GenAI Literacy | Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) | Seneca Polytechnic

Learning how to use GenAI technologies appropriately is rapidly becoming part of academic and career development. Many students will increasingly be expected to use AI to generate content in their professions. It is crucial that their education plays a role in developing their critical thinking and reflective skills around the evaluation of a range of sources, including AI-generated material.

What do we need to do to prepare students to engage with GenAI tools responsibly, ethically, safely, and in an informed manner? What do we need to tell them, or discuss with them, to ensure their experience is positive, responsible, and informed, in their courses at Seneca and beyond?

Critical GenAI literacy for students will include the following.

General GenAI knowledge (students need to know/understand)

• What is GenAI and how does it work?
• What tools exist?
• What limitations, risks and ethical considerations exist?
• How does GenAI relate to academic integrity?
• How is GenAI impacting the workplace?
• What is the future potential of these tools?
• What GenAI skills are required?

Using GenAI (students need to practice)

• How can students use GenAI tools to support learning and generate content?
• What strategies are most efficient/effective for interacting with GenAI tools to produce meaningful outputs (prompt engineering)?
• What are the copyright considerations? 

Critical analysis of GenAI outputs (students need to practice) 

• How should students analyze output to modify or add to prompt in order to obtain the desired output?
• What critical analysis of output should occur before content is used (i.e. content accuracy, bias awareness, ethical considerations, source verification)? 

Discussing GenAI outputs

One of the core Generative AI Literacy skills that students should learn is how to evaluate Generative AI content. There are many ways that you can teach this skill set and try to encourage students to be more critical of Generative AI outputs. Check out some of the example assessments in the Teaching Resources webpage to discover how you can introduce a critical assessment activity in your classroom. In addition to assignments and activities, you can also introduce your students to the SIFT method for evaluating GenAI outputs, which is detailed below.

Select the "+" to learn more.

Adapted from Algorithmic Awareness Toolkit: Teaching Algorithmic Literacy in Academic Libraries and Beyond by Marta Samokishyn is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

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