< AI Ethics

Lesson 2: Societal Impact of Generative AI

60 minutes

Overview

Students explore the impact of generative AI by participating in a collaborative game. They start by watching a video introducing how large language models work, like chatbots or generative images. Then, students take on a persona of someone impacted by generative AI to read a few articles and react in-character. Then, students form groups and are given a scenario involving their persona and generative AI. Working together, they come up with guidelines for how generative AI should be implemented in this scenario that includes the voices and perspectives of all stakeholders. Finally, students share their results with the class and reflect on this process.

CSTA K-12 Computer Science Standards (2017)
    • 2-IC-20 - Compare tradeoffs associated with computing technologies that affect people's everyday activities and career options.
    • 2-IC-21 - Discuss issues of bias and accessibility in the design of existing technologies.

Agenda

Preparation

  • Review the slide deck and student resources
  • Review the research topics and decide if you would like to remove / add any topics
  • Decide how you would like to structure how students access resources (what is printed vs what is distributed digitally)
  • Decide how you will facilitate students working individually while researching and then moving into groups for discussion

Links

Heads Up! Please make a copy of any documents you plan to share with students.

For the teachers
For the students

Vocabulary

  • Generative AI - A type of Artificial Intelligence (AI) that uses patterns from existing content to create new content, such as new text or new images.

Teaching Guide

Before the Lesson

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View the Resources: This lesson plan comes with a slide deck and additional resources, found in the Links section of the lesson plan. Each bolded line in the lesson plan usually corresponds to a slide in the slide deck. It can be helpful to have the slides and student resources open while reading the lesson plan, as there are visuals and additional information not always represented in the lesson plan.

Supports for Teachers: You can learn more about bringing AI lessons to your classroom through our AI 101 for Teachers series. AI 101 for Teachers is a free, foundational online professional learning series for any teacher and educator interested in the groundbreaking world of artificial intelligence (AI) and its transformative potential in education.

Preparing to Teach a Lesson on AI Impact & Bias

Checking Resources: Students will be researching different topics related to Artificial Intelligence. Research areas are included in this handout: Generative AI News Articles. We haven't provided these directly to students because sometimes these sites are blocked by district filtering programs, or the latest news-worthy innovation may not be middle-school appropriate. We strongly suggest you check each site for appropriateness of content and to make sure it will load on classroom computers before sharing it with students. You are also welcome to curate your own news sources based on current events or issues in your state or community.

LEADERS Framework: This lesson allows students to explore the societal impacts of artificial intelligence on society, both the intentional solutions that can be beneficial to society and the unintended consequences that may be harmful to society. Issues of bias in artificial intelligence may come up in research material and class discussion.

To help prepare for these moments, we recommend reviewing the LEADERS Framework for facilitating lessons and discussions involving the societal effects of AI, including bias and ethical considerations. Not all of the tenets are applicable to every lesson, but many of the teaching tips and discussion goals in this lesson follow the principles outlined in this framework.

Warm Up (10 minutes)

Vocabulary: Display the slide with the following vocabulary and prompt on it:

  • Generative AI - A type of Artificial Intelligence (AI) that uses patterns from existing content to create new content, such as new text or new images.

Prompt: Have you seen AI-generated text before? Or AI-generated images? What's one example you've seen in your life or in the media?

Discussion Goal: This is meant to be a low-stakes brainstorm about different ways students have experienced AI-generated content before. Encourage students to share with a neighbor before sharing with the class. Students only need to share a few examples before the lesson can continue. This prompt assumes students are at least aware of AI-generated content - if not, see the teaching tip below for some alternative options.

Teaching Tip

Giving Students Context: If student responses indicate that some students have never heard of AI generated content before, consider finding a way to show the entire class a demonstration or example of AI generated art. If you decide to follow these options, we highly recommend vetting these examples before showing your class.

  • Option 1 - Demonstration. You could open an AI Chatbot, such as ChatGPT or Bing AI, and show students how it works and give it some creative and silly prompts. You could also do this with an AI image generator, such as DALL-E or Midjourney. Double-check these links are available through your school's network.
  • Option 2 - A Video. Consider showing a video of someone using an AI-generation tool, such as ChatGPT or Midjourney. Choose a video where students can still see how the technology works and it's potential.

Remarks

Generative AI is a new technology that will have a significant impact on our society. But like all new technology, it has some issues and concerns that people are working on solving. Today - we're going to learn how Generative AI technology works, then learn more about some of the current issues with generative AI and how we can work together to solve them.

Video: Show students the How AI Works: Large Language Models video

Remarks

Now that we know a bit more about how this technology works, we can start to think about its impact on society. As we saw towards the end of the video, there are still issues with these models, like misinformation and bias, that teams are working on improving. Let's learn a bit more about some of these issues by taking on different personas of people affected by these issues.

Activity (45 minutes)

Collaborative Game

Teaching Tip

Preparing for the Activity: This activity has several components that, when reading the lesson plan linearly, can be difficult to see how they all fit together. Here's the big picture behind this activity:

  • Students are participating in a collaborative game, where each person takes on a specific role or persona and they all have to work together to "win" against the scenario set out by the game. This is similar in spirit to board games like Pandemic or Forbidden Island
  • Students will be in groups of 4, where all four people have taken on a persona related to a specific scenario. Their goal will be to work together to come up with guidelines for Generative AI that try to satisfy the needs and goals of everyone in the group.
    • For example: an actor, a producer, an audience member, and a costume designer must work together to come up with guidelines for use of Generative AI in movie productions.
  • Each student has a particular persona they can embody on a Character Card. These cards include some baseline information about how this person might feel about generative AI, along with some news articles that students read and react to as this character.

Even though the ultimate goal is to be in a group as a character solving a problem, the lesson plan introduces these steps in stages rather than explaining the full game all-at-once. First students are introduced to their character and read their news articles. Once they understand their character, then they form their groups and are given their scenario. And once they understand their scenario, they can begin the collaborative game of coming up with guidelines for generative AI.

Distribute: Distribute a Character Card for each student. You may decide to distribute these randomly, or pre-select roles for certain students based on their interests, or have students self-select which character they would like. Here are a few options for how to handle the logistics of distributing these:

  • Option 1 - Print Physical Copies: Use the Character Cards (All In One Doc) resource to print out all of the character cards, then distribute them to each student. Students can complete any work on these cards on-paper, and then use the Generative AI News Articles resource to read their articles digitally.
  • Option 2 - Provide Digital Copies: Use the Character Card (Spread Over Individual Docs) Google Drive folder to make copies of individual Character Cards and distribute them digitally to students so each student only has their character card, which they can also use to read their articles.

Remarks

Each one of you will now take on the persona of someone affected by generative AI. This person has a unique perspective on how generative AI could be helpful or harmful for them. To better understand their perspective and embody this persona, we're going to read a bit about them and add a few more details to the character card. Then, we're going to read some of the same articles they've been reading that are influencing their thoughts and opinions.

Teaching Tip

Embrace the Persona: Encourage students to really take on the persona of their character. In the Character Cards, they can give their character a name and some backstory. The students will be communicating with their group as if they really are this character stakeholder. Encourage them to think like their character would about the problem.

Do This: Read through the card individually. The card also has a few blank spaces - you can fill these in with additional information about your fake character to make them your own!

Circulate: Monitor students as they read through their character persona. At this point, students are only getting familiar with their character - they do not need to start reading the articles on the bottom of the card yet

Do This: Read through the articles on the bottom of the card as if you were this character. Think about how they would react to what is happening in these articles. Think about how they would feel about what's happening - are there things happening that would benefit them? Or that would concern them? On the bottom of your character card, respond to the articles in character.

(Optional) Distribute: Digitally distribute the Generative AI News Articles resource, which is a complete list of all the articles that different groups are reading. Students can quickly identify which articles to read by the Group Letter on their character sheet. Students can use this resource to click into each link and read it for easy access. This is an especially good option if you decided to physically distribute the character cards.

Circulate: Monitor students as they read through the articles. As they begin answering questions, remind them that they are acting in-character. You may even encourage them to speak to you as if they were that character, acting out how they feel about these articles.

Regroup: Once students have had a chance to reflect in character, regroup the class to continue to the next part of the activity.

Display: Display the slide with a visual explanation for the next part of the activity

Remarks

Now that you're familiar with this person, here's the next step: each of you has been invited to a meeting at a big company to discuss how generative AI will be used in that company. Working together, you and three other people will need to come up with guidelines for how to use generative AI in a way that has the most benefit and the least amount of harm. The key to developing good guidelines is making sure each person's voice and perspective is represented in the decisions you make.

Distribute: Hand out the Generative AI Activity Instructions resource to each student.

Do This: Read the first page as a class so students understand the instructions. Emphasize that the goals is not to argue or have a debate, but instead to try and work together to find common ground. It's okay to disagree, but students should use that the find common ground that includes all perspectives rather than invalidate or dismiss a point of view.

Group: Have students find their group by matching the letter in the corner of their character sheet.

Distribute: Once students are in their groups, pass out the corresponding Group Scenarios to each group.

If a group is missing a person, distribute the Character Card for that person so the group can still advocate on behalf of this person's interests and concerns.

Do This: Have students follow the steps on their instruction sheet and discuss as a group what their recommendations should be, taking into account the different needs of each person.

Teaching Tip

Differentiation Options: As a way to differentiate how students perform this task, consider two possible adaptations for how students create their recommendations:

  • Create a Comic Strip / Movie Script: Students can work individually to create an artistic representation of what this discussion would look like as the team comes up with their generative AI recommendations. This still lets students think through the push-and-pull of a collaborative decision, but can be accomplished individually
  • Act out a Skit: Students work in their group to come up with a skit that acts out the process of coming up with their generative AI recommendations. This still lets students engage in the push-and-pull of a collaborative decision, but ups the ante to a more performative or exaggerated presentation of their solution.

Circulate: Monitor students as they have their discussions and come up with their recommendations.

Share Out: Have groups share out their scenario and the guidelines they created, especially since each group had a different scenario and read a different set of articles. Groups should share what their problem was, what their biggest challenges were, and the organization rules they came up with!

Teaching Tip

Extending Impact: Students may feel passionately about the pros and cons of generative AI, with some students more impacted than others. Remind students that these are current issues which have yet to be resolved, and that their opinions matter. You may want to offer an option for students to write to their legislators about what they learned.

Wrap Up (5 minutes)

Prompt: Choose 2-3 prompts below to have students reflect on their experiences:

  • What was the biggest challenge you successfully resolved?
  • Whose needs were the easiest to meet?
  • Which compromise are you proudest of?
  • List what you felt were the top concerns/needs that needed to be met.
  • What is your biggest concern about generative AI moving forward?
  • What is your most exciting hope about generative AI moving forward?
  • In a letter, write your advice for businesses and organizations to collaborate on issues of AI. Use what you learned today, and include one article.
Teaching Tip

Extending the Lesson: Students may go home and play with Generative AI tools, testing their theories or experimenting with what they learned. Encourage students to open up dialogue with their family and friends, with a solutions oriented approach. You may want to guide passionate students towards the multiple careers in AI technology!

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