Artificial Intelligence (AI) language models are on the rise. The world’s largest tech companies are in a race to develop the most powerful and most used tools. Microsoft Copilot (powered by Open AI), Google Bard, GrammarlyGo, and Adobe FireFly are examples. A multitude of applications and platforms are being developed daily (honestly, I can’t keep up). Open AI appears to be leading the way, with others chasing to catch up. 

Buckle up because AI-Language Models will shift the world and how we do everything. I was curious, so I asked ChatGPT 3(a free Open AI platform I will discuss in depth below) how AI Language models will change the world. It shared with me that AI Language Models will change the world in the following ways: 

1. Communication: AI language models can help people communicate more effectively across languages and cultures. For example, translation models like Google Translate can help people communicate with each other in real time without the need for a human translator.
2. Education: AI language models can provide personalized and adaptive learning experiences that cater to individual learning styles and abilities. For example, language models can create interactive lessons and quizzes based on a student’s skill level.
3. Research: AI language models can help researchers analyze large volumes of text data quickly and accurately, making it easier to identify trends, patterns, and insights. This can lead to breakthroughs in fields like medicine, social science, and technology.
4. Creativity: AI language models can generate new content that is both creative and informative. For example, language models can write news articles, generate marketing, or even compose music.
5. Accessibility: AI language models can make information more accessible to people with disabilities. For example, language models can convert text into audio or braille, making it easier for people with visual impairments to consume content.

There is much more that AI will shift that we are not even thinking about at this point. Check out what Bill Gates recently wrote. Also, many are worried and calling for things to pause in the AI race. The bottom line is that things could look dramatically different in the world very soon. 

You might be asking, what is an AI Langage model, and what does this mean for us as health and physical education professionals? AI language models help people communicate more effectively and efficiently by providing tools to understand, analyze, and generate human language. These models are trained on large datasets of human language, allowing them to learn the patterns and structures of human speech and writing.

AI Langague Models can help in education and, more specifically, in health and physical education. This includes various ways, such as curriculum development, assessment creation, and lesson plan development. AI Langague Models can also help with repetitive tasks that take up much time, such as writing emails, and can also help you consider the tone of your emails which can be very helpful. 

The most (for now) popular way to access an AI Language Model at the moment is through a tool created by Open AI, Chat Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT) 3. To use ChatGPT’s language capabilities, you can access its web interface directly on the OpenAI website. Simply go to the ChatGPT page and click on “Start chatting.” You’ll then be taken to a chat window to interact with ChatGPT directly.

Once in the chat window, you can ask ChatGPT questions or provide prompts to generate text. For example, you can ask ChatGPT to generate a sentence about a specific physical education or health inquiry or ask it to give ideas for a new lesson plan. ChatGPT will then create a response based on its training data and provide it in the chat window. 

The best part is that ChatGPT is accessible for free and requires no special software or hardware. It is important to note that ChatGPT only has access to data from 2021 and before. If you want to sign up for an account, click here (suggested), and it will save all of your many conversations that you can refer back to later. If you want a more powerful tool, you can upgrade to ChatGPT 4 ($20) a month. ChatGpt 4 has a variety of plugins provided by various platforms, such as Zapier, which can access the web. 

It’s important to note that while ChatGPT is a powerful tool, it is not a substitute for human expertise and judgment. Health and physical education professionals should use ChatGPT to assist in their work, not as a replacement for their knowledge, experience, and expertise. 

Additionally, it’s important to critically evaluate the responses generated by ChatGPT and use your own judgment to determine whether they are appropriate and accurate. Below, we will explore how ChatGPT can create quality learning content and lesson plans, focusing on prompt engineering.

The Importance of Prompt Engineering

Prompt engineering is the process of designing specific and precise prompts that enable the AI language model to generate high-quality responses that align with the user’s goals. Prompt engineering is crucial because it directly impacts the AI language model’s output quality. The prompts provided to the model are essentially instructions that guide it on what kind of response to generate. Therefore, the prompts’ quality and specificity will determine the generated content’s quality and relevance.

Good prompt engineering involves designing prompts that are clear, concise, and aligned with the user’s goals. The prompts should be tailored to the specific task or use case, and consider the nuances of the language and domain used.

With ChatGPT specifically, prompt engineering is particularly important because it is a large language model that generates responses based on vast training data. Therefore, the quality of the prompts can help the model identify the most relevant information and create accurate, informative, and engaging responses.

I asked ChatGPT to give an example of prompt engineering, and this is what it shared: 

Let’s say you want to ask ChatGPT for information about a particular topic. A poorly designed prompt might be:

“What can you tell me about topic X?”

This prompt is too general and open-ended and may not provide enough information for ChatGPT to generate an accurate response. The model could potentially generate a response that is too broad or unrelated to the specific aspect of topic X that you are interested in.

A well-designed prompt might be:

“What are some effective strategies for managing stress and anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic?”

This prompt is effective because it is specific and clearly states the topic (managing stress and anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic). It also provides a clear request for information (effective strategies), which helps ChatGPT understand what the user is looking for. The prompt is easy to understand and well-structured, which can help ChatGPT generate a helpful and relevant response.

By designing prompts tailored to your specific question or task, you can ensure that ChatGPT generates accurate and relevant responses. I suggest you simply play around with this and become familiar with the prompt engineering process. 

A Physical Education Example for Creating Learning Content with ChatGPT

Using prompt engineering, ChatGPT can help create learning activities aligned with the SHAPE America National Standards. Let’s look at an example of how to use ChatGPT to create a learning activity for second-grade students.

Note: This is simply an example of the capabilities of ChatGPT. This is not a perfect learning activity. Some modifications were made (as I will discuss below), but the learning activity was left primarily as ChatGPT created it. I wanted to show some errors a user would need to correct while collaborating with ChatGPT. 

The following prompt was provided to ChatGPT: “Please create a detailed Pokémon-themed instant activity for second-grade students. Please include the SHAPE America National Standards, a psychomotor objective, a cognitive objective related to physical education, and an affective objective related to physical education. Include safety for this activity. Ensure that this game is not an elimination game and that it includes all students for the entire activity. This activity should last 2-5 minutes in length.” Below is what it provided. 

Activity Objective:

To improve students’ locomotor skills (skipping, in particular) while also increasing their social-emotional skills, including teamwork and cooperation.

Materials:

• Soft nerf ball as the Pokeball
• Open space with boundaries to keep students within the play area.

Gameplay:

1. Divide students into two groups, one group as Pikachu and the other as Ash Ketchum. Each group stands on opposite ends of the play area.
2. The teacher or assigned leader starts the game by throwing the Pokeball into the air.
3. Both groups race to reach the ball.
4. Once a student picks up the ball, they must skip back to their group’s starting point.
5. The opposite group’s leader (either Pikachu or Ash Ketchum) tries to tag the student with the ball by touching them on the shoulder.
6. If the leader successfully tags the student, the student switches teams and becomes a member of the other team.
7. If the student returns to their starting point without being tagged, they score a point for their team.
8. The game continues for a set period, typically 2-5 minutes.

Affective Objectives:

• Students will demonstrate cooperation and teamwork by working together with their group members to achieve their objectives.
• Students will demonstrate respect and fairness by playing the game without any physical contact and no winner or loser.

Cognitive Objective:

• Students will demonstrate an understanding of the concepts of the game and the rules by following the teacher’s instructions and the gameplay.

Psychomotor Objective:

• Students will improve their locomotor skills, specifically skipping, through the game’s activities.

It’s important to note that it took four sets of revisions to arrive at the final learning activity. The first response was too complex and challenging for second-grade students, the second response involved running instead of skipping, and I chose to change the movement for it to be safer; the third response had Pikachu trying to tag Ash Ketchum instead of what is listed above, and finally, the fourth response involved a winner and loser and I removed this. By collaborating with ChatGPT and using prompt engineering, we arrived at an age-appropriate and inclusive learning activity. However, specific safety cues were left out. Further, the final version shared above left off the SHAPE America standards. An early version of the game included SHAPE America standard One as a guide for instruction. Last, the objective could be more specific. Additional prompts could have added these features. Being a content expert will be necessary when using AI Langage Models. 

Cautions for Teachers

While ChatGPT is a valuable tool for physical education professionals, it’s essential to be cautious. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Always double-check the generated text to ensure that it is accurate and appropriate. 
• Be mindful of the language and cultural biases that may be present in the AI model.
• Avoid using AI-generated text as the sole basis for decision-making. It should always be used in conjunction with other sources of information and professional expertise.

Cautions for Creators and Businesses in the Health and Physical Education Space

It’s important to note that while AI language models like ChatGPT can be incredibly useful in creating educational content, it’s essential to approach the development process with a student-first mentality. As educational creators and businesses begin to use and develop tools with AI language models, it’s crucial to remember the learning needs and experiences of the students they’re trying to reach. Right now, the whole world is in a race to be the first. However, being the first could come at the expense of students if those in the education sector put financial gain over students’ needs.

While there is a way to integrate ChatGPT within education platforms, this should be done with care and attention to student learning. There should be a focus on best practices, including creating content that is standards-based, inclusive, accessible, and engaging to students of all backgrounds and abilities. By approaching the creation process with a student-first mentality, businesses and creators can steer our profession in a way that will lead to better student learning and experiences if done with care and intentionality.

In conclusion, AI Language Models are a valuable tool for health and physical education professionals, and prompt engineering is essential for ensuring that the generated text is relevant and valuable. With caution and careful consideration, physical education professionals can leverage this technology to create more engaging and effective learning content.