Riding the AI Wave: Teaching with NotebookLM and Grammarly Authorship
You’ve heard the saying, “If you can’t beat them, join them.” That’s pretty much where I’ve landed with AI. Students are already using it, sometimes clumsily, sometimes brilliantly, so rather than pretending we can outsmart the bots, I’ve started figuring out how to make them work for learning instead of against it. Two tools I’m using this semester are NotebookLM and Grammarly Authorship.
NotebookLM has become a surprisingly effective tool for essay revision. Students upload their drafts and my feedback, then use the AI to ask targeted questions about how to improve their writing. Because NotebookLM only works with the sources they upload, it doesn’t pull anything from the internet, it stays focused on their words, their structure, and their feedback.
I give students simple prompts to get started:
- What changes could strengthen my thesis or organization?
- How can I make my evidence clearer or more convincing?
- What patterns do I notice in my instructor’s feedback?
What happens next is the part I love most: instead of relying on vague advice like “add more detail” or “work on transitions,” students begin to engage in their own revision process. NotebookLM gives them an accessible way to talk through the “why” behind my comments and to see their writing from a more analytical perspective.
Grammarly Authorship, on the other hand, helps me confirm that students’ writing actually sounds like them. It builds an authorship profile that tracks writing style and habits across drafts, which can be useful when a submission suddenly feels suspiciously polished. I use it less as a gotcha tool and more as a way to encourage students to develop and maintain their unique voice.
If you want to experiment with NotebookLM, you’ll need to use a personal Gmail account for now. It’s not yet available through Maricopa’s system. Go to notebooklm.google.com, create a notebook, upload a few documents, and start asking questions. You’ll get a good sense of how students can use it to think more critically about revision once it becomes available in our district. And I created a video for my students explaining how it works and how to get started with their revision assignment.
AI isn’t going away anytime soon, but tools like these can help us use it with students rather than against them. In other words, if you can’t beat the AI wave, you might as well ride it. Get it? Ride the wave. ?
Resources:
Embracing AI in Writing Instruction: A Look at Packback’s Writing Lab
Time is wearing me down. Yep. We, as community college educators, are facing an evolving challenge: how do we equip students with the skills to thrive in a world that increasingly blends traditional methods with cutting-edge technologies? I’ve written about Packback before with its innovative way of engaging students in asynchronous discussion boards. Today, I want to talk about Packback’s new Writing Lab. They boast they are here to bridge that gap, offering a solution that doesn’t just use AI for convenience but actively teaches students how to write more effectively, with and without AI assistance. Seems ideal, doesn’t it?
So what is Writing Lab? Writing Lab is a “direct-to-student AI-powered platform” designed to help students refine their writing skills independently. Unlike traditional AI tools that “write for you,” Writing Lab focuses on pedagogy and mastery-based learning. It provides real-time feedback on grammar, structure, readability, and logic, making it a supportive writing companion for students working on essays, research papers, or even creative pieces. I could never provide real-time feedback to my students like that. But here’s where it gets interesting. Writing Lab is available to students at GCC who are in Packback-integrated classrooms. So if you adopt Packback (it’s free – district pays), you can just set up your class to let students access Writing Lab independently. It’s like sending them to the Writing Center.
Let’s face it. AI tools like ChatGPT, Grammarly, and the 10+ other bots out there have thrown a curveball at academic writing. Some of us are grappling with questions about how to maintain high standards and integrity in the writing process while embracing these new technologies. If Writing Lab can help students build AI literacy while fostering foundational writing skills, it’s a “best of both worlds” approach that recognizes AI as a partner, not a crutch. I’ve got my rose-colored glasses on here and fingers crossed.
I like the idea that Writing Lab flags issues like logical fallacies or unsupported claims, offering explanations rather than just corrections. This encourages critical thinking and helps students understand why revisions are necessary. It also claims to help students with source credibility and citation support. Students receive feedback on the reliability of their sources and can generate citations in APA, MLA, or Chicago styles. It even assigns “Credibility Scores” to sources, helping students discern quality research. The more I read about Packback’s Writing Lab, the more I see my retirement future. I can’t wait to try this out this spring. Another feature I like is it’s plagiarism prevention. Instead of punishing plagiarism, Writing Lab proactively alerts students to potentially uncredited text and prompts them to cite appropriately. It even guides them on citing AI-generated suggestions transparently, a skill becoming increasingly relevant in academic and professional writing. Pretty cool, no?
Okay, I’m starting to sound like an ad for Packback. Truth is, I’m torn between wanting to prepare students not just for their current courses but for the realities of the professional world. AI is not going away, and I’m already seeing more and more student use, and that’s not permitted use. We’ve got to find a balance for ethical use of AI, where tools like Writing Lab can hopefully serve as an extension of our classroom and not a means to cheat. Students using it could gain confidence and competence, reducing the time I spend grading and marking basic errors and allowing me to focus on higher-level feedback. Ah, that would be really nice. I can’t wait to try it. For more information, send me an email, and I’ll forward it to our Packback Curriculum Consultant, Naomi Campbell (not the British fashion model, I’m sure), who is standing in for our regular support person, Katie Horan.
Additional Information
Video Discussions are a Superior Option for Asynchronous Online Learning
In online education, asynchronous discussions are a key component of engaging students and encouraging participation in a flexible learning environment. Traditionally, these discussions have been text-based, with students posting written responses to prompts and replying to their peers. However, the rise of video platforms and tools like Canvas Studio, the late Flip (rest in peace), Kaltura, Screencast-O-Matic, Padlet, and others has opened the door to a more dynamic and interactive approach: video discussions. Integrating video discussions into online courses offers several key advantages, enhancing both the educational experience and community-building efforts.
The biggest reason I made the switch to video discussion is because of AI. As AI tools become more accessible, some students often turn to AI to generate text responses for asynchronous discussions. While this can save time, it undermines the authenticity and value of the learning process. AI-generated responses can come across as disingenuous, lacking the personal touch and deeper understanding that real human input provides. The result is a discussion that feels robotic and unengaging. This can make the overall conversation dull and uninspiring, as students simply churn out polished but formulaic responses without truly engaging with the material or their peers. Video discussions, on the other hand, make it much harder for students to rely on AI tools, ensuring that the content is genuinely their own and that they are actively participating in the learning process.
One of the main criticisms of online learning is the lack of personal connection compared to face-to-face classes. Video discussions bridge this gap by allowing students to see and hear each other, creating a more humanized and engaging interaction. Facial expressions, tone of voice, and body language add layers of communication that are absent in text discussions, fostering deeper connections between students and instructors. Video discussions enable learners to feel like they’re part of a real community, rather than just a series of names on a screen. This can be especially important for students who may feel isolated in an online environment. Seeing their classmates speak directly to the camera creates a sense of immediacy and involvement, helping to build camaraderie and rapport in the virtual classroom.
This semester I made the switch from Flip to Padlet for my video discussions in my journalism courses. After 3 weeks I can see a real connection between the students in the class. I can see the authenticity of their videos and feel it encourages students to speak more naturally and conversationally compared to the often formal, stilted language used in written posts. This leads to more dynamic exchanges and often deeper, more thoughtful reflections. Video discussions also tend to capture attention more effectively. Students are likely to watch a brief video response from a peer rather than reading through lengthy text posts, thus encouraging more active participation in ongoing discussions. I know that I’ve moved from spot-reading posts to watching all of their videos. I wish I could show you some of the cool interactions that have already transpired so far in these video discussions. You’ll just have to take my word for it.
Canvas Studio’s Auto-Captioning Feature Does Not Work for Videos Added by a YouTube Link
Canvas Studio is an interactive video platform integrated within the Canvas learning management system (LMS). It allows educators and students to create, upload, and share videos directly within Canvas courses. Canvas Studio offers auto-captioning for videos. When you upload a video to Canvas Studio, you can generate captions automatically. The auto-captioning feature uses speech recognition technology to create captions, which are then editable to ensure accuracy. This feature helps make video content more accessible to all students, including those who are deaf or hard of hearing.
However, Canvas Studio’s auto-captioning feature does not work for videos added by a YouTube link. The auto-captioning functionality is only available for videos that are directly uploaded to Canvas Studio. When you link to a YouTube video within Canvas Studio, you can still use YouTube’s own captioning tools if the video owner has enabled them. However, the direct auto-captioning and editing features of Canvas Studio won’t apply to these externally hosted videos. To utilize Canvas Studio’s auto-captioning, you would need to download the video from YouTube (if allowed), upload it directly to Canvas Studio, and then use the auto-captioning feature. Alternatively, you can rely on YouTube’s captioning options or manually add captions within Canvas Studio after uploading.
All of those options for getting captions on YouTube videos added to Studio are not great. You can’t download videos from YouTube legally, and if it’s not your video, you can’t download or access the captioning file. Finally, who has time to manually add captions to a video? Not me.
There are several ways to get the transcript from a YouTube video. Most will just give a text file with no formatting and no timestamp, so you end up manually editing and wasting just as much time as if you created the file yourself. Here’s a process I use:
Tech Tip: Use Time-Blocking – Please!
This might be a personal request of all faculty I have the pleasure of working with. With all of us working from home a lot more and possibly only being on campus two days a week, it’s challenging trying to find time to meet with people. It’s so nice when I can just pull up a calendar invite, add the people I want to meet with, and choose “Find a Time,” and it magically presents everyone’s calendar revealing all the common free time. This, people, is how most organizations work. However, we don’t even come close. Most of the time there is nothing listed on faculty calendars. Oh, so you’re free on Wednesday at 2 pm? That’s perfect. Well, that’s usually not the case.
My tiny tech tip is to leverage your digital calendar tools to implement time-blocking strategies. In addition to simply listing your class, office hours, and meeting times, allocate specific blocks of time for different tasks, such as grading, research, and class preparation. This helps in creating a structured schedule and enhances focus on specific activities during dedicated time slots. It also allows for better visualization of your day and ensures that important tasks are given the attention they deserve. But most importantly to me, your colleague, is now I know when I can request a meeting with you. If you’re still available for meeting requests but you’ve blocked off time to grade, you can indicate that you are still free on the calendar event. It’s quite simple. So what do say? Can we please use our calendars?
Monitor Online Attendance in Canvas
You’ve created a great online class. Your students have started the semester eagerly digging in to your course content and submitting assignments. Everything is going great, but is it really? Are you students really engage? Are they all even logging in to Canvas? With online instruction it can be challenging to gauge how engaged students are in your online course on a daily basis, especially if you only require assignments every few weeks. What are students doing in between those big assignments? Are they reading? Are they watching your videos? Are they discussion a course topic? Do they have smaller assessments to help keep them engaged weekly in your course? All of these additions would make a good online course and make it easy for you see how your students are doing on a weekly basis.
If you design an online course that requires some of these elements, you will be able to check online attendance in Canvas using the New Analytics tool. What exactly does online attendance track? It tracks posts to an announcement or discussion, assignment submissions, conferences using Big Blue Button, page creation, and quiz submissions. Previously the feature only tracked student log ins, but that didn’t really tell us anything. Students log in all the time, look at their failing grade, get discourage and leave again. That would previous count as attendance. But now they’ve turn on the criteria listed above, so it gives us a better picture of who’s doing what in the course.
Here’s a quick video showing you how to set up New Analytics in your Canvas courses and view online attendance.
An added note about assignments: Does the criteria Assignments: Student submits an assignment include assignments that use ‘external tool submission type’?
It depends. If the external tool is using the Canvas API endpoint for submission, it will count toward that criteria. For many tools that use assignment-level integration, this will be the case.
However, if you are using a third-party tool that only passes average grades back to Canvas, those assignment submissions will likely not be included in the Online Attendance Criteria.
Using AI to Support Teaching & Learning: Captioning and Quiz Question Generation
AI is all the rage these days, specifically generative AI. It seems as if everywhere I turn there are articles about new tools and new debates about their usefulness. Although that might be because Google’s algorithms know I’m interested, so they keep feeding me stuff. The next person may see nothing about generative AI. Oh, well. I’m obsessed. I just started a module with my ENG101 students on rhetorical analysis, and we’ve been exploring how to use generative AI tools to help with that process. I made sure to find database sources for them to use, which makes it more challenging to have the chatbots do all the work for them. And then we’re using website articles to practice with. It seems to be working well. I have a sense that students are quicker to understand analysis by doing it this way.
But I’m also looking for a way to get the chatbots to help me with streamlining my processes. I’m pretty solid with my content knowledge at this point after 30+ years of teaching, but I could use some time-saving hacks. One such hack is writing quiz questions and captions for YouTube videos. I’m a firm believer in not reinventing the wheel, so if I find a good video that already shares the essential points of a lesson, I’m using it. The problem is, if I put that video in Canvas Studio and create a quiz, it takes a long time to caption the video and write the quiz questions.
I discovered recently that YouTube videos added to Canvas Studio don’t have the captions attached. I can go over to YouTube and copy/paste the transcript for the video, but I would still need to match up the words with the video which can be time-consuming. It’s actually faster just to transcribe it in the captioning editor. But who has time for that? At that point, it would be easier to just create my own video, which Studio will auto-caption for me. But I found a solution online using a website https://downsub.com/ that will take a URL from a YouTube video and provide an SRT file with the subtitles that you can then just upload to the video in Studio. The website is super sketchy, so be careful if you use it. I’ll show you how in the video below.
Once I have the captions in place, now I need to create a quiz and add my questions. Super easy to do in Studio, but it’s tedious and time-consuming. For this, I found a Chrome extension, NoteGPT: YouTube Summary with ChatGPT & Notes. Make sure you’re using the Chrome browser. The original script for the extension was to summarize YouTube videos for you, but I was able to edit the script to make it write quiz questions. That makes me sound like I’m really smart, but don’t worry, it wasn’t that complicated. The following video will show you the whole process in case you want to replicate it yourself.
Video Link: https://app.screencast.com/3Anjh9XC7a5W1
Can AI Grade My Essays For Me?
I made a joke with Beth a few days ago about how I wished AI would grade my essays for me. And then I really thought about that, and now I can’t stop. I mean seriously if AI can write the students’ papers for them, what about us? Why can’t it grade papers too? Well, guess what. It can. I tried it. Shhh. Now don’t tell on me. I used both ChatGPT and Microsoft’s tool built into Bing. GPT is much better.
First off, it was a lot of work, probably equal to if I’d just graded them myself, but the benefit was far better for the student. It spat out paragraph long feedback on what was wrong, how the paper did or didn’t meet each rubric standard, and how to improve the work. I was simply amazed. If I were to leave that kind of feedback on a paper, it would take me days to grade instead of hours. As it is, I’ve already moved to grading by recording my feedback, so I can say more and make it easier for students to understand what I’m saying, but this was amazing.
But like a said. It wasn’t easy or quick. I first began by asking the AI to find a rubric for a news article using a summary lead and following the inverted pyramid style. It quickly pulled up a rubric that was adequate, but it was only on a 10-point scale. I used it anyway to see how it would work. Then my next prompt asked Maud, remember, I named her Maud in my last post. I asked her to grade this news article using that rubric, and pasted in a student’s news article. Surprisingly, it worked. She put the two prompts together and graded the article. It was okay, but there wasn’t much detail and it didn’t really meet the standards I was looking for. I decided instead to ask Maud to build me a rubric and added the essential things and the total points I needed. She created this.
Okay, that was interesting, but could she grade a news article using that rubric? I wondered. Yep! She gave the article a 47/60, provided the tally from the rubric AND added this feedback:
Strengths:
- The article follows the inverted pyramid structure.
- The information provided is relevant to the target audience.
- The article includes quotes from reliable sources.
Weaknesses:
- The lead is weak and could benefit from being more focused.
- The article could use more clarity in its presentation of information.
- The article could be more concise.
- The article could be more explicit in identifying biases or opinions.
Suggestions for Improvement:
- The lead should be more specific and focused on the key point of the article.
- The article should be more clear and concise, with shorter paragraphs and simpler language.
- The author should explicitly identify any biases or opinions and explain how they might influence the article’s content.
- The author should consider additional sources to provide a more complete understanding of the issue.
Crazy, right? I probably would have scored it a bit higher, but I noticed Maud didn’t say anything about grammar and punctuation in her feedback and I found a couple of specific errors, so I asked her about them. I typed in, “What about grammar and punctuation?” She replied:
As an AI language model, I don’t have the capability to fully analyze grammar and punctuation, but I can tell you that there are a few errors in the article. For example, in the sentence “This issue goes for not only students but members of the community who live downtown,” the phrase “goes for” should be replaced with “applies to.” Additionally, there are a few instances where punctuation could be improved for clarity and readability. Overall, however, the article is well-written and understandable.
She was right. In another instance, Maud pointed out two run-on sentences in the article and offered a suggestion for how to fix it. Amazing.
Yep, I’m obsessed, but that took a lot of work. In fact, I paused playing so I could quickly grade those news articles and get them back to students. This was going to take all day. First, Maud would forget my rubric after a few follow-up questions about the article she graded, so I’d have to start all over. Then sometimes she would ignore my rubric and just give a paragraph analysis of the article or she would leave out key elements. Basically, she was not consistent and I had to keep retraining her. She gave good feedback, but not the same feedback for each student.
My Heart Just Wasn’t In It After Day 1
I taught my first face-to-face class in two years 3 weeks ago. It’s a late start ENG102 hybrid that meets once a week in LA108. I didn’t really want to teach the class face-to-face, but my chair said that admin would like us to have more on-campus classes this semester. “The data show that is what students want.” I saw the data and had a completely different interpretation, but I’m a team player, so I agreed to teach the class. It is one of the two classes I previously taught on campus in 2020, so the class was prepared and ready to go.
The first indication that things were going to be different is when I noticed I wasn’t teaching in my preferred space. Apparently, HT2 classrooms were not big enough to accommodate our class sizes (18). I was bummed but verified I’d have a Chromebook cart in my new teaching space. On the first day, I arrived about 15 minutes early just so I could familiarize myself with the technology in the classroom. I’d promised students I would do a live-online class so students who couldn’t make it to class for whatever reason could attend live from home. I also have the same course as an all online and thought it might be nice to offer the option to them. Turns out LA108 is a cave with no cell service. You might think that fact is not that important, but trust me it is.
I began by trying to log into the teacher station computer, which I haven’t had to do since Duo Two-Factor Authentication was introduced into our lives last year along with having better log-in passwords. I had found a loophole and was successful in using the same password for probably 3 years. I should be ashamed, but I wasn’t. I actually knew my password back in the day BC (Before Covid). Today, not so much. My souped-up 17 digit numbers and symbols are a solid password now. So I looked up my password on my phone using my LastPass app; I have offline access on my phone, and I typed it into the prompt on the computer at the teacher station. The computer went into some weird realm that took probably 5-6 minutes before it stopped and prompted me for a user name and password again. Again? I looked it up again and typed all the letters, symbols, and numbers again. After another ridiculous amount of time, you know what happened. No, it worked, but our new friend Duo popped up. I asked Duo to send me a text. She goes into spin mode waiting for me to complete the action on my phone. Nothing appears on my watch or phone. So I kindly ask Duo to send me another text. And then again. By this time I have about 5 students sitting in front of me watching. Duo never complies so I give up on that endeavor.
I thought to myself, I don’t need your crappy technology. I’ve got a backpack full of it sitting at my feet. We are about 10 minutes into class time at this point when I realized I needed to log into the WiFi on campus if anything was going to happen today – my first day back in the classroom after 2 years. That wasn’t going to happen, so Maricopa net or whatever the open wifi is called was it. Fifteen minutes into my first class, with 5 students sitting in front of me, and one single person online, I was finally ready to teach. I learned later that several students gave up on the online class when I wasn’t there to let them in. Bummer. But hey I was ready. I say to the students in front of me. Let me just “plug” my laptop into the teacher station and you’ll be able to see my screen. I had already started teaching but had no visual for them yet.
Let me ask you a question before I continue. Does anyone have one of these plugs on their computer anymore? Oh, never mind. The whole point of this post is to point out how I was done after day one. And I can’t say that the following week was any better. I had a whole new set of problems. I’m so out of practice with trying to use someone else’s technology that my heart is just not into teaching face to face anymore. It ruined my experience. Technology should enhance, not prohibit. Apparently, you need cell service in order to get Duo prompts or be logged in to wifi on a computer to get a password to log into the computer. Or you need to remember to put your dongle in your backpack so you can connect your fancy technology to the old school kind in the classroom. Or…(fill in the blank). It’s just too much to deal with. I need to stick with what I do best and tackling GCC technology ain’t it.
P.S. Thank you Caryn Bird for hiding whiteboard markers in the classroom because of course you have to bring your own low tech too.
Have Students Engage with Guests in the Classroom via Video Discussions
Most of us are missing the normal student engagement we used to have in the classroom. Even I, who taught mostly online except for two hybrid courses, am missing those one day a week meetups in the classroom. What I miss most is seeing and hearing the enthusiasm and excitement about a topic or discussion from my students. You can’t really see or hear that in a regular asynchronous discussion. But you can bring a little of that back with a video discussion tool like FlipGrid. I’ve written about FlipGrid in the past, but today I want to share how I use it to bring guest speakers into the classroom as a way to have students engage with professionals in the field.
Luckily for me, I work in a wonderful district full of people passionate about teaching and helping students. One such person is the talented Sam Fraulino who works at PVCC as a Senior Software Developer. He works in the Center for Teaching & Learning helping faculty with their online courses, but his talents go far beyond that. Last semester I invited Sam to be a guest speaker in my JRN203 Writing for Online Media class. I thought he would have a lot to share with my students who are predominately Digital Media Arts students, and many are aspiring artists and very talented. We have a module on Citizen/Participatory Journalism where students learn how to capitalize on social media for their own benefits whether it be self-promotion or news dissemination. And Sam is a great example of someone who does that with his own artwork on Instagram.
After the pandemic hit and this hybrid course moved fully online, I didn’t want for students to miss out on this experience, so I invited Sam to visit the class virtually. But instead of making it a live webinar, I had Sam record a short video showing students his art studio and talking about his job, art, and experience using social media. Students were then asked to compose questions for Sam about his presentation and ask them in the discussion. To make all this flow, I used FlipGrid so both sides could see and hear each other. I hadn’t actually planned for Sam to respond to individual posts/questions, but he volunteered and it worked out better than expected.
Students were truly appreciative of his time and excited to engage with him online. And Sam had similar sentiments. He said,
All of them were so well-spoken, confident and so appreciative of my time; that was very nice and this was a very cool experience.
Sam Fraulino
Here’s a quick video showing how I set this up and how it works in Canvas and FlipGrid.
