I have worked professionally as an English teacher all my working life, so this question appeals to me. Though I guess if I were given the chance to teach college undergraduates, I wouldn’t need to teach them to mind their full stops and commas heh.

I believe that teaching is the best way to accelerate one’s learning. So, the topic that has captured my imagination and galvanised my attention is Artificial Intelligence. I think I would be able to find enough material to engage me (and my students) for a term.

Since I want to carve a niche for myself as a forward-looking teacher who is adept at leveraging AI to enhance his productivity, I’m currently reading “Generative AI: How ChatGPT and other AI tools will revolutionise business”. We tend to assume that ChatGPT ignited our consciousness all of a sudden, but this book informed me of the many years of hard work AI scientists and developers have done so that mankind’s collective intelligence and expertise could create ChatGPT last year. Hence, I would definitely include lectures on the evolution of AI so that my students can follow its development. After all, hindsight brings about foresight.

Personally, I also want to teach my students to be able to mindset-switch. Just as we code-switch between the vernacular and the formal register depending on whom we are speaking to, we should be keenly aware of the cognitive demands a task requires of us and respond to them promptly and effectively. For instance, if I have to get a class of graduation testimonials, I would consult ChatGPT because it’s more skilled than me at using pertinent phrases to describe an individual. However, if I want to write a confessional column for my personal blog, I would most likely not engage ChatGPT because I don’t want any intrusion on my original thoughts and phrasing. My students are likely to have to be prompt engineers - whether they like it or not - so it’s my responsibility to teach them how to use their language skills to get the most out of Generative AI.

Indeed, the sky is the limit. I found out recently that we are allowed to see the images we generate from AI platforms. I may not be good at Photoshop and other software, but hey, if I utilise my prompt engineering skills well, I may be able to carve a viable side hustle out of AI-generated images. Let me report back six months later!