[audio logo] Otan: Outreach and Technical Assistance Network.

Lori Howard: So today, my wonderful colleague Portia LaFerla and I are going to be talking about using AI to develop COAAP instruction and assessment tools. Again, this is for beginners-- if you've never used ChatGPT. if you have, this is probably not the right place for you because we're just beginners and we're just going to share what we did.

So both Portia and I are on the Yale Civics team at CASAS, and we wanted to try to make things easier for the cities. We realized that writing your instructional materials and writing your assessments is a burden these days when you perhaps don't have ESL coordinators at your school, or perhaps that might be having the time to do this for you.

So we thought we could use ChatGPT to do it. And so that's-- we went through and just made a few samples just to see how it would work. So that's what we're going to talk about today. And then we're going to give you a chance. So I hope you have either your phones or your computer because we're going to give you a chance to work with it too.

And the website is just TDLS. Just look it up so that you're logged in, if you would, while we're talking here. Go ahead and go to the next slide, if you would, please. Thank you, Portia. So our goals today are to introduce the use of ChatGPT or to create El Civics COAAP instruction and assessment materials such as what you're asked to do in the agency-created histories, resumes, application scenarios, example writing tasks.

So you're often asked to create those or you want to-- you're teaching how to write an email and you want to give a sample of what an email would be like. We need to write a scenario. You could do it yourself, but wouldn't it be so nice to have a little bit of help to do it so that it wouldn't take up so much time.

So that's what we're going to show you today. Go ahead. Thank you. So we're going to start with 33.2, task 2. First of all, raise your hand if you work with El Civics. Everybody. OK, great. If you don't, you can still use this for other things, but we're going to be talking specifically about El Civics instructions and all of our materials are civics related. So hopefully you all understand 33.2 task 2. Does anybody remember what topic this is?

Audience Member 1: Job skills.

Lori Howard: What?

Audience Member 1: Job skills.

Lori Howard: Job skills. Employment. 33 is employment. Yes. And we're going to talk about task 2 in 30 33.2. So let's go ahead. So this is our task 2 in 32.2. The civic objective, again, for employment, the general civic objective: identify and access employment and training resources needed to obtain and keep a job.

Everything about jobs is in 33. So 33.2 happens to have a task that says using a level appropriate agency created employment history. It's like, Oh my goodness, we have to give the students an agency created employment history. Why?

This didn't used to be in 2004. We didn't ask for this. But why are we asking for it now? Why do we ask the agency to use an agency created employment history? Why do you think?

Audience Member 2: You need to customize to the students community and their needs.

Lori Howard: Sure. That's one reason. Something else. We want to standardize it, because we don't know whether our students are putting in-- if they write about themselves, we don't know whether what they wrote is true or whether it has any validity.

So it may be a little different in an employment history for other things, especially but for this also, we want to give a history that the student would read it and then pick out the information. So do we know who their references are? Is it just the friend? The employment history might say, my friend so-and-so suggested I take this job but the references maybe there are different people.

So we want them to be able to distinguish, Oh, this is who a good reference is, right? Because that's what we're teaching, who's a good reference to put in a job application. So you might put a few distractors in the employment history that would cause the student to read carefully to make sure Oh, these are the people that should be the references, not that person who's just my friend that I met a month ago, OK?

So again, we're using this so that the student has to use their critical thinking skills and figure out what goes in each of the spaces. OK? Because otherwise, they could just write 10 names. We don't know who they are or whether they'd be a good reference or not. Does that make sense?

So this is where we've come to. Also, we may not want to have the student Social Security Number or we don't want to have it Social Security number or other personal information. So this keeps it so that we don't have their address and phone number and all the things for themselves.

In the classroom, if the student wants to do it for themselves and write their own, that's great, but we don't want to make that for a test that they're giving their personal information. Remember, we have to keep a pass and a fail. So this would be in our records. Their personal information would be in our records for years to come. So that's why we've done this, OK? Didn't mean to get off on that, but it's good to know.

OK, so this is what we want to do. So this is what we did. So let's go to the next slide. So we didn't know what we were doing, just thought, OK, let's use ChatGPT. And we're going to give you the link so that you can do it and everything.

So this is what I wrote the first time: please write a paragraph at CEFR level one, which tells the employment history of Juana Hernandez-- I just made that up, who has been a home health care aide for the last 10 years in Torrance, California.

She got her home health aide certificate at Torrance Adult School. She's worked for three different people. Please delineate the employment of the three employers' homes and give dates. Also include Juana's home, address, education, experience and references.

So I didn't want to have to come up with all this stuff. I came up with her name. I came up with Torrance Adult School. I came up with the fact that she's a health care worker, but I put all this in. And this will be interesting, the CEFR level.

That's the Common European Framework Reference, because I was told by a colleague that ChatGPT knows the Common European Framework. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to know the college and career readiness standards or the English language proficiency standards. We wish it did.

And I'm sort of wondering if I just sort of copied it into ChatGPT, if it would know it, but I don't know how to do that. So if you know, that'd be great. But right now, we're using the Common European Framework. This is the link to it and we'll get you the slides. So anyway, this is what I told it to do. Let's see what it did. Next slide. Next slide.

Portia Laferla: Yeah. Sorry. There we go this time.

Lori Howard: There we go. Oh, sorry. I have just a slide. This is so-- so when you get the slides, the Common European Framework is here. It looks similar to our six levels of college and career readiness standards, right?

A1 is can understand and use familiar-- can understand and use familiar everyday expressions and very basic phrases aimed at satisfaction of needs of concrete type, can introduce him or herself and others and ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, can interact in a simple way, provided the other person talks slowly and clearly and prepared to help.

I think that sounds like beginning high to me really. It's not as low, I think, as our English language proficiency standards are, but it's close. Anyways, I started there because I thought that's all I have to start with. And again, you'll have this in the slides.

So this was the first response. I'm going to read it. Sorry, because I know it might be hard for you to read. So Juana Hernandez is a home health care aide in Torrance, California. She's been working in this role for the last few years, providing compassionate care to those in need. That's all ChatGPT. Isn't that lovely that they-- I wouldn't have written that.

But ChatGPT came up with that. Juana earned her home health care aide certificate from Torrance Adult school, showcasing her commitment to professional development. Over the course of her career, she's worked on three different individuals, bringing her expertise to various homes. Unfortunately, specific dates, addresses and references cannot be provided, as these details are typically considered private information.

However, Juana's dedication to her work and her educational background make her a valuable asset in the home health care field. So look how much extra language I got here that I would have liked to have written had I done it.

But it didn't give me what I wanted, which I didn't want to have to make up the names, addresses, and the references, and the dates and everything. But ChatGPT told me they don't do that because they don't want to use personal information is what I've heard. OK.

Portia Laferla: Lori.

Lori Howard: Yeah.

Portia Laferla: A couple questions regarding links and the slides. Regarding links and the slides.

Lori Howard: Yeah. So we'll be giving that, OK? And we've got links throughout.

Portia Laferla: Does it help for me to drop the PowerPoint again in the chat?

Lori Howard: Yes.

Portia Laferla: Great.

Lori Howard: So drop it in the chat for those of you who are on Zoom. If you thought of-- you have computers, if you could, you could go to TDLS. And we'll drop the slides in the chat and you can go on there and get them. That'd be great.

Portia Laferla: So make sure you're muted, your audio is off.

Lori Howard: OK. Thank you. Make sure you're muted and your audio is off. OK, great. So would you use this for a beginning level student as an agency created history? It may not have enough information, but just the language level, what do you think?

Audience Member 3: Too high.

Lori Howard: Too high.

Audience Member 3: Too high.

Lori Howard: So OK, great. So can we go on?

Audience Member 3: Yeah.

Lori Howard: So then I said to ChatGPT-- second prompt. I want second prompt. Second one.

Portia Laferla: Second prompt.

Lori Howard: There we go. So then I had to write my own dates, which I was unhappy about, but I had to. So I said, please include the following work history information. So I gave it dates. And I gave some extra information-- Juan always came on time and worked hard. She was a great companion. I added some other details because I thought they could add that in.

So that's how I changed my second prompt. And let's see what we got. So then it gave me Juana's work history includes serving as a caregiver for three different individuals, and then it listed it. Again, I didn't give them this sentence, this entry sentence here, but it's a great sentence. And then it added the work history that I gave it.

But still, is this good for a beginning low student or no? Any kind of beginning student, maybe even for intermediate student, too high. So let's go ahead to the next one. So then I said, please use only vocabulary and grammar that could be understood by CEFR level one students.

So even though I had said CEFR 1, I didn't think it picked up on that somehow. So I tried to make it-- I tried to do that again. And I-- the prompt, only vocabulary and grammar that could be understood. I hope that would lower the level. Let's see what happened. So then, here we go. Juan Hernandez helps people at home in Torrance, California. Is that better?

Audience Member 3: Yeah.

Lori Howard: OK. And then at the end, then there's all the work history, et cetera. She learned about taking care of people at Torrance Adult School. Better? So we're getting closer now. So that prompt really helped. Vocabulary and grammar that only so-and-so could understand.

That helped a lot and a lot of the inner things too. She learned to care for others at Torrance Adult School. She worked for three different people. She helped John Smith. He liked her a lot and said she worked very well.

I didn't say he liked her a lot, I don't think, but they added that. I love the way it just makes stuff up. That's really great. OK. So now I thought, OK, this is pretty good. Still high level, but it's pretty good. I just want to see what happens.

So now-- and I think this is where it can help you as curriculum developers and assessment writers and instructional writers. So now, I want to have an example, but then I need to have the test as well, right?

So I asked it now to change the information to be about a different person. So my example that I'm teaching from is one thing, but then I have to have a different thing for the actual assessment, right? But rather than start from the beginning, I just asked it to change the information to Hong Huynh and where she got her different information.

And then I had to put in the different employer dates and everything so that it would be a similar paragraph, but it would be about a different person. So example and then assessment. So let's see what happened.

So Hong Huynh is a caring home health care worker in Torrance, California. Similar. She's a good worker who learned how to help people at San Diego community College District. And then there's differences in between. So that's, I think, a really great thing that you can just put in other information and you get similar but different things to have a different example.

Portia Laferla: There's a couple questions. Question in the chat, Lori. Did you try surf A1, A2, B1 or et cetera?

Lori Howard: I don't know what that means. I'm so sorry.

Audience Member 1: They're separable.

Lori Howard: Separate.

Portia Laferla: Yeah.

Lori Howard: Did I try using the other levels?

Portia Laferla: Yes.

Lori Howard: I did not because I wanted it to be low and I started with level one.

Portia Laferla: I think what the user means is that there's no such thing as CEFR level one. There's A1, there's B1, there's C1. So if you put AI as opposed to just one, would that have--

Lori Howard: OK. Would that have changed it? I didn't do that because I didn't-- that's a great thing I should have done, but I didn't do it.

Portia Laferla: We could do that in our practice.

Lori Howard: We can do it in our practice.

Portia Laferla: This is your [muffled voice]

Lori Howard: OK. Let's go ahead. Thank you for that suggestion. So remember, that's what you should use-- A1, et cetera.

Portia Laferla: Or even pre A1.

Lori Howard: Pre A1. That's a good suggestion.

Portia Laferla: To get literacy in beginning.

Lori Howard: OK. Good. Again, we're all learning this together hopefully. So then I said, thank you for your help, and then I thought this was hysterical. You're welcome. If you have any more questions, if there's anything else I can help you with, feel free to ask. Good luck with your writing.

So it pretends-- well, I shouldn't say that, it is a helpful assistant and treats you as if it's a conscious being. So I thought that was interesting. My friend who uses it has a whole relationship with her. OK, let's go on. OK now, of course, she's going to tell you about a different one we did for 12.9 task 5. Be similar, sure.

Portia Laferla: So in Yale, civics are different kinds of tasks, and so we're going to look at a different kind of task and how we might use AI to do that. And we're going to look at 12.9 task 5. And unfortunately, I do not have Lori's recall to tell you exactly what that is.

Lori Howard: There you go.

Portia Laferla: Thank you. So it's about describing and accessing the services offered by the DMV. And if you were teaching this one, the students would need to write a letter, a persuasive letter about following safe driving laws. So if you're going to be teaching that, it's good to have some examples, so some sample letters about the task.

And so what we did is we fed AI pretty much the same language that you see here in yellow. The student will write an article, email, or letter trying to convince a friend or family member that they should follow safe driving laws. And they give different examples. We could choose from seat belts, child safety seats, cell phones. We happen to choose seat belts.

So we pretty much copied that information and we plugged it in-- go ahead, Lori, and asked at the CEFR level two. Maybe we should have said B2 or something like that. But we just said CEFR level 2, that they could understand the vocab and the grammar.

We asked it for a two convince a friend, so it's that persuasive letter and cite two reasons, because at the intermediate level, that's what the assessment says. For intermediate, they have to cite two examples. So I didn't give it-- we did not give it two reasons, but if you were the teacher, you would know what reasons you were teaching and you might want to plug those into the AI, although we did not do that. Go ahead, Lori.

So this is a letter that came up. And again, I'll read it because it's kind of small, otherwise I would not. Dear friends name, I hope this letter finds you well. I've been thinking about something important that I want to share with you. It's about the safety laws here in California, especially regarding the use of seat belts while driving. You set it up.

Firstly, using seat belts is crucial because they can save lives in case of an accident, a seat belt keeps you securely in your seat, preventing you from being thrown out of the car. Well, that's a good reason. It's like having a reliable guardian that ensures you stay protected, reducing the risk of serious injuries.

Go ahead, Lori. And secondly, wearing seat belts is the law. Following it helps us contribute to a safer community. The rules are there to protect us and those around us. By using seat belts, we not only safeguard ourselves, but also show responsibility and consideration for others on the road. He loves flowery language.

I understand that sometimes it might feel inconvenient or unnecessary, but it's a small effort that can make a big difference. Let's make a pact to always buckle up when we're in the car. It's a simple act can have a significant impact on our safety and the well-being of everyone on the road. Take care and stay safe. What do you think of that letter?

Audience Member 1: What level was that?

Portia Laferla: What's that? I'm sorry.

Lori Howard: What level is that?

Portia Laferla: Well, we asked for CEFR level two, which would be-- we're looking kind of for an intermediate high. You think an intermediate high student could read that or?

Audience Member 1: Yeah

Portia Laferla: Yeah. That's not bad, right? That's not bad. It's not great, but it's not bad. It's a good starting place, right? There's probably words that I would change in there, maybe some phrases that I would change, but it's certainly easier than starting with a blank Canvas. It's something you can use and edit as opposed to having to start from zero.

OK. Go ahead, Lori. So then we wanted to move it down a level, so we asked it to change it to use vocabulary and grammar at the CEFR level one, and this is what we got. Dear friend, I hope you're doing well. I want to talk about something important-- using seat belts when we're in the car. It's a rule in California and super important for our safety.

First, seat belts keep us safe. If there's an accident, they stop us from getting hurt. It's like a superhero that makes sure we stay in our seats and don't get hurt too much. That changes it up a bit. It made it simpler. Changed it up a bit.

Second, we have to use seat belts because it's the law. The law is like a set of rules to keep us safe. When we wear seat belts, we're doing the right thing and helping everyone stay safe on the road. I know it might feel a bit annoying, but it's a small thing we can do to stay safe.

Let's promise to always wear our seat belts when we're in the car. It's an easy way to make sure we're OK. So if you look at that, what do you think about it? Do you think it-- what do you think about the level? Do you get something an intermediate low student could read, you think?

Audience Member 1: Borderline.

Portia Laferla: Borderline?

Audience Member 1: Yeah.

Portia Laferla: Do you have any ideas about how you might edit a letter like that?

Audience Member 1: Change some of the vocabulary to make it simpler.

Audience Member 4: And make shorter sentences.

Audience Member 1: Yeah.

Portia Laferla: Yeah. Make shorter sentences. Change some of the vocabulary. So we went back in again to make it even lower, and this time we said change the letter to utilize vocabulary and grammar that literacy levels below CEFR could use, and change it to only three paragraphs with simple sentences and no clauses. And this is what we got.

Hi. I hope you're good. Let's talk about something super important-- wearing seat belts when we're in the car. It keeps us safe. Like strong belt that stops us from flying. Why do you have to wear a seat belt? Because it's the law. Big rule to keep everyone safe.

When we wear seat belts, we're doing what we're supposed to. I know it might feel a bit funny, but it's an easy thing to do to keep us safe. Let's promise to always wear our seat belts when we're in the car. It's a simple way to make sure we're OK. And as always, take care and stay safe.

Audience Member 1: European students are higher level than ours.

Portia Laferla: Yeah.

Audience Member 1: That's still way too difficult for a beginning level student.

Portia Laferla: Definitely.

Audience Member 1: Yeah.

Portia Laferla: Definitely.

Lori Howard: But again, in using that, you got it lower so you could use this for an intermediate student or whatever level you thought it was for.

Portia Laferla: And I have a friend who uses ChatGPT all the time to do lessons and he just says things like take it down a level, take it down a level. He just keeps saying that until he gets it where he wants it.

Lori Howard: Simplify.

Portia Laferla: Simplify. Smaller words, shorter sentences. But it's not hard to do because when you put the prompt in, within seconds, you get the result and you like it, you keep it, you don't like it, you just keep asking it questions. So it's kind of fun. OK. Go ahead, Lori.

And so for example, you could edit this by taking out some of the extra words. Taking out the clauses, some of those transition words, shortening the sentences. But again, you're not starting from a blank Canvas. You've got something to go on.

When you write stuff, it's always your voice. This gives it a different voice, something that maybe you wouldn't have come up with that language, but it would be good for the students because they get used to how you talk and your vocabulary and what you write. So it changes it up for them too. I think that's the last one, Lori. OK.

Lori Howard: Thank you so much. Great job. So now we want to go to a practice. Do you want to--

Portia Laferla: Type? you want me to type?

Lori Howard: Sure. If that works for you, that's great. So first, before we do that, we want-- and I know this is probably hard to see and hopefully you have it on your screen, but this is from-- and I guess we can't see it down here, but it's from Susan Gaer. Thank you. Susan Gaer's.

She did a lunch with LAREAC I think it was December. There we go. The New Frontier: Using ChatGPT for Teacher Lesson Support. And we have those resources for you. You should definitely go and watch those lunch with Lareac. Two presentations, I think. The other one is Christy Ray's. I can't remember. It'll be in the last slide.

But here we have Susan Gaer who's spectacular with AI and those other things. December 23. So this came from her. So she said when you're building a prompt, because this is the most important thing you do, what you have to do is build an appropriate prompt so that you get what you want as sooner than we got it, OK?

Because we just started from the air. We didn't know what we were doing. But if you use some of these things, that might help you. And we're going to do this together. So think about it. So, for example, if you're talking about the task, build me a reading lesson on the overuse of plastics, give me a step by step process, build, generate.

So she's saying be very specific, ask for a step by step process if that's what you want. The more specific you are, the better result you'll get. The context, Community college level. We meet two times a week for a 50 minute period. This is a reading class.

I never would have thought to say that, but she thinks that's helpful to her. She's got CEFR level and she used the A1. Yes. So we didn't know that at the time. So A1, A2. Look at the list I put in the earlier slide and see-- or as our colleague here said, pre A1, for example. Maybe that helps. The persona, I'm an ESL teacher who wants to read about the overuse of plastics.

I want a reading that will develop critical thinking skills. I think that's important. Use bullet points if you want that, which again, for our learners, bullet points is going to help them pinpoint the information that's important, right? So if you want your sample to do that, tell it to do it. In a paragraph, write a quiz, multiple choice questions, all the things. You need to tell it exactly what to do and it'll do it for you.

Is it formal, informal or academic? Include an example lesson reference for a framework. So she's not only getting the sample here, but then the instructions on how to teach it. So it's just unbelievable what's in there and what you can get out of it. So let's think about these as we do an example. We're going to do the first one together and then we're going to put you in pairs or small groups to do one yourself.

So let us go to the next slide. That doesn't move. Yeah. At the group, we will create a prompt for the creation of the scenario on the next slide and enter it. We'll revise the prompt as necessary until ChatGPT has created an appropriate scenario. So we're going to do this together.

And so of course, this is going to be our first time. You need to sign in to ChatGPT. [interposing voices] So here's how you access it. You can just Google ChatGPT and it'll come up, but the actual link is chat.openai.com.

Portia Laferla: Lori, I'll sign in after we do the next slide because we can't look at--

Lori Howard: That's right. Or do you want to do it on my computer? Oh yeah, we want to see it. Sorry. Thank you. Too many computers. OK. So you don't need to do that yet, but you're going to do that when you practice it yourself, so that's good. So we're going to do one together. So you can type it in if you want, but we're going to type it in here and you'll see what we get. And then the next one, you'll use your own computer to do that.

OK. I think if we develop the question we're going to ask before opening lines because this is going to disappear. OK. So let's talk about-- so where are we going to write it? Can we maybe put it in the chat document. OK. That's good. But let's-- yeah. Can you put two screens?

Portia Laferla: Let me see if I can.

Lori Howard: And share two things. That's possible.

Portia Laferla: Kind of a newby at this.

Lori Howard: We'll see how incredibly wonderful--

Zoom Administrator: There's a question in the chat if I can roll it back. Once you're happy with the scenario writing a prompt, what's the process of downloading, editing and printing it?

Lori Howard: Just copy and paste. You just go in there with your cursor, copy and paste it to wherever you want it. Into a Word document, into a Google Doc. Yeah. That's how it is right? It's right there for you. So can we do--

Portia Laferla: Let me see if I can do.

Zoom Administrator: One last question. Is there a resource that translates the CEFR to NRS levels?

Lori Howard: So that we haven't found yet. Does anybody know that? So it's a good question for Susan Gear perhaps, but I'm assuming she would have said that in her presentation if she knew that.

Audience Member 5: Just off the top of my head, you might just ask ChatGPT to do sort of a crosswalk analysis of the levels and see what it says.

Portia Laferla: It does seem to recognize things like beginning low ESL though. You could just say that.

Audience Member 5: [interposing voices] around for a while.

Lori Howard: Yeah.

Zoom Administrator: What if you used the grade level equivalent instead of NRS levels?

Lori Howard: Well, We don't use grade levels [interposing voices] we want to do--

Zoom Administrator: But there's correlations though, aren't there? The correlations.

Lori Howard: So it would be good to put in the ELPS levels or the NRS levels. And they're fairly similar, but yes, ChatGPT will give you a correlation. So when I get a chance, I'll type those in and do that. Well, if I do it, I will bring it up at one of the civic network meetings. I think if we all ask that question, I will teach it. So I'm hoping it will teach itself, but it hasn't yet. Anyways--

Portia Laferla: So I'm just going to type in this a little bit.

Lori Howard: Perfect. So we're going to-- so this is a 11 point-- what is it? Can you just show me? It's a culture one. So this is what it says. Write an article comparing cultures. So we want to give a sample article to our students before they have to write their own article, right? So this is the task. Write an article comparing cultures.

The student will write a brief account of his or her own or another cultural background. Number one, describe at least two similarities and two differences between his or her own country's culture or other country's culture and U.S. culture.

So the sample content. Paragraph one is a brief account of education, home and value family life in the student's native country and immigration in the U.S.-- a group emigration to the U.S. Forgive me. Paragraph two: how the students life in the native country is the same or different from life in the U.S., referencing two of the following topics. And those are what they are. So what country would we like our example student to be from?

Audience Member 1: Afghanistan.

Lori Howard: Afghanistan. OK. So we're going to have Afghanistan. And what do you think-- can you start the prompt. What would you say if this is what you want? You want two paragraphs: paragraph one, paragraph two. What would we say?

Audience Member 2: ELS student.

Lori Howard: I'm sorry.

Audience Member 2: I'd tell ChatGPT-- I'd give them the role.

Lori Howard: So you are an ESL student from-- you're an ESL student from Afghanistan. OK. Period.

Audience Member 2: You could probably add a clarifying line.

Lori Howard: OK.

Audience Member 1: You don't know the level. You don't describe the level.

Audience Member 2: Yeah. We probably add a level at the beginning.

Lori Howard: OK. So what do we want to say for the level? So why don't we use the CEFR? So that's the lowest one. We talked about pre A1.

Audience Member 2: I just learned there's CEFR zero.

Lori Howard: Zero. OK. So let's do the CEFR zero. At the CEFR zero level ESL student. OK. What am I going to say now?

Audience Member 1: Please write a brief-- I can't say. I can't write. A brief paragraph about my cultural background.

Lori Howard: My cultural background. Yes and? What else do we want to say?

Audience Member 1: And describe two similarities and two different--

Lori Howard: Before we get to the second paragraph, let's start with the first one. In the first paragraph--

Audience Member 1: Oh, like tell us about education, home and family life.

Lori Howard: OK, good. In the first paragraph. OK. And what do we want to say about immigration to the US and how I emigrated to the U.S.? I wonder how. What do you think? OK. So here we are.

You're a CEFR level 0 student from Afghanistan. Write a short paragraph about my-- so it says my and you were-- I think we need to probably change that. How about your? OK, good. Your background, your cultural background. In the first paragraph, tell about education and family life. We want to say home.

Portia Laferla: I think that home-- I think we got it.

Lori Howard: We probably-- we tend to write a short paragraph and then we said in the first paragraph, do you want to just say a short--

Portia Laferla: OK. So then write about write a short--

Lori Howard: Write a short first half of a short first paragraph you could say a short. First paragraph about-- OK.

Portia Laferla: It does not know what CEFR level 0 is because--

Lori Howard: It doesn't know that? We're going to find these things out when we--

Portia Laferla: I just tried it in Gemini and it knew.

Lori Howard: OK. Well, let's try it. If it doesn't, we'll just keep hitting lower. So write a short first paragraph about your cultural background. Why don't we say including education and family life. Just to have the two things there.

And then is that going to be OK for this? Brief short paragraph in that level. And now let's talk about this. Paragraph 2, how students life in the native country is the same or different from the U.S., referencing two of the following topics. So what would we tell it? Paragraph 2. What do we want it to do?

Portia Laferla: In employment and raising children.

Lori Howard: OK. So in paragraph two, we better say brief again, I would think. Write briefly about--

Audience Member 1: Two similarities or differences.

Lori Howard: OK. About two similarities and differences-- similarities and differences from Afghanistan and the U.S. You are two similarities and two differences. OK. Write two similarities and two differences between the U.S. and Afghanistan in--

Portia Laferla: What did you say the areas were? Sorry. We're implying it.

Lori Howard: Work. Or just let's use one word in work.

Portia Laferla: And did you say raising children?

Lori Howard: And raising children. OK. So let's see if we can make that our prompt bigger now. Can we cover the whole screen and just make it something bigger? Thank you. OK. Great. So why don't we-- can we bring it to the-- there we go. Perfect.

Audience Member 1: Can we put it into the chat thing.

Lori Howard: So what do you think? Now I think you can see that.

Portia Laferla: Starting line?

Lori Howard: Mhm. What we get. OK. So we're going to copy and paste it into ChatGPT. So now we're going to go to ChatGPT. Hopefully we can. Again, this is just our idea and we can fix it if it's not right.

Audience Member 1: Are we using free version or the--

Lori Howard: We're using the free version.

Audience Member 1: Free version.

Lori Howard: Which is acceptable to everyone, and then you can pay-- [interposing voices]

Audience Member 1: I think it's $20.

Lori Howard: $20 a month if you want to pay for it. And what do you get for paying for it? You get extra extensions or something like that. It processes data lot easier. So if you're using it a lot, it might be worth it to do it, but I found that the free version of-- so this is how it looks.

It's a little bit weird because it has all this other stuff, but then at the very bottom, it has this open area. We didn't get to see it. And that's where you put your prompts. I think it said, how can I help you? How can I help you at the bottom. OK. There's all this other stuff that sort of-- it's sort of hard to find at first, but you just put your prompt in there. So let's--

Portia Laferla: I'll just cut and paste it in. Let's see what it does.

Lori Howard: OK.

Portia Laferla: Immediately.

Lori Howard: It took about five seconds.

Portia Laferla: Immediately comes up, hasn't it?

Audience Member 1: That's level zero? I probably couldn't read the level, right?

Lori Howard: Yeah. Maybe. Yeah. So we're going to-- but it gave us something. I come from Afghanistan, a country rich in history and tradition. It has so much information. It doesn't know how to cut it down.

It's very chatty. In my family, education is highly valued and my parents have always emphasized the importance of learning and knowledge. Despite the challenges we face, my parents have worked hard to provide me with opportunities for education.

Family is central to our culture, and we have a close knit bond with extended relatives, often gathering for meals and celebrations. Respect for elders is ingrained in our upbringing and we learn to cherish our traditions and customs. So it's too high. We are-- [muffled voice] But what's good about it?

Audience Member 1: Very explicit.

Lori Howard: Very explicit. Did these things about Afghanistan necessarily? You may or may not. If you've traveled there or you have information about it, but great thing is you can choose a culture that you may not know about and you get all the information. Hopefully it's true. You can't always be sure. So if you have an Afghani student, you might check it with them if you're going to use this example if you don't know if it's true, right? Because it may or may not be true.

I'm sure you all heard about the lawyer who had ChatGPT write his brief and all of the citations were not real cases. Well, guess what? In a law document, they have to be real, right? Because people are going-- that's where the law is located.

So this person just thought it was good, sent it in, and then had a big problem. It's basically malpractice because he hadn't written it himself and he didn't check the citation. So good idea to check it out before you let your students know. Yes.

Audience Member 6: So I was kind of curious to see what would come back because we didn't specify if the student is a male or a female, for example. And so that sentence, education is highly valued, valued in my country, which is beautiful, the reality, though, may not be the same depending on whether you're a male or a female in Afghanistan. That's true, especially in the current political climate. So, yeah. I think--

Portia Laferla: Would you like to see a woman's point of view?

Audience Member 6: Yeah, right. Yeah. So maybe again, maybe that's for further prompting, right? But to your point, right. In this case, I would say the language is very flowery. And yeah, we also value education in the United States I think as well, and yet the reality for people is very different depending on--

Lori Howard: OK. So what did you write?

Portia Laferla: I said rewrite the letter from a female point of view.

Lori Howard: OK. So let's see what it says. Despite the challenges we face, my parents have worked hard to provide me with opportunities for education. It really didn't address that.

Portia Laferla: It does discuss down here that societal norms may limit a woman's participation in certain fields, including education.

Audience Member 6: We're getting at it.

Portia Laferla: Just for funsies, I put a similar chat in Gemini. So Gemini is the Google version of this, and put pre level A1. And it actually wrote it. This is what it wrote. Long trip, very tired. new place, many people, miss family. So it actually-- and then there's a few other. But it wrote it as if it were an pre A1-- you know what I mean? Not for the student, but as if it were the student. Two word sentences. Interesting.

Lori Howard: Very interesting. So can you give us the link for the Google version.

Portia Laferla: It's gemini.google.com.

Lori Howard: Let's put that in the chat. So that's something. And is that a free service?

Portia Laferla: Yes.

Lori Howard: So this is--

Portia Laferla: I learnt about it 24 hours ago.

Lori Howard: OK.

Portia Laferla: [laughter] gemini.google.com. It was borrowed.

Audience Member 1: It was borrowed.

Portia Laferla: It was borrowed. Yeah. They changed the name.

Lori Howard: Yeah. Your district may block it because it's not part of the Google district. It's not part of the core, so you might-- if you get blocked on your work account or device, you might have to try it at home. OK. OK, good.

Portia Laferla: Can I say something, Lori?

Lori Howard: Yes.

Portia Laferla: I kind of don't mind that sometimes you get a level that you don't want because when you're doing your civics, a lot of times, you need a different example for different levels. So if the example you get is too low, you ask it to bring it up.

If the example you get is too high, you ask them to bring it down. So when you're doing it with ChatGPT, I don't know about Gemini, you just get this long continuous scroll of everything that you did. So stuff doesn't go away. So I still have the previous.

Yeah. I thought it was really cool because we could just write, make it simpler and then it simplifies it to level five. If this was level five, it would go to level four. And then we wrote make it even more simpler, and then it went to level three. And then we just kept doing it till it got to the level 1.

Lori Howard: So let's do this one. Also, we need two paragraphs. So can you say do this in two paragraphs and make it much simpler in vocabulary and grammar. See what that is. Whoa. So that's cut-- it was 500 words, now it's 100 words.

Portia Laferla: Changes are super important.

Lori Howard: Really crazy. I'm from Afghanistan where family and school are super important. They love to use super.

Portia Laferla: They have to say that super.

Lori Howard: My mom and dad always tell me how learning is key to success. We are really close to our relatives and enjoy spending time together. Both Afghanistan and the U.S. think working hard is essential, but in the U.S., women can work more easily.

When it comes to raising kids, both places care a lot about education. In Afghanistan, grandparents often help with childcare, while in the U.S., parents usually do it alone. Wow. That really made a big difference. And is this something you might use in your classroom? At what level do you think you would use it for?

Audience Member 1: Maybe a little intermediate or intermediate [muffled voice]

Lori Howard: Intermediate high. So we want to look at the standards to see. I think it's got some pretty big vocabulary words in this. It's essential. Maybe you could change that to important if you didn't feel like it. So I think it could be lower, depending on the sentence length and the clauses, et cetera if we change the vocabulary words.

But anyway, that would be up to you to decide what your students can deal with and the English proficiency standards and common college and career rating standards which we use. Great. OK. Yes, Anthony.

Audience Member 6: OK. So I just had an idea.

Lori Howard: YES.

Audience Member 6: [muffled voice] and all that. I just have an idea. So you're probably not starting your semester or term with El Civics, right? You're working up to Civics, right? [muffled voice] So I wonder if you might pull some student samples and use that as your level, right?

Because then, it'll write it sort of-- you would say, can you write a sample paragraph sort of at the level of these other writings? And then that way, maybe you'll get something close to what's going on at the level that you're teaching in your classroom.

Lori Howard: That's very interesting. Or something that's in your textbook. Match the level of this textbook because we assume that a textbook you're using, you chose at the level of your students or that-- again, we want it to be challenging to students. We always want it to be plus one, right? That they're learning something from it.

I think also in this prompt, we could have said use short sentences, use simple vocabulary. And again, if you add more detail to what you want, then it would have given us something much shorter and simpler as well.