{"id":1219,"date":"2026-11-10T17:36:14","date_gmt":"2026-11-10T17:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/?p=1219"},"modified":"2026-11-10T17:36:14","modified_gmt":"2026-11-10T17:36:14","slug":"my-first-prompt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/my-first-prompt\/","title":{"rendered":"My first prompt!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conversation with Google Gemini<\/strong><\/h1>\n

I was in an online discusssion recently about the potential implications of generative AI as a tool for supporting professional practice, in this case teaching. I asked a question in the discussion (see below). After the discussion ended I used it as a prompt for Google Gemini. At this stage, I was still in my ‘hands off, I don’t want to get involved in AI mode’ although, through following various feeds, I am aware of the problems and dilemmas that generative AI can bring to the role of educators (the very issues that have made me wary of getting too deeply into AI).<\/p>\n

Here’s the question and below is Gemini’s reply which is both thought provoking (i.e. it’s pretty good!) and worrying (couldn’t have come up with that in less than a minute!). It’s an impressive reponse to a moderately elaborate\u00a0 question. Finally I have succumbed! I am now beguiled by these mysterious beasts.<\/p>\n

If \u2018AI\u2019 can be \u2018trained\u2019 to reproduce realistic conversations, facsimiles of novels, essays, mathematical proofs, images, videos, etc. etc., and if, in this way, AI weakens the centrality of people (you and me) in creating these things, with the consequence that for a great deal of cultural activity the role of people is in some way downgraded or sidelined, then does this not also affect, and sideline, the pivotal role of teachers in planning, constructing, and guiding teaching and learning?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Gemini\u2019s Reply<\/strong>:<\/h2>\n

(For reference here’s a link to the original reply: https:\/\/share.gemini.google\/wxhQIGFlpwzV<\/a>)<\/p>\n

The short answer is yes, it undeniably destabilizes the traditional role of the teacher<\/strong>\u2014for the exact same reason it destabilizes the author, the artist, and the programmer.<\/p>\n

When a technology automates the creation of artifacts (essays, lesson plans, problem sets, rubrics, explanations), any profession whose primary value was bound up in producing those artifacts experiences a crisis of purpose.<\/p>\n

However, the nature of this \u201csidelining\u201d in education is distinct from other cultural domains because of what teaching actually is at its core.<\/p>\n

1. The Dislocation of \u201cTeacher as Content Provider & Planner\u201d<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Historically, a significant portion of a teacher\u2019s authority and labor rested on two pillars:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Curriculum Construction:<\/strong> Designing unit plans, scaffolding assignments, generating practice materials, and writing rubrics.<\/li>\n
  • Knowledge Delivery:<\/strong> Explaining complex concepts, answering foundational questions, and evaluating student output (grading).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    Generative models now perform all of these tasks with remarkable velocity. An AI can instantly draft a differentiated 6-week unit plan on Hamlet, produce tiered math problems for varying skill levels, or provide step-by-step diagnostic feedback on a student\u2019s essay.<\/p>\n

    If teaching is defined primarily as the generation of instructional content and the execution of assessment pipelines<\/strong>, then the teacher\u2019s pivotal role is actively downgraded. The teacher risks becoming a mere middle manager\u2014a human prompt engineer or an administrative monitor enforcing interaction with machine-generated curricula.<\/p>\n

    2. The Devaluation of Student Artifacts<\/strong><\/h4>\n

    The shift goes deeper than teacher workload; it transforms the basic contract of learning.<\/p>\n

    For centuries, education relied on the proxy: \u201cIf you can produce the artifact (the essay, the proof, the project), you have acquired the capability.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Because AI trivializes the production of the artifact, that proxy breaks. When the artifact is decoupled from the cognitive labor of the student, the teacher\u2019s role as an evaluator of finished work becomes largely obsolete or untrustworthy. Grading a take-home essay is no longer evaluating a mind; it is often evaluating an algorithm or an editing process.<\/p>\n

    3. Where the Pivot Must Shift: The Resistance of the Relational<\/strong><\/h4>\n

    This raises a crucial question: Is the artifact the point, or is the process the point?<\/p>\n

    In art and literature, the sidelining of human creators happens because consumers often care only about the final product (the image, the track, the text). But education is not a product-delivery system; it is a process of human transformation.<\/p>\n

    If teachers are sidelined, it is usually because education systems have treated them as content delivery mechanisms rather than relational mentors. Where AI cannot easily supplant the teacher is in the territory that technology historically ignores:<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
    THE SHIFT IN THE ROLE OF THE TEACHER<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n
    TRADITIONAL ARCHETYPE<\/td>\nEMERGING ARCHETYPE<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    Content Generator<\/td>\nCurator of Friction<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    Evaluator of Products<\/td>\nWitness to Process<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    Source of Knowledge<\/td>\nAnchor of Accountability<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    Asynchronous Grader<\/td>\nReal-time Dialogue Partner<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n
      \n
    • Curating Productive Friction:<\/strong> AI minimizes friction, offering instant answers. Learning, however, requires cognitive struggle. The teacher\u2019s role shifts from making things clear to knowing when to make things difficult\u2014introducing boundary conditions, counterexamples, and real-world stakes that force genuine thinking.<\/li>\n
    • Evaluating the Live Mind:<\/strong> As static homework artifacts lose diagnostic value, teaching must return to Socratic oral defense, real-time problem-solving, physical laboratory work, and collaborative discussion\u2014spaces where human presence and live reasoning are observed directly.<\/li>\n
    • Social and Epistemic Trust:<\/strong> Motivation in learning is heavily social. Students rarely push through deep intellectual discomfort for a software interface alone; they do it within a community, spurred by human recognition, accountability, and mentorship.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      The Core PradOX<\/strong><\/h4>\n

      The danger is not that AI is incapable of teaching skills, but that educational institutions\u2014driven by cost, scale, and efficiency\u2014will mistake the automated production of instructional materials for the act of education itself.<\/p>\n

      If education is reduced to data transfer and artifact verification, teachers will indeed be sidelined into technicians supervising software. Preserving the pivotal role of the teacher requires explicitly redefining teaching away from content production<\/strong> and back toward the human practice of intellectual formation<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

      * END *<\/strong><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      In an online discusssion about the potential implications of generative AI as a tool for supporting professional practice, in this case teaching. I contribued a long, ‘discuss this’ question. I subsequently fed it to Google Gemini. My first time! Read the result. Couldn’t have put it better myself!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federated","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[29,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ai_etc","category-edtech"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1219"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1235,"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219\/revisions\/1235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brevities.harddfan.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}