- AIED Custom Bots/GPTs Subgroup Collaborative Document. Casandra Silva Sibilin. “This is a collaborative document for participants in the AI in Education subgroup on Custom Bots/GPTs.”
- Building Bridges of Knowledge (BBK). CUNY faculty and students. “This resource empowers students to develop their own AI-powered educational tools while critically reflecting on the role of generative AI in education.”
Feb 2024
Build-your-own AI chatbots are all the rage at this point, meaning that you might be searching to figure out how to do it. While you might have thought that you needed ChatGPT Pro to do this, it turns out that Hugging Face allows you to build your own chatbot for free.
- HuggingChat Assistants: https://huggingface.co/chat/assistants. The following information might be helpful as you work through building your chatbots.
- https://huggingface.co/tasks/conversational
- Stack Overflow: How to use HuggingFace models for chatbot-like answers
- Lance Cummings on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/lance-cummings-phd_building-chatbots-is-hands-down-one-of-the-activity-7136343050108170241-C_Cp
- Lance Cummings on Medium: https://medium.com/educreation/step-by-step-guide-to-taking-a-structured-approach-to-building-chatbots-02ec9e8e28c6
- Lance Cummings on Substack: https://www.isophist.com/
- For a more conversational piece on HuggingChat assistants, see Carl Franzen’s Feb 2, 2024 piece, Hugging Face launches open source AI assistant maker to rival OpenAI’s custom GPTs.
- Feb 10, 2024. Stefan Bauchard gives another view of GPTs/chatbots on his substack. GPTs for Everyday Needs: Using a GPT to Analyze Debate Judge Philosophies. And why is this important for everyone.
Free tools for Chatbot building
- Google AI Studio quickstart.
- LibreChat.
- Langchain Hub. Find prompts here.
Help building chatbots
- Don’t Think You Can Create Your Own Chatbot? You Can! Laura Yost at Kirkwood Community College. Handout to help you build a chatbot.
- NotebookLM: An “Instant Expert”. Laura Yost at Kirkwood Community College. Google advertises NotebookLM as an “instant expert.” Referred to by howtogeek.com as “a Game Changer for Notetaking,” the app allows users to create “a personalized AI that’s versed in the information relevant to you.”
Ideas from other educators
Anne Fensie built some prompts for students to use to help with their assignments.
- Writing an Essay: https://bit.ly/ai-writing-an-essay
- Remember Chapter Reading: https://bit.ly/ai-remember-chapter-reading
- Personalized Tutor: https://bit.ly/ai-personalized-stats-tutor
- Increase Interest in Course Content: https://bit.ly/ai-increase-interest
- Forming Memories: https://bit.ly/ai-forming-memories
- Study for an Exam: https://bit.ly/ai-study-for-an-exam
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Lauren Kelly shared an example of a custom bot for a psychology class.
Critical and Systems Thinking Mad Lib Prompt Template
[GREETING] I’m excited to help you deepen your understanding and enhance your critical thinking and systems thinking abilities in the area of [SUBJECT/DISCIPLINE]. Let’s work together to explore how various factors interact over time to influence [CONCEPT/PHENOMENON].
STEP 1: Consider how [FACTOR 1], [FACTOR 2], [FACTOR 3], and [FACTOR 4] interact over time to influence [CONCEPT/PHENOMENON] within the context of [SPECIFIC SCENARIO/CASE STUDY]. Rather than making simple comparisons between isolated factors or groups, think about how these elements are interconnected. Please provide [NUMBER] specific examples, make comparisons across concepts, and show an understanding of differences within your response.
STEP 2: I’ll use a friendly, coach-like tone to create a supportive learning environment. If your response isn’t fully supported with context or research, I’ll nudge you to strengthen it. The goal is to align your thinking with the systems approach we discussed in STEP 1.
STEP 3: I’ll engage you with open-ended questions and follow-up inquiries like, “Why do you think that is?” to push your analytical abilities. When you demonstrate strong critical thinking skills, I’ll give you compliments to boost your confidence and keep you engaged with deep thinking.
STEP 4: Let’s start our discussion! [WELCOME STATEMENT]. To get us going, here’s a question: [INITIAL OPEN-ENDED QUESTION TO START DISCUSSION].
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Heather Myers created an infographic to help faculty develop a prompt for creating assignments with AI. https://www.canva.com/design/DAGAuEEakEA/jSq19B14oLmliEHmW1U1ZA/edit
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Chatbots for Educators from Peter Shea at Middlesex Community college. https://sheap.bubbleapps.io/. Note that correct spelling matters and that the responses take about 10 seconds to return. The focus will be on MCC, but the bots are usable by anyone.
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From Jeanne Beatrix Law on a LinkedIn post. “I added the rhetorical prompting method and ethical use-case notes to this off-line custom GPT, so it now walks students through the method, which mirrors the writing process. I have found that using this GPT to first teach students how to prompt also gives them metacognitive insights into the writing process for later in the semester. And, interestingly, the voice assistant sneezed when she was reading back the output! Check it out: https://chatgpt.com/g/g-KwpWcnhqe-openstax-writing-guide-assistant “