What started as a normal Novel course for EFL undergraduates in a Saudi university, ended up being an oppertunity for a case study research. A student was liberally using AI generative tools to study the course. She used ChatGPT as a substitute for reading the novel. Since the exams tackled higher critical thinking skills, she opted to memorize the answers generated by AI tools and simply paste them in the paper! This presentation juxtaposes the literary critical essays written by two EFL- undergraduate students studying a Novel course. One student was too liberal in her use of AI Generative tools as a learning tool. The other student was commited to the recommended method of studying, i.e., starting with a close reading of the text to ensure well-informed analysis. The method of this study is a qualitative case study assessing all the critical essays the subjects submitted in midterm and final exams then to conduct an open-ended interview to explore their perspectives. The results are illustrative for any researcher who aims to explore the effects of overusing AI tools on critical thinking skills; reasons are: (1) students are studying a literary text in a foreign language; so they are not able to detect some discrepancies in AI generated analysis which makes the overuse demostratable.(2) Literary analysis involves affectational hints that can not be foreged by AI generative tools. (3) students perspectives are presented to give a qualitative exploration of this educational challenge.

Authors:
Abrar AlAli, Imam Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University, Saudi Arabia

About the Presenter(s)
Dr.AlAli is an Assistant Professor She believes maintaining rigorous quality assurance system in HEd starts with studying changes in the academic landscape i.e., using AI tools. These changes warrant empirical exploration leading to informed changes

Connect on Linkedin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/abrar-al-ali-elqa-a-8947a3206/

See this presentation on the full schedule – Sunday Schedule

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