The ELT Buzz Digest - Oct. 27th
All the "buzz" in English language teaching this week.
Dear Teachers,
This week’s educational “buzz” below.
My reading tip this week is a BBC report about AI unreliability. Education has always rested on the trusted mantle of fact and truth. Think of how you got so hot under the collar when a textbook had a typo or god-forbid a factual error! And now we have AI just making stuff up 50% of the time. And we are supposed to support its use with students? And I’m not even talking about all the “hallucinations” it has in addition. It is all just getting a little too too ridiculous but still stuck in our faces - this made-up world some powers that be want us to believe and our students to digest. Same goes with distorted slop images of AI - fakery and as they say “enshitification”. Education and our lessons don’t deserve muddy waters.
Best,
David - ELT-Buzzer-In-Chief
The Core Challenge of Public Education
AI “agents,” man - Cognitive Resonance
Thursday 16 October - Newsletter Katherine Bilsborough
Amazon strategised about keeping its datacentres’ full water use secret, leaked document shows
How AI Data Centers Are Sending Your Power Bill Soaring
Challenging AI Inevitability.pdf - ELT Buzz Teaching Resources
English UK news - Bell English school closings
Now Is the Time of Monsters - Newsletter
Higher Ed’s Rush To Adopt AI Is About So Much More Than AI
What if Generative AI does to schools what it’s doing to the NBA?
Statement on Superintelligence
How The Massive Power Draw Of Generative AI Is Overtaxing Our Grid - YouTube
How AI and data centers impact climate change - YouTube
S7E05 – Browser Bots are Doing the Homework - Higher Ed Podcast
30 English Language Teaching Myths. Confront your educational beliefs.
Proof or it didn’t happen: Assess it like it’s research
Video Lesson Of The Week - The House On The Lake
Seriously, that point about AI just making stuff up and the "hallucinations" is so spot on, David. How do we even begin to teach students to navigate this kinda tech without making them totaly cynical, you know?
Ugh I’m navigating this so much in my lessons too. I now dread the assignments coming in as there is nothing to correct. I’m having to find new ways to assess. It’s partly why I started my page. It’s an ESL bookclub. I want to get real beautiful texts across to as many people as possible.