Designing and improving a micro-curriculum on Critical Generative AI Literacy for doctoral students

Research Project, 2024 – 2025

The advent of Generative AI Tools (GAI), such as ChatGPT, poses challenges and opportunities for education and research. It is imperative that doctoral students develop the required skills necessary to use GAI tools ethically and critically in their academic writing and research process.

This project aims at investigating (1) the content of Critical GAI Literacy in doctoral education, specifically doctoral writing courses offered at Chalmers University of Technology, and (2) the pedagogical methods for teaching and assessing students’ Critical GAI Literacy efficiently and effectively.

The project includes designing and examining a micro-curriculum for Critical Generative AI Literacy (CGAIL). Our working definition of “Critical GAI Literacy” is a specialized skill set essential for academic writers to effectively and ethically engage with AI tools in their academic writing processes.

To achieve this objective, we base our micro-curriculum design on self-regulated learning theory, which underscores how learning can be enhanced by scaffolding students’ goal setting, strategic planning, monitoring and evaluation. Thus, in our micro-curriculum, activities guide students to self-direct their learning by completing personalized AI-mediated writing tasks and evaluate their writing processes, focusing on the effectiveness of prompts and ethical aspects. These activities are embedded in a flipped-classroom.