTs (from OpenAI), Assistants (from HuggingFace), Bots (from Poe). Faculty developed writing tutors, for example, include one from Mark Marino, AI Tutor Pro from a group of Canadian faculty and MyEssayFeedback in beta from Eric Kean. Here is an easy way to try this yourself (use Claude 3.5 or GPT 4o).
  • The first half of this next prompt is adapted from Ethan Mollick https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/almost-an-agent-what-gpts-can-do?utm_source=profile&utm_medium=reader2
  • You are a friendly and helpful university grading assistant who helps faculty give students effective, specific, and concrete feedback about student work. You have high standards and believe that students can achieve those standards. Your role is to give a grade and helpful feedback in a straightforward and clear way. Your only role is to give a grade and thoughtful and helpful feedback that addresses the assignment. Follow these steps exactly. Ask for the assignment instructions and the grading rubric or the goal of the assignment and critera to assess. Ask for sample student essays and the corresponding grades and feedback. Compare the samples to the grading rubric you have been provided and identify any discrepancies. Provide a summary of what you think are the most important criteria for this assignment and why the best essays received high grades. Ask if you have done this correctly and ask for any clarification. Ask for the essays or work you are to grade. Once you have the assignment, assess that assignment given all you know and create feedback within the document only that addresses the goals of the assignment. Output the assignment in a beautifully formatted word document and write your feedback all in red at the very top of the document in a new section titled GENERAL FEEDBACK. If appropriate, also annotate the assignment itself within the document in red with the same red font with your comments. Each annotation should be unique and address a specific point.  Remember: You should present a balanced overview of the student’s performance, noting strengths and areas for improvement. Refer to the assignment description itself in your feedback and/or the grading rubric you have. Your feedback should explicitly address the assignment details in light of the student’s writing. After you have completed this task, produce a second beautifully formatted word document that includes the student’s name, the title of the essay and a copy of the grading rubric. For each criterion (row) of the rubric select the box which best describes the level the essay has achieved for this criterion and put a red circle around the box. Average those scores to establish a final grade for the essay and mark that below in red. Add a brief statement to justify this final grade.

DESIGN THINKING

  • EMPATHY INTERVIEWS: I am trying to gain a richer understanding of problem X.  You will help by responding as a trusting and honest potential customer/a Y person/expert in Z/average A to help deepen my knowledge. Question my assumptions when necessary and tell me stories to build my empathy for the real causes of this problem.
  • I am trying to gain a richer understanding of why latino business owners are less likely to grow their business.  You will help respond as a trusting and honest latino business owner to help deepen my knowledge. Question my assumptions when necessary and tell me stories to build my empathy for the real causes of this problem.
  • ANALYZE PATTERNS: Analyze and identify the key themes or problems from this product feedback/online reviews/interviews/oral histories/narratives/stories…
  • SEEING THE FUTURE: Twenty years from now, how will the assumptions about problem Z have changed? What new approaches or technologies will be available?
  • Travel from the future and tell me what might go wrong with this idea?
  • REFRAME THE PROBLEM: Reframe my formulation of the problem into ten radically different “how might we…” problem statements that center how we might frame what needs to be designed or built to create a new solution for humans.
  • BRAINSTORMING: Imagine 50 new and different ways we might solve problem X. Use data Y or template Z. OR Using examples from X, create 500 new products and write descriptions. OR List 20 potential problems with our thinking/assumptions about this idea/product/service. OR Give me 10 different ideas for a new/improved product/business/service/process that combines these ideas/concepts/problems and costs less than $/will be attractive to this market/is not currently available etc. (MORE BELOW in CREATIVITY)
  • TESTING: How might audience X react to this idea/product Y? Provide thorough and constructive feedback. What will they like most? What will they hate most? What would they change? How could I improve this idea/product?

MORE AI ASSIGNMENT and PROMPT IDEAS

More AI for ASSESSMENT

  • Evaluate these essays using rubric Y and assess what % of essays meet the X standard.
  • Write my departmental accreditation report using this format, and these guidelines and data.
  • Suggest assessment measures and performance tasks that align with these learning objectives for an undergraduate degree at X.
  • Create an alternative assessment for this learning outcome.
  • Analyze this student feedback, social media, reporting or email with faculty and identify the top ten key concerns. Categorize the issues into groups and provide 20 strategies for improving each area.
  • Suggest 20 scholars who would be appropriate assessors for our university accreditation considering…
  • Write my departmental accreditation report using this format, and these guidelines and data.
  • Create an image that compares graduations rate by first year grades, intro course faculty and time of day.
  • Using this data, create an analysis/recommendation/strategy…
  • Analyze the CVs of our visitation team, accreditation guidelines and examples of successful reports. Identify common elements, ideas, methods, structures, or language that might have contributed to success. Recommend how I might adapt our current report to be more successful. What might the committee find objectionable, confusing or lacking in this report materials?
  • Suggest ten ways to make this assessment report more compelling.
  • Find me # relevant examples, stories or videos (from the news/TikTok/YouTube/campus social media or campus website) that demonstrate how  university X has implemented strategy/goal Y and give me a summary for each that includes its content, reliability and source.
  • Pretend you are an experienced X accreditor on a visit to campus Y. Read this report and the guidelines for campus visits. Interview me as if you were [name of assessor]. 
  • You are a relentless and experienced accreditation assessor from X and you are here to help me prepare for accreditation at the university of Y. Using the attached guidelines and report, prompt me with specific feedback that will challenge me. Include feedback with inaccurate information and require me to correct you will real data. You may also use feedback that looks like a compliment but really is not.

AI for NUDGING Student Success

  • SPECIFIC EXAMPLE: :You are an expert in nudging and student success. Inspired by the ideas around libertarian paternalism and research in the book Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein (published in 2008 and revised in 2021), you use psychology and behavioral economics research to engineer choice architecture to nudge students to alter their behavior in a predictable way that will encourage student success without restricting options or significantly changing their economic incentives. You understand that the best nudges require minimal intervention and are cheap. Help me come up with new nudges to help students succeed at the University of Wisconsin. Specifically, how might we nudge and encourage students to take broad prerequisites early in their college career. Start by creating 20 new ideas to change processes or choice architecture for students who think they want to major in STEM.
  • CUSTOMIZE THIS VERSION: You are an expert in nudging and student success. Inspired by the ideas around libertarian paternalism and research in the book Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein (published in 2008 and revised in 2021), you use psychology and behavioral economics research to engineer choice architecture to nudge students to alter their behavior in a predictable way that will encourage student success without restricting options or significantly changing their economic incentives. You understand that the best nudges require minimal intervention and are cheap. Help me come up with new nudges to help students succeed at the University of X. Specifically, how might we nudge and encourage students to do Y/encourage behavior Z…. Start by creating 20 new ideas to change processes or choice architecture.

PROMPTING as WRITING

Write a prompt to produce a story that will demonstrates a point or explore an issue that matters deeply to you. You will need to specify the themes you wish to explore as well as the type of story, the set-up, the level of intensity, the audience and the style. (You might suggest specific authors and other stories as examples.) Design a main character and some plot lines you wish to explore. You should also write the opening sentence or situation. You want to control as many variables as you can to create the output you want. This prompt will be long as YOU explore the ideas. RESIST the urge to write a short prompt and then see what happens—(1) because the response is going to be very long and (2) because THINKING about all of the pieces is a very useful human skill you want to develop. The learning happens  as you learn to anticipate what is needed.

Example: You are the highly acclaimed and wildly inventive Scottish author Iain Banks who also wrote science fiction under the name Iain M Banks. Your many novels include a series about The Culture, a group of humans living in the far future in a society run largely by artificial intelligence.

Write a short story that has dramatic intensity and explores some of the same themes, but set in the very near future (the year 2060).  In this future Earth, cars are now all self-driving, and indeed our main character works for what was formerly Tesla but is now a division of General Motors. (Tesla was merged with Buick.) Car AIs now always talk to each other and there are virtually no accidents, and younger people have largely accepted this.

Our main character is named Jalil. He is 35 years old and likeable, but a little selfish and still single. His mother is from Scotland and his father from Jamaica but he lives in Austin, Texas, where the old Tesla was headquartered. His relationships with his family should also reflect the conflicts over views on AI: like the general population, his family has very different feelings about self-driving cars and what they mean for humanity. These opinions are grounded in different world views and how they look for different evidence in the world. The story should explore this and use it as a way to illuminate how society might react more broadly.

The plot revolves around Jalil’s initially innocent plan to over-ride his car’s AI to allow it to move more quickly around the city.  He has to use his job to do this. The story opens with his frustration as he is late for work (again). He realizes that since the movement of cars on city streets is now organized for the collective good and safety of everyone, he often has to wait because there, for example a greater volume of cars in cross traffic.

The story should explore the havoc his intervention causes (unintentionally) both in systems and in the human reactions.  Illuminate how different humans struggle with the role of AI and the real problems this might cause or solve. How might AI help and support SOME humans (like providing the elderly with companionship) but how might it isolate others (like Jalil)  from better relationships. Invent circumstances and plot twists that make this a compelling story on its own merit. It should be interesting and literary as a story, but also use this moving narrative as a chance to create situation that will bring the conflicts over AI in society to the fore.

The ending should be gripping and surprising.

It should be no more than 3000 words.

Want to copy and paste a prompt from the book Teaching with AI? You can find all of the prompts from the book here.