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The year 2023 is proving to be a fascinating one for generative AI tools, with ChatGPT, the latest chatbot from OpenAI, crossing the 100 million user line in January 2023, making it the fastest-growing consumer application in a short period of time (source: DemandSage). ChatGPT is a large language model that provides detailed answers to a wide range of questions. Ask it to summarise a report, structure a presentation or activities for your session and you may well be pleased with the results. ChatGPT’s ease of use, speed of response, and detailed answers have seen it quickly dominate the AI generator market and gain both widespread acclaim and criticism.
While early media attention focused on the negative, playing on sci-fi tropes and the out-of-control desires of AI tools, scientists such as Stephen Wolfram have been exploring and explaining the capabilities and intricacies of ChatGPT, expertly raising awareness of its underlying Large Language Model architecture and its limitations as a tool.
In his recent talk on the Turnitin Webinar ‘AI: friend or foe?’, Robin Crockett – Academic Integrity Lead here at UON, discussed how a better understanding of the ability of ChatGPT to create content can be used to deter cheating with AI tools. However, concerns have also been raised about students using the tool to cheat, claiming that minimal effort required to enter an essay question in ChatGPT may produce an essay that may be of an adequate standard to, at least, pass an assessment (source: The Guardian).
Link to YouTube, Turnitin Session: AI friend or foe? 28/02/23 (CC Turnitin)
The next webinar in the Turnitin series entitled ‘Combating Contract Cheating on Campus’ with expert speakers Robin Crockett, Irene Glendinning and Sandie Dann, can be found here.
One thing the media stories seem to agree upon is that generative AI tools have the potential to change the way we do things and challenge the status quo, with some traditional skill sets at risk of becoming replaced by AI, and new opportunities for those who embrace these technologies.
In terms of how AI might be utilised by academic staff, Lee Machado, Professor of Molecular Medicine, describes his use of AI tools in cancer classification and how AI tools might be used to help answer questions in his field. Lee also discusses how he feels AI tools such as ChatGPT could improve student experiences by providing personalised feedback on essays and by simplifying complex information.
In the following interview, Jane Mills, Senior Lecturer in Fashion and Textiles, discusses how the fashion industry is embracing AI, emphasising that rather than AI replacing creativity, it can be used to enhance creative work. Students Amalia Samoila and Donald Mubangizi reflect on the collaborative nature of working with AI, using examples of their current work.
In his interview, Rob Howe, Head of Learning Technology, discusses the evolution of AI technology and its impact on the academic world. He explains that AI has come a long way since the original definitions by Minsky and Turing in the 1950s and that improvements in processing speed and access to data have made it a revolution in technology. Rob describes how AI technology has already been integrated into tools and academic systems in universities and how the rise of AI technology has led to a change in the way assignments are being considered, as students may now be using AI systems to assist in their studies. Although there is discussion around institutions wishing to ban the use of AI in academic work, Rob emphasizes the importance of learning to live with such tools and using them in a way that supports educators and students. AI systems have the potential to be a valuable resource for tutors to generate learning outcomes and offer new ideas which can then be critically evaluated and modified.
Exploring AI through multiple platforms and apps is a great way for users to get started. However, it’s important to note that not all AI tools are free. While many offer free tokens or limited availability for new users, some require payment. Our team member, inspired by the use of AI-generated images by an art student at UON, tried the IOS app, Dawn AI, which offered a 3-day trial. They enjoyed generating 48 new versions of themselves and even created versions of themselves as a warrior and video game character.
However, it’s important to consider whether using AI in this way is simply a gimmick or if it has a more purposeful use. It’s easy to dismiss AI-generated images as mere novelties, but the potential applications of this technology are vast and varied. AI-generated images can be used in advertising, social media marketing, and even in the film industry. As AI continues to develop and evolve, we’re likely to see even more innovative and exciting uses for this technology. The possibilities are endless.
The full extent of how AI tools will fit into daily academic life is yet to be determined. While some believe that AI has the potential to revolutionize the way in which we teach and learn, others remain skeptical about its ethical implications and its potential to negatively impact student engagement.
One of the main concerns is whether AI tools will prove to be a positive tool to enhance creativity and support students or whether they will provide a shortcut to assessments that undermine the learning process. It is clear that there are significant implications for how educators use AI tools in the classroom.
To explore these issues and more, Rob Howe, Head of Learning Technology at the University of Northampton (supported by University staff, external colleagues and the National Centre for A.I.), will be running a series of debates and talks on campus and online. These discussions will aim to assess the potential of AI tools and examine their ethical implications. Participants will discuss the challenges and opportunities presented by AI, and debate the best ways to incorporate these tools into the classroom.
The first of these debates, titled, ‘The computers are taking over…?’, is on March 15th. The full details can be found here; https://blogs.northampton.ac.uk/learntech/2023/01/30/the-computers-are-taking-over-debate/
Link to future Webinar from the series: https://www.turnitin.com/resources/webinars/turnitin-session-series-contract-cheating-2023
Authors: Richard Byles and Kelly Lea.
In celebration of International Women’s Day, I decided to use AI image generation to create some beautiful, photo-realistic portraits of women from around the world, in traditional dress.
Those of you who know me personally will know that I worked as a Freelance Graphic Designer for many years before becoming a Learning Technologist. Whilst I no longer work as a Graphic Designer, I do still keep my ear to the ground in the Graphic Design communities where there has been such a mixed reaction to AI image generation. It has been really interesting to watch the reactions over the last six months, as AI image generation has improved so much in such a short time. I, like many others, see it as an amazing and powerful tool that can work with a digital artist to produce pieces of work in a fraction of the time.
Limitations at the beginning
I used deepai.org, a free online text-to-image website that doesn’t require any login or registration, to play around and explore this new medium. For those simply wanting to type a keyword or two and see the result, it is really good fun. You could waste hours of your life just typing in different keywords and seeing what you get. It’s just so much fun creating weird and wonderful images! Here was one of my first attempts. I’d just asked for a sunflower, I wasn’t expecting a little Panda face peering out from the middle. I quickly learned what I’d done wrong and was determined to get better control over the results.
Writing Prompts: There is a skill to it!
I went back to the Graphic Design community blogs and YouTube videos where I’d seen absolutely stunning results, with futuristic and surreal city-scapes and weird fantastical creatures. Most of the designers I saw are using a platform called Midjourney. Midjourney offers a free trial and then a monthly subscription of just $10 a month for their cheapest plan. These AI artists, and yes I will call them artists despite how controversial that is, are using and sharing specific prompts that, through trial and error, they have found work really effectively to achieve certain visual effects.
It is quite well accepted that AI can’t do hands and often can’t do faces particularly well. I often see lions with 6 legs. You end up with some fairly disturbing images sometimes. The image below was created when I asked for a scene with The Queen of England. You’ll see in this example what I mean when I say it can’t do faces. (The little furry, three-eared creature, with no eyes, was supposed to be Paddington 😞).
Harnessing the power of AI
Despite using a free AI image generator, which states very clearly on its homepage NOT to expect photo realism, I was amazed by these results. I was blown away by the quality of all the images that came out, and the ones I’ve omitted from my gallery below, I’ve only done so because they looked a bit too airbrushed.
The prompt I generally used went as follows; (X is the nationality)
“Create a portrait of a traditional X woman, clear facial features, cinematic, 35mm lens, f/1.8, accent lighting, global illumination"
Why don’t you give it a go and try a different nationality? I’d love to hear how you got on.
A much longer version of this prompt was originally shared on Reddit and I took it from a YouTube video. You can watch if you want to understand more about what some of those elements are in the prompt — https://youtu.be/KXCVBu4btUk. (Photographers reading this will already have recognised some of those terms).
How AI image generation works
You may be looking at the images, wondering who these people are and whether they want AI using their faces. Well, you may be surprised to find out that none of these women are real people. They do not exist. You will not find these faces anywhere on the internet. Of course, coincidently, they might happen to look like someone in the world, but the faces, along with the rest of the image, are created by AI.
For example, if I want to paint a picture of a horse, I don’t have a horse to look at, so I’ll find a number of images on the internet to observe the proportions, the face shape, the mane, etc. I look at lots of different images from different angles to get a good idea of what it looks like. Then I’ll do my painting based on what I’ve observed. Similarly, AI will look at thousands of images on the Internet based on the specifics you’d put in your prompt. It then uses that information to create a brand new, original (Royalty Free*) image just for you. If you don’t like it, you can just tweak your prompt and it’ll make you a brand new, original image.
*Check the T&Cs of the platform you are using
Moving forward with AI
AI is here to stay whether we like it or not. I hope that we can appreciate it for what it can do for us, and embrace the technology. I am all for technology that can save us time and AI image generation certainly does that. Does it replace the artist? No, not necessarily. As you have seen in the examples, there is a skill, and you do have to learn how to get the best results. I look forward to seeing the images get better and better.
The new features in Blackboard’s March upgrade will be available from the morning of Friday 3rd March. This month’s upgrade includes the following new features to Ultra courses:
- Prevent editing or deletion of discussion posts
- Improved data and analytics in Ultra courses
- Improved attempt switching when grading student submissions with multiple attempts
Prevent editing or deletion of discussion posts
The March upgrade includes an important enhancement to discussions in Ultra courses, which allows staff to prevent students from editing or deleting their discussion posts while the discussion is ongoing.
At present, staff can choose to lock an assessed discussion on the due date, but cannot prevent students from editing and deleting their own discussion posts prior to the due date. Following the March upgrade, staff will be able to select ‘Prevent editing’ when setting up an assessed or non-assessed discussion, which will make all published posts permanent.
More information about setting up and using Ultra discussions is available at: Blackboard Help – Create Discussions
Improved engagement analytics in Ultra courses
Following the March upgrade, staff will be able to get a quick overview of their students’ engagement in their Ultra courses.
Under ‘Course Activity’ in the Analytics section of an Ultra course, staff will be able to see how much time students have spent in their Ultra course, along with the number of days since their last access. Both ‘Hours in Course’ and ‘Days of Inactivity’ will be sortable ascending and descending, and from this view staff will be able to select one or more students and bulk message them.
Improved attempt switching when grading student submissions with multiple attempts
When students make multiple submissions to Blackboard assignments in Ultra courses, after the March upgrade it will be quicker and easier to navigate the submissions.
Rather then having to choose which submission to view, staff will immediately be presented with the most recent submission, and will be able to switch between submissions directly inside the submission viewer.
More information
As ever, please get in touch with your learning technologist if you would like any more information about the new features available in this month’s upgrade: https://libguides.northampton.ac.uk/learntech/staff/nile-help/who-is-my-learning-technologist
New Ultra Flexible Grading Interface: Technical preview & feedback opportunity
Blackboard are currently developing a new assessment grading interface for Ultra courses, and are looking for academic staff to test and provide feedback on the proposed new flexible grading interface over the coming 4 – 5 months.
The engagement will largely be self-paced, with staff working through various grading workflows (as they get built and added) in their own time, and providing feedback via a survey form. In terms of time commitment, it is envisioned that this will take no more than a couple of hours per month.
If you would like to get involved with this project, and to help shape the design of the new Ultra flexible grading interface, please sign up here: Flex Grading Tech Preview Sign up
The new features in Blackboard’s February upgrade will be available from the morning of Friday 3rd February. This month’s upgrade includes the following new features to Ultra courses:
- Polygon shape tool available when creating hotspot questions in Ultra tests
- Sort items by grading status in the Ultra gradebook
- Students can see other members of their group in Ultra courses
- Ally alternative format views count towards progress in progress tracking
Polygon shape tool available when creating hotspot questions in Ultra tests
Since the November upgrade, staff have been able to create hotspot questions in Ultra tests. Initially, the hotspot area could only be rectangular, but following the February upgrade staff will be able to define complex hotspot areas in Ultra tests using the polygon shape tool.
More information about how to add and use hotspot questions is available at:
Sort items by grading status in the Ultra gradebook
Following the February upgrade, when viewing the gradebook in list view, staff can sort the gradebook by the grading status.
Students can see other members of their group in Ultra courses
After the February upgrade, students who have been assigned to groups will be more easily able to see who they are in a group with. However, they will not be able to see any information about groups that they are not a member of, nor will they be able to view detailed information about their other group members. All that will be disclosed when viewing other group members will be their name, their role in the course, and their profile image if they have uploaded one.
Ally alternative format views count towards progress in progress tracking
When documents are uploaded into NILE they are automatically made available in various additional accessible formats by Ally. Following the February upgrade, when students download and view one of Ally’s accessible versions of a document, this will be tracked by Ultra’s progress tracking tool.
You can find out more about Ally at:
More information
As ever, please get in touch with your learning technologist if you would like any more information about the new features available in this month’s upgrade: https://libguides.northampton.ac.uk/learntech/staff/nile-help/who-is-my-learning-technologist
You may have seen films where artificially intelligent devices either help or hinder humans – but where is it all going?
Artificial Intelligence will increasingly form part of our daily lives but what actually is it and what might be the benefits and challenges for us in our future home, study and work environments?
The debate, moderated by the UK’s National Centre for Artificial Intelligence, will raise questions for all of us about the way in which this technology will impact our lives.
This session is aimed at everyone, regardless of their background and level of expertise.
Hear both sides of the argument and vote at the end!
This event is taking place in person and online.
In person details and registration:
https://AIdebateinperson.eventbrite.com
Online details and registration:
https://AIdebateonline.eventbrite.com
Would you like to meet with members of Blackboard’s Product Management Team, and to have some input into the development of the groups tools that are available in Ultra courses?
If so, Blackboard are hosting an online Ultra groups tools focus group specifically for staff at the University of Northampton at 3pm on Monday the 23rd of January.
If you would like to attend, please email Robert Farmer: robert.farmer@northampton.ac.uk
The new features in Blackboard’s January upgrade will be available from the morning of Friday 6th January. This month’s upgrade includes the following new features to Ultra courses:
- Prevent students from editing or deleting Ultra discussion posts after the due date
- Model answer question type supported in Ultra tests
- Improvements to Ultra test randomisation options
Prevent students from editing or deleting Ultra discussion posts after the due date
Prior to the January upgrade, students could continue posting to Ultra discussions after the due date had passed. This created problems for staff when grading discussions. Following this month’s upgrade, staff can automatically lock the discussion after the due date has passed. When ‘Stop discussion activity after due date’ is selected, students can’t create, reply to, or edit posts after the due date. Students with a due date accommodation can continue to create, reply to, and edit posts after the due date.
You can find out more about setting up and using discussions in Ultra courses at: Blackboard Help – Ultra Discussions
Model answer question type supported in Ultra test
Following the January upgrade, when adding an essay question to an Ultra test, staff will be able to include a model answer. The model answer will always be available for staff to view when marking the test, and staff can also configure the test settings to allow students to see the model answer once they have taken the test. As would be expected, regardless of how the test is set up, the model answer cannot be seen by students while they are completing the test.
The option for students to view the model answer is controlled by the ‘Correct Answers’ setting in the ‘Assessment results’ section of the Ultra test settings panel.
Please note that the essay question must be marked in order to display the model answer to students. Therefore, where staff are using model answer questions in a formative test in which students are required to judge their own response(s) against the model answer(s), a quick option for staff would be to assign 1 point per model answer question, and to award the point to everyone who submitted an answer, thus revealing the model answer to students who view their test results.
You can find out more about setting up and using Ultra tests at: Blackboard Help – Ultra Tests
Improvements to Ultra test randomisation options
Prior to the January upgrade, staff were not able to randomise test questions if the test contained text blocks, files, or images. Following the upgrade, staff will be able to enable randomisation when the test has text blocks, files, or images, as these non-question elements will be locked in place, and the test will randomise the questions between the non-question elements.
Staff will also be able to randomise questions in a test that contains page breaks, as the questions will randomise within their assigned page. If a page contains non-question elements, the questions will randomise between those elements.
When there are pages for the test, staff can also randomise page order. If staff randomise the page order, they can also choose to lock the first page into position. This is particularly important if the first page of the test is a cover page or contains test instructions.
You can find out more about randomising Ultra tests at: Blackboard Help – Ultra Tests: Randomising questions and answers
More information
As ever, please get in touch with your learning technologist if you would like any more information about the new features available in this month’s upgrade: https://libguides.northampton.ac.uk/learntech/staff/nile-help/who-is-my-learning-technologist
The new features in Blackboard’s December upgrade will be available from the morning of Friday 2nd December, with the exception of the drag-and-drop and course links improvements, which should be available by Monday 5th December. The December upgrade includes the following new features to Ultra courses, some of which were specifically requested by staff in our ‘What new features do you want to see in your Ultra courses?‘ survey:
- Drag-and-drop content re-ordering improvements
- Course links
- Single student progress report
- Improvements for copying content
- Question banks descriptions and search
- Simpler exit actions for student preview
- Improvements to ‘needs grading’ count for Blackboard Ultra assignments
Drag-and-drop content re-ordering improvements
In response to feedback that the drag-and-drop content re-ordering function was clumsy and difficult to use, Blackboard have improved the way that it works. Following the upgrade, staff should find it easier to grab and move content items in their Ultra courses. Please also note that the location of the content re-ordering tool has moved from the right to the left-hand side of the content item.
Course links
As well as adding links to external web sites, etc., following December’s upgrade, staff will be able to add internal links to items already in an Ultra course. To create a course link, add a new link, and select ‘Create Course Link’.
In this initial release of the course link tool there are some limitations, but the functionality is expected to develop and improve over the coming upgrades.
Linking Exceptions
- In this release, staff cannot create course links using the content editor.
- In this release, staff cannot create course links to folders, learning modules, discussions, and web links.
- Course links to learning modules where force sequence is enabled cannot be created. This is because links could allow users to access something they should not yet access. If a course link to a learning module exists, it will not be possible to enable forced sequence.
Copying Content
When a course is copied into a new course, course links are updated to link within the new course. However, there are exceptions:
- In this release, staff cannot copy course links for documents and third-party LTI content, i.e., course links to anything originally added via the content market, e.g., Turnitin assignments, Kaltura videos, Leganto reading lists.
- When copying or converting from an Original course, the copy process will exclude course links for folders, learning modules, and web links.
Single student progress report
Following on from last month’s upgrade, in which Blackboard introduced the ability for staff to find out more about how their students were interacting with Ultra courses, December’s upgrade adds additional functionality to the course analytics options.
When in grid view in the Ultra gradebook, selecting a student’s name will open up the student grades overview page, which shows an overview of all of that student’s grades in the course. After the December upgrade, staff will be able to view a progress report for a student, as well as details of the last time that the student was active in the course, along with a student activity link.
Improvements for copying content
When copying content into an Ultra course, the copy content panel is quite narrow, which can make it difficult to navigate. December’s upgrade introduces a new, expanded copy content panel.
Staff can find out more about copying content into Ultra courses at: Blackboard Help – Copy Content from Other Courses
Question banks descriptions and search
Following December’s upgrade, staff will be able to add a description to a question bank. These descriptions may be useful for noting the topics or objectives the questions cover. The question bank description is displayed with the question bank title on the question banks page.
December’s upgrade will also bring in the option to search questions banks, with the search facility searching both the name and the description fields of the question bank.
Staff can find out more about using question banks at: Blackboard Help – Question Banks
Simpler exit actions for student preview
December’s upgrade will bring in simpler exit process when viewing a course in student preview mode, allowing staff to exit in two clicks, instead of three.
Improvements to ‘needs grading’ count for Blackboard Ultra assignments
In addition to the above improvements, December’s upgrade also improves the way that the needs grading count works, as it has sometimes provided an incorrect count of the number of items which required grading when assessing work with multiple attempts where ‘last attempt with a grade’ or ‘first attempt with a grade’ was selected in ‘Mark attempts’ in the assignment settings.
More information
As ever, please get in touch with your learning technologist if you would like any more information about the new features available in this month’s upgrade: https://libguides.northampton.ac.uk/learntech/staff/nile-help/who-is-my-learning-technologist
In 2021, a small project was conducted to find out how students wanted to be communicated with (were there any tips and tricks that we were not already using?). The final list provided a few new ideas and have led to a broader discussion within Library and Learning Services about the way in which we communicate to all our stakeholders:
- Chalk boards in walkways (being used by Waterside Campus restaurant in walkways)
- Paper handouts on tables (used sometimes in food areas)
- Rollup banner
- Digital screens
- Social Media (noted that F/book popularity decreasing) but Instagram could be useful
- MyNorthampton / local app – it was asked if can it do notifications?
- NILE / VLE homepage
The group noted that we should use more of:
- Targeted messages (perhaps by subject area)
- Memes
- Put up main survey results on screen and what we are doing about them
- Have a competition which encourages user generated content
- Short tips
- Quick videos (under 3 mins….ideally much less)
They suggested that messages could use:
- Capital letters
- Note when services are FREE
- Bold text
- Text which is short and focused
- Text which quickly highlights the benefits and opportunities of the message
It was noted that senders should be cautious of jokes / cartoons – the message needs to apply to all and not offend audiences.
