Using AI in the Classroom for Teaching K-12 Earth and Space Science
As K-12 classroom teachers complete their academic year, it is a time to recharge and start to plan for next fall. Use AI to gamify inquiry-based learning in the following classroom exercises.
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Mission 1: Spot the Hallucination. Prompt the AI tool to explain (in language appropriate to grade level) a complex scientific phenomenon, but also ask AI to deliberately include one or more false facts. Students can then use approved data sets (NASA, NOAA, USGS, local weather data, etc.) to prove where the AI is wrong.
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Mission 2: A Closer Inspection. As in the first example, prompt the AI tool to explain a complex scientific phenomenon, but do not include the request for false facts. Have students source data from approved sources to support or disprove each component of the AI explanation of the phenomenon.
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Mission 3: Checking the Facts. Have students identify a specific fact (or facts) from an approved data source (such as the water level in a certain location on a certain date). Then, prompt the AI tool to retrieve the same information (e.g. "What was the water level at noon in Honolulu on June 26th, 2025?"). Does the AI report the same information students found? Did the AI and students draw information from the same location? If the facts do not match, challenge students to figure out why.
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