Build Momentum - Thought Leadership for Education, Global Workforce Edition

S03E15 - AI: Are we Asking the Right Questions? | Ben Farrell

April 06, 2023 Sarah Williamson and Katie Lash / Ben Farrell Season 3 Episode 15
Build Momentum - Thought Leadership for Education, Global Workforce Edition
S03E15 - AI: Are we Asking the Right Questions? | Ben Farrell
Show Notes Transcript

On this episode of Build Momentum, Sarah and Katie are joined by Ben Farrell, the Assistant Head of School and Director of the Upper School at the New England Innovation Academy. Prior to joining NEIA, Ben was the Principal and Head of School at The International Montessori School of Beijing. Ben received his M.A. in higher and post-secondary education from Teachers College, Columbia University in New York, and completed graduate coursework in cross cultural conflict transformation and reconciliation at the School for International Training in Vermont.

Some Questions We Ask:

  • How can teachers effectively use artificial intelligence in the classroom? (00:43)
  • What are some of the challenges utilizing AI and how can they be addressed in the classroom? (03:37)
  • What are some ways that you see projects being managed with AI? (05:14)
  • How do you think administrators (maybe even PR firm owners!) can take advantage of AI? (8:07)
  • What other ways do you see generative AI integrating into the curriculum? (11:17)
  • How can teachers and school leaders navigate AI conversations with their communities? (14:10)

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

  • About the use of AI in classrooms (00:50)
  • Challenges of utilizing AI (03:45)
  • Ideas for differentiated learning with generative AI (05:44)
  • AI use beyond education (08:24)
  • Other integration of generative AI into the curriculum (12:13)
  • Tips for having AI conversations in the community (14:51)

Quotes:

“All the information in the world is just out there waiting for us to find it and to utilize it..”

“This is going to be with us in the future. So I think we have to find ways to not only live with it but utilize it in an ethical, thoughtful way that our students can grab onto because they're going to be using this or some more advanced version of this the rest of their lives now.”

“For the first time in my career, I had the ability to sort of sit with my Upper School students and say, ‘What should we do? What do you think we should do?’ And I think they were taken aback by that.”

Connect with Tom:
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Ben Farrell’s LinkedIn


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SWPR GROUP Website
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Stay in touch with Chad Bolser:
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About "The Secret to Transformational Leadership," which Sarah co-authored with Dr. Quintin Shepherd:
Transformational Leadership Secret website
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Sarah Williamson:

Hello, and welcome to build momentum, a show where we explore thought leadership and education. I'm Sarah Williamson, the founder of SWPR Group.

Katie Lash:

And I'm Katie lash, the director of the East Central Educational Service Center. Together, we explore how to leverage key partners, your constituencies, and immediate to authentically impact your organizations and the leaders who champion them. We can't wait to get started. So let's dive into today's show.

Sarah Williamson:

On today's episode of build momentum, we have Ben Farrell, the assistant head of school at New England Innovation Academy. Welcome, Ben,

Ben Farrell:

Thank you so much. So great to be here with both of

Katie Lash:

All right. So let's get started then tell us in your you. opinion, how did teachers, How can teachers effectively use AI in the classroom?

Ben Farrell:

Yeah, well, that is? That's a wonderful question. And it's a bit daunting, I think for everybody, because it feels like for many of us, Chat GPT and other generative AI just showed up in October, you know, wasn't really paying attention to it. And all of a sudden, it was everywhere. And then it was here. And then what did we do? And, you know, I think if I go just high level for a moment, one of the things in my career that I've always aspired to, is to find innovative and thoughtful solutions to challenging problems. I think we all want to do that. And, you know, I chose when I was looking for I was a former head of school in Beijing these last couple of years during COVID. And as I was looking to come back to the States, I found this really unique opportunity here at NEIA New England Innovation Academy. And I thought, okay, it's a new school, it's got innovation in the title, this seems like it could be a good match for what I want to do this kind of stage of my career. And it's proven to be that, you know, it's this place where we have these amazing students and families, but we have our staff and our faculty, our teachers, and the whole team is dedicated to providing a type of education that we believe the world needs. And that is a way in really partnering with our students as best we can in thoughtful ways so that when you know Chat GPT and generative AI just showed up. It was for the first time in my career, I had the ability to sort of sit with my upper school students and say, What should we do? What do you think we should do? And I think they were taken aback by that. The candor of the conversation, and I know, that's a freedom that not everybody has. And I'm really proud of that. But it was amazing to see sort of the breadth of the conversation, because I think it encompasses all of the wisdom that we need. And some of them you could see it in their faces. They're like, Oh, wait, he knows about it now. Oh, no. Okay, so I need to straighten up and sit right. He knows about that. And they've been using it I thought no one would know. And but that was a smaller groupings minority. We had if we think of like a bowling alley, the bumpers were, we had one of our students, a junior said that she felt this was a death of original thought. And so that was one side. And then we had another side of this idea that, could we use it, but let's use it in a thoughtful way. It's do it. I don't want to use it. We know we shouldn't use it to write a paper for us. You know, right. 800 word essay on Hamlet. That doesn't sound like he came from Chat GPT. They thought it was I would love to use it in a way where can help me generate ideas. And then I have one of my students just kind of quietly say, it can teach us to ask better questions. And I think that was the thing that really got me, because that's what we all need to do now. All the information in the world is just out there waiting for us to find it and to utilize it. And the teachers ask further questions. You know, as I thought about kind of all of this, in that room that day, we had a lot of, I think the main parts of the conversation.

Sarah Williamson:

That's really exceptional. I love that. And I love thinking about it that way. Because we tend to hear a lot in education about all the negative aspects of Chat GPT,

Ben Farrell:

Of course, of course.

Sarah Williamson:

So I'm curious if when you were in the classroom talking with your kids, if you talked about some of the challenges and how you plan to address those in the classroom? Yeah, I think it's evolving. You know, it was interesting,

Katie Lash:

I love reflecting my husband and I were actually talking about how remember like Ask Jeeves remember when that because another one of my students and I, we were talking about, he's somebody who's very up on technology, and he kind of was a thing? like, and so when you very first could start like

Ben Farrell:

Yeah, pulled me aside and said, Hey, man, listen, listen, there's more coming. There's more of this coming. So you should, whatever. And we know that the second we put pen to paper and put it into the handbook and everything, we're already about seven, eight months a year behind. So there was this really thoughtful approach coming from another student saying, why asking your phone questions, you could text that number however it worked, right? And then now like, we can't even picture not don't you have a modular approach that what is Neos having Google for anything. But I love what you said there been that, like, it challenges us now we have to ask better questions, response to disruptive and new technologies, and I thought that because just the Google questions are, I mean, that's been at our fingertips a long time. But yeah, that's really reflective. So tell us, what are some ways that you see project was also really amazing, and coming right from the student managing with AI? Yeah, well, I think that's gonna be the trick, because it can lead to potentially a lot of different steps. I don't want to say extra work, but different steps. And body. So we've made it clear here that you can't and it's not what I certainly grew up with, you know, I'm not going to kind of give you a sense of where I kind of enter into the internet in my life. But yes, you know, I think it would be different steps for us. So I can foresee in a classroom and things like, our expectation and nor, And they are not allowed to just go for instance, here at NEIA, one of the ways we've been utilizing it is analyzing an essay. So you ask it to ask Chat GPT or one of the generative AI platforms to write an essay and then sort of and have their homework paper or whatever written by that. And deconstruct that in the classroom and see what it looks like. Because that's a fairly basic way. You know, one of the ways that I am really excited about this, and this comes from like a deeply personal spot, as somebody who had some disordered just like we would with anything, if a student was learning that really affected me, and like my grammar and math, but really, in grammar, I had always wanted to write writing was a real passion of mine. But then as I got older, I plagiarizing, we would take the appropriate actions. But we're started to feel like I couldn't do it, I wasn't good enough. And, you know, I wasn't in the place where I was getting a lot of support. And then when I went off to college, and I did, I actually had quite a bit of shame and worry around that by not over responding to this because I think this is an going to the writers center and asking for help. So always feeling a little less than, and I can think, and I've gone on to write a book. And I can imagine as I was writing, even that inflection point for all of us and where we go with it. This is book, in my 30s, how great it would have been to have sort of like a bit of an AI partner, where I could ask questions, understand, look at it, reflect on my own writing, and then come back to it not have it right for me, but sort of see where I this going to be with us in the future. It's only going to mean could go, because I did a lot of that, you know, through Google and through different search engines, and just trying to figure all that out. So I can see how that would be a place. And also the idea where we can maybe this is a way I don't even we got to GPT for what felt like two weeks and that's even think maybe I think it's going to happen. This is a way we can invite more of our students into the conversation, who do have some challenges in the way sort of disordered working, learning further along the road. So I think we have to find ways to whatever it might be, or ways that they learned that a differentiated, say, this might be a way where they can get their voices heard in a whole different kind of way. I've seen not only live with it, but utilize it in an ethical, some of our students who might have some challenges in their writing might be dyslexic, that type of thing, that this is a way they can step into the conversation. And I had this wonderful conversation in passing with our head of thoughtful way that our students can grab onto and because teaching and learning. And we both kind of came to that place at our own at the same time on our own. And we thought, Oh, my goodness, this is game changing for us. So anyway, I think there's a lot of ways we can step into this and not have the they're going to be using this the rest of their lives now, or skies falling. But this is how we can have more of our students get involved.

Sarah Williamson:

Yeah, that's great. And I'm so curious, even just beyond students, how do you think some administrators can some version more advanced version of this. take advantage of using AI? And maybe even PR firm owners? I might just throw that in there. Have you think we might take advantage?

Ben Farrell:

Yeah, I mean, I've tried it out. And I've used it. And there was a task, where I was kind of pulling in multiple different places, or different thoughts from kind of multiple different documents. And what would normally have taken me, I don't know, 35-30-45 minutes, took me about 10. And that was in that exact very mundane task, it was so shocking for me quickly, I got it done. And I started looking around like, did I Is anybody noticing this, that I do something wrong, but in fact, that was my own voice. But it was able to collate in a way and put some thoughts together, that was really helpful. And I think there are ways this is going to change what we do very quickly. And I go back to what one of our students said too, is that we don't want to lose our own original thought. And that actually, AI might make us more human in the way that we communicate with each other. Because maybe one day, it'll get there, we can totally mimic this conversation here and the emotion that we see, or when we're in person, you know, I use my hands a lot when I'm talking. But I think we have to work on that. And this is something well, you know, that our in person conversational skills, and the way that we talk to each other will actually be sharpened in a really positive way in a different way than and something we'll have to work on a different type of way. And that also came from one of my students do so it was this really thoughtful conversation. Anyway, so I can imagine, but in the PR firm, there might be a lot of ways you can utilize this. That would cut down some of your time and everything else you got going on.

Sarah Williamson:

Yeah, it's very tempting the thought of using it to ghostwrite a bunch of articles. That'd be awesome, but probably not ethical. I'm not doing that. No one's doing that. Are you looking to build brand awareness and expand your impact? As an organization, but maybe you're struggling to find the ROI with your general marketing and PR efforts, it could be time to try something a little different. At SWPR group, we approach every organization through the lens of how we can help them add the most value to the conversations that are happening in education today for one of our clients, the Institute for Education innovation, this led to the launch of Supe's Choice, an award that we co created to build incredible brand awareness and his firmly established organization as an industry leader driving impact growth and awareness on every level. What will your success story be? Let me know when you're ready to get started. Reach out at Sarah with an H sarah@swpr-group.com. We look forward to hearing from you.

Katie Lash:

I did see a tiktok the other day about how the SEO I don't really understand this part. Probably some of our like hyper technology friends that listen to this podcast would know. But the SEO can tell what is through Chat GPT. So for if you're a PR firm, then you probably don't want that. Because you really make

Sarah Williamson:

that difficult decision. And if your comment, that's really not a good thing, not a good book.

Katie Lash:

But even if it's like, I mean, everybody's on the same page, like yeah, let's use it. Let's go all the way. I think my neck at the viewership that you seek to find, but I'm sure that they'll be somebody to address that too. But okay, so two parts of a question. Here been one thing I think about when I had a building of my own when I was administrator, I think about how I would coach teachers through the curriculum and instruction and like one thing that comes to mind, is that like, any good assessment, in my opinion, any good assessments not treatable, anyway. Right. So if you're having a kiddo go through the writing process, like using Chat, GPT the whole the whole way, seems like a fantastic tool to like, help a student go through the writing process. So instead of like saying, don't use it, and we're going to try to protect you from it. Let's step you all the way through it. But that came up for me what other things do you see it actually integrating into curriculum? Like on purpose?

Ben Farrell:

Yeah, that's a great question. You know, I've learned a lot from we have a wonderful Learning Support Coordinator here at NEIA and her push, and to kind of push all of us into thinking about ways that we scaffold better for students and that we, you know, kind of really clearly lay things out, let them see it ahead of time, understand where they're going, understand why they're going there and kind of do this in person. If I pull back, I'm just thinking about, I look at what our kids have gone through in these last couple of years, and some of this big chunk of stuff that they've missed, because we were online for so long. And I can see how the scaffolding and the previewing of this for students, and then also in class has been really helpful. So our Learning Support Coordinator did a phenomenal job of helping all of us kind of come back to that. And I, to your point, I do see Kenny, that this is a way that if it's a part of the process all the way through, and that instead of saying no, you can't do it, and we hide it, and it's sort of the kids are looking over their shoulder as opposed to No, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna take a screenshot of it, you can see where there's a timestamp. And we do this as part of the class, it's part of what we're doing. It could be really helpful in as we generate ideas, and that as long as the teacher to your point sees it all the way through, there's nothing to hide there. There's nothing to cheat on. And you know, if I go back to Sarah, one of the things you were saying as well around, you can't just have a ghost write everything. I still think our voices are so important in this. And I've, as I've begun to learn more on all this, the idea of like collective intelligence, not artificial, not just human collective intelligence, you can get to some really interesting and wonderful ideas there. And if we think of this as a tool to support learning, and we scaffold and preview and lay it all out for students, and that does take a lot of time, and it does, but that also for me, it takes it's going to be different. But I think you have to be flexible. And if you're flexible with it, I think there's a lot of good that can come out of it.

Sarah Williamson:

Yeah, it's gonna be so interesting to see Katie go,

Katie Lash:

I've got one more juicy question here. So I referenced tiktok. And we won't go down the tiktok route right now. But along the same lines of that type of controversy, AI in the classroom can be controversial, right? We I live in a community in which I think that people probably aren't, well, first off, I would guess that there's still like a lot of lack of awareness of even Chat GPT for that matter, but furthermore, probably in an area that will be slower to adopt. And so I share that to say how could teachers and school leaders have conversations with their communities because with especially those who have strong opinions that we should not be touching this stuff, right. How can we navigate that?

Ben Farrell:

I appreciate that question. Because as I said earlier, that I know that right now, I have the freedom in my school to do this and not everyone does that. And so there's no casting any stones here, I think we all have to come to this in our own time. And I do think that eventually we will all get there. And, you know, I know everyone's drawn parallels to spellcheck and you know, Grammarly and all this other stuff. And those have become tools that we use. And I think we just in whatever way, and whatever school system district area we're in, in the country and around the world, we have to come to this in the ways that makes sense in that community. And I know that what I'm doing here at one of my previous schools, I wouldn't have been able to do and that's an amazing school, there's nothing wrong with that, this probably would have been different had I still been in China, when this was coming up in different ways. So I totally understand that. I just think, and this is, hopefully my turn, I'm not passing the buck on this. But it's got to be manageable in your community, and all of us know our community as well. And we have to manage that in a way that makes sense and help, because I think you have a really good point, Katie. I'm thinking about this all the time. Many other people might not have thought about it at all, it might not come though in the day to day, and it is scary, and it is overwhelming. And this again, doesn't. It just showed up one day, and all of a sudden was sitting in the front, like knock on the window and be like, Hey, I'm here. What did we do? It was like we had to figure it out. And anyway, so I think it just it's gonna take time, and it will feel slow, because this is already iterated multiple times since it started in,(inaudible) like the fall. So it's interesting just to see how it goes throughout the country. And I respect that.

Katie Lash:

Yeah, someone should study like the adoption of Chat GPT in different parts of the country. And like, the pace of that, and then like, that brings me to an interesting equity issue, right? If if this tool can really just accelerate learning at such a pace that I think it has the potential to do so then those who are slow to adopt are going to be quite frankly, behind the eight ball. That's gonna be interesting to watch.

Ben Farrell:

Yeah, I mean, that was one of the conversations we had here was around with our senior administrative team, or senior leadership team, excuse me, was that, you know, we can't hear I mean, again, this is casting no stones anywhere. But you can't ban this. Because if students are going to use it, they're going to use it, they'll get a VPN, they'll get on their phone, that whatever. Just like if a student is going to plagerize, they're going to make a mistake, make a challenging decision, they're going to do it. So that's part of our job as educators to help them through those moments. So our thought was just that Katie was it's, it's coming, it's you're starting to come into here now. And so we should ethically and thoughtfully work with it now, because the students are going to be doing this. And, you know, it's interesting, because one of the things that I feel really strongly about and what we're going to be doing here, in our little area of Marlborough, Massachusetts, where our school is about 45 minutes outside of Boston, where you know, boarding and day school here. So really interesting community, because we're going to be working with some of the other schools in the area, because we've read all read these position papers from amazing institutes and universities around the world. But I really want to know, what are the students? You know, what are people who are going to be using this their entire lives that are coming up with this? So we're gonna get them get some students together here on campus and have them write their own position paper, I'm really interested to see what they think because, you know, just like I thought I knew it was going to happen in the room that day, I think it's going to be thoughtful, and expansive view that maybe we're not thinking about, from where I sit. So it's, I'm excited to see where it goes, because it's already here. And they're already, you know, down the road past me. So we just got to some of it. I just got to keep up a little bit and listen and learn.

Sarah Williamson:

Well, I want to see that paper once it's done. That sounds like a great thought leadership piece.

Ben Farrell:

I'm excited about it. Yeah.

Sarah Williamson:

Yeah. That's awesome.

Katie Lash:

I thought that was fantastic conversation.

Sarah Williamson:

I thought it was too. That was fantastic.

Ben Farrell:

All right. Great.

Sarah Williamson:

Yeah.

Ben Farrell:

Like to to thank you for taking the time.

Sarah Williamson:

I really appreciate it. Ben. That was awesome. Thank you. Keep doing what you're doing. I think it's pretty impressive and inspiring

Ben Farrell:

Thank you very much. Yeah, it's a great, great school. We got here. Great, great space for it. So and let me know if I can do anything else. I'd love to talk. So it was really nice catching up.

Sarah Williamson:

Oh, can you tell our listeners where they can find you?

Ben Farrell:

Yeah, yeah. So again, my name is Ben Farrell Assistant Head of School Director. Member of school here at the New England Innovation Academy. Again, we're just outside of Boston brand new school. This is our kind of second year in operation 18-19 months in. So we are building this brand new school from the ground up international boarding and day school. And our program is built around innovation. Again, it's literally in the title. And we have some really amazing programs around it. We have a required class that they take all yours from grade six to next year, we'll have our first graduating class of grade 12 Innovation Studio, which is around human centered design, which is you know, being entrepreneurial and thinking innovative and you're thinking but to do that with empathy and thoughtfulness for the whatever the end result might be. And I would just add that one of the things that has drawn so many strong educators here is that we believe that this is a place where students don't have to sort of in my world kind of wait their turn like you, when you're 34 years old, and you're now the Project Director of something, then you can go and do it here. We believe that if you've got a good idea, we want to help you, you know, understand how to bring that credit, bring it forward, whatever the idea is, and then go with it. So it's really exciting to see where this is going and where it might go. And you can find us just on the internet at the New England Innovation Academy, and anybody who wants to talk, we're really open to talking to everybody. So this is exciting just to be here speaking with both of you.

Sarah Williamson:

Fantastic. Thank you so much, Ben. Appreciate it.

Ben Farrell:

Thank you have a great rest of your day.

Sarah Williamson:

You too. If you're looking for more of this thought leadership goodness for your organization, you're in the right place. Visit us at SWPR-group.com To learn more about how we work with education organizations and their leaders, superintendents and influencers to increase your impact. Again, that's SWPR-group.com. Thanks for tuning in today and we will see you next time on Build Momentum.