Noted Bravado

Thursday. Eighth grade English. Third period. 

Their final, the next week, was going to be on The Diary of Anne Frank. They had been given a study assignment on it (flash cards on the computer and a brief quiz) and they had an extra credit assignment with questions that went along with watching a video, After the Annex. 

Because eighth graders at the end of the school year, I was circulating to make sure things didn't get crazy. 

"You told Mr. C I was using ChatGPT."

It was Axel. He was not happy. 

So, yes, I absolutely included Axel's name and the incident I wrote about last week. And I said so.

Axel: "He lets me."

Me: Then it wasn't a big deal, was it? 

Because, seriously, when I mention something to a teacher that they do, in fact, allow, I may get a reply that it was fine. If I sub for them in the future, there may be a note in the lesson plan about how such-and-such is allowed. 

Axel: "It, uh, wasn't, but I didn't appreciate that you wrote about me in your note."

I pointed out that that incident was maybe two sentences in a note that spanned three pages. (I was in Mr. C's class for a week. Some things needed to be noted.)

Axel continued to make his displeasure known. Mr. C had gone through my note with the class. (Some teachers do this.) And he didn't like getting called out. 

I moved on. 

Ms. S, the English teacher, had said that they weren't allowed to use cell phones. I told them that they had plenty of work to do. But many still were trying to sneak their phones. They're not very good about being sneaky, but as it was individual work, I wasn't really policing them on it other than to sidle up to them and meaningfully look at their phones. They mostly got the hint.

I passed Axel on my classroom circuit. 

Axel: "I'm not on my phone." As he hid his phone in his pocket. The phone that he was clearly just on. "Please, don't report me."

I think Axel had more of a consequence for his ChatGPT usage than he cared to admit.

(I didn't report him. If I had, I would have made a list of all the students on their phones. I only call out individuals for notable occurrences, like loudly proclaiming that ChatGPT is how they're going to do their work.)