Teaching AI as a Productivity Tool: Practice and Pedagogy

Keith Herndon, Erin Kenney (graduating master's student) and Brittany Adams-Pope (July, 2024). "Teaching AI as a Productivity Tool: Practice and Pedagogy," poster presentation accepted for the annual conference of the Association of Leadership Educators, Minneapolis, MN.

Abstract: This presentation explains a classroom practice that empowers students to deploy artificial intelligence (AI) applications as productivity tools. The practice begins with workshop-style instruction on prompt engineering and ethical considerations followed by an AI awareness assignment in which students select an appropriate AI application, use it to deliver a project and then write reflection essays on their selected tool and the processes they used. While leadership educators must hold students accountable for academic integrity when using AI, this practice emphasizes proactively teaching students effective uses for AI rather than merely addressing it in a negative connation associated with academic dishonesty. Note: This teaching practice and presentation is an outcome of an ongoing collaboration between Grady's Cox Institute for Journalism Innovation, Management and Leadership and UGA's Fanning Institute for Leadership Development.