Researchers compare math progress of almost 1,000 high school students

Does AI actually help students learn? A recent experiment in a high school provides a cautionary tale.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania found that Turkish high school students who had access to ChatGPT while doing practice math problems did worse on a math test compared with students who didn’t have access to ChatGPT. Those with ChatGPT solved 48 percent more of the practice problems correctly, but they ultimately scored 17 percent worse on a test of the topic that the students were learning.

A third group of students had access to a revised version of ChatGPT that functioned more like a tutor. This chatbot was programmed to provide hints without directly divulging the answer. The students who used it did spectacularly better on the practice problems, solving 127 percent more of them correctly compared with students who did their practice work without any high-tech aids. But on a test afterwards, these AI-tutored students did no better. Students who just did their practice problems the old fashioned way — on their own — matched their test scores.

  • @VedditEnglish
    5•3 months ago

    I read that comment, and use it similarly, as more a super-dictionary/encyclopedia in the same way I’d watch supplementary YouTube videos to enhance my understanding. Rather than automating the understanding process.

    More like having a tutor who you ask all the too-stupid and too-hard questions to, who never gets tired or fed up with you.

    • @[email protected]English
      1•3 months ago

      Exactly this! That is why I always have at least one instance of AI chatbot running when I am coding or better said analyse code for debugging.

      It makes it possible to debug kernel stuff without much pre-knowledge, if you are proficient in prompting your questions. Well, it did work for me.