[jdshaffer]

I've been trying to figure out how to avoid AI fraud in my classes, like many others. While not perfect, I've written down my thoughts and attempts in the hope it might help someone else:

https://web.hedc.shizuoka.ac.jp/msg-from-center/creating-mea...

Edit: Didn't realize the original URL was paywalled. Sorry. This newer URL is open. Apologies.

[randunel]

Nice way to paywall a comment on HN.

[jdshaffer]

Is it paywalled? I honestly didn't realize that. Sorry. I'll edit the comment and change to an open URL and paste the two main ideas here:

FORCED SKILL-BUILDING GOALS

Where my original purpose of giving homework assignments was to help students build their skills through active engagement, I can no longer trust that all my students will have done it by hand. But I still want my students to feel the need to improve their skills. So, I start by considering which skills I think are most important for that class (writing, for example) and build a forced need for my students to improve that skill. For example, in my writing-focused classes, I now give students in-class hand-written exams. I let them know about the essay-based tests (mid-term and final) on the first day of class and encourage them to practice their writing each week, in-class and at home, thus giving them a very clear reason to practice — to get a good grade. Additionally, I take away the need to get a “good grade” on written homework by giving them full points if the homework is turned in on time, regardless of contents or mistakes. Thus, with the need to practice their writing skills for exams and no need to worry about making a good grade on homework assignments, students are encouraged to try the homework themselves — they cannot fail and they can only benefit by doing it themselves. In fact, using an LLM to complete an assignment will likely hurt them as other students who improved their skills will do better on the exams.

Homework once again can be used as a tool for them to improve their abilities through engagement, not just a pointless activity that an LLM can do to help them “get a good grade”.

FORCED LLM FRICTION

Another method I have found for encouraging students to complete assignments on their own is to purposely create friction to using an LLM. I try to plan assignments that it would be MORE work to use an LLM than to simply do it themselves. Humans being what we are, we often will choose the path of least resistance, especially if a grade is on the line!

For example, in one of my classes, I have students write a short story for homework (of about 250 words) about a picture I show them in class. Spelling and grammar mistakes are OK, they are guaranteed to get full marks if they turn it in on time, but the story has to be written BY HAND. To use an LLM, a student would first have to write a lengthy prompt describing the picture in detail and explain the type of output they need (a lot of work), and then they would still have to rewrite the entire story by hand (forcing them to focus on reading, spelling, and handwriting anyway). Thus, by introducing forced friction to using an LLM, especially where there is no danger (no friction) of getting a bad score because of mistakes, encourages students to take the easier path — just do it themselves.

The same idea also applies to shorter listening assignments. As long as the homework receives full marks for turning it in on time (low friction against the fear of poor ability) and the exams including a listening element (clear purpose for trying), the hassle of downloading the audio, sending it to an AI to transcribe it, then upload pictures of the homework questions just isn’t worth it. It’s just easier and more beneficial for students to do it themselves.

[davidgay]

For homework: if you make homework results not count towards the final grade, then there's no reason to use an LLM - the point then just becomes to have practice problems and feedback on how well you are doing.

This is what my university (EPFL) was doing ~40 years ago. And yes, some students didn't bother with the homework, and mostly paid the price at the final exam...

[jdshaffer]

Yes. I've tinkered with the idea of non-graded homework, too.

Unfortunately, if I give homework that will not be graded, almost no one will do it. But I WANT them to do it for the practice it gives them.

The only reasonable answer I could find is to award them full points for simply doing the homework on time, even if it has errors.

[nneonneo]

Worth pointing out - modern multimodal LLMs (properly called VLMs, etc.) can easily take pictures as input and describe them in text. In fact, the CLIP model - one of the predecessors of modern VLMs - is entirely designed around being able to caption images with text.

That said - requiring students to hand-write answers is reasonably effective. It's a lot more boring to hand-copy text out of an LLM answer than write it yourself, and it makes the "cheating" significantly more visceral.

[jdshaffer]

I considered that... and in the "worst comes to worse" scenario where they decide to use an LLM and re-write everything by hand, I'm still hoping they'll learn SOMETHING during the copying process... kind of like the old time "copy books" that were once used.