BisikayEduc8: Global SuperEducoaching

23/08/2026

The essays improved. The evidence of learning did not.

I have mentioned this study several times over the past few months, but it deserves a closer look because it captures one of the central problems with generative AI in education: better performance on an assignment does not necessarily mean better learning.

Fan, Tang, and colleagues conducted a randomized laboratory experiment with 117 university students completing an English writing task.

Students revised their essays under four different conditions: support from ChatGPT, one-on-one guidance from an experienced writing teacher, writing-analytics checklists, or no additional support.

When the essays were scored, the ChatGPT group came out on top. Their writing improved significantly more than that of every other group including the students who received real-time assistance from the human expert.

But when the researchers tested what students had actually learned, the advantage disappeared. There were no meaningful differences among the groups in either knowledge gain or the ability to transfer what they had learned to a new task.

The essays were better, but there was no evidence that the students had become better writers.

The process data helps explain why. The researchers recorded students’ clicks, keystrokes, and page views to examine how they regulated their learning.

Students using ChatGPT settled into a narrow cycle: write, ask ChatGPT, revise, and ask again. They spent less time orienting themselves to the task and evaluating their work.

Students working with the human expert were more likely to return to the readings, revisit the assessment criteria, and reconsider their decisions.

The researchers described this pattern as metacognitive laziness.

Some students even copied ChatGPT’s example sentences directly into their essays to satisfy the rubric, despite instructions intended to prevent the tool from doing the writing for them.

As Bastani and colleagues similarly demonstrated in mathematics, better performance with AI is not necessarily evidence of learning from AI.

Link in the first comment!



Reference

Bastani, H., Bastani, O., Sungu, A., Ge, H., Kabakcı, Ö., & Mariman, R. (2025). Generative AI without guardrails can harm learning: Evidence from high school mathematics. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 122(26), e2422633122.

Fan, Y., Tang, L., Le, H., Shen, K., Tan, S., Zhao, Y., Shen, Y., Li, X., & Gašević, D. (2025). Beware of metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative artificial intelligence on learning motivation, processes, and performance. British Journal of Educational Technology, 56*(2), 489–530.

23/08/2026

When you do your degree with the OU, The Future is Open

23/08/2026

23/08/2026

Here is one of my favourite papers on critical thinking. It brings together evidence from hundreds of studies and features a collection of practical activities that you can use to help students question assumptions, evaluate evidence, consider alternatives, and justify their conclusions.

These include:

1. Teacher questioning that moves beyond recall: What evidence supports this? What assumptions are being made? Is there another explanation?

2. Whole-class and small-group discussions in which students explain, challenge, and revise ideas.

3. Authentic problems connected to situations students recognize from life beyond school.

4. Case studies, simulations, ethical dilemmas, debates, and role-playing activities.

5. Applied problem-solving that requires students to use knowledge rather than simply repeat it.

6. Mentoring and coaching in which teachers model good reasoning, identify weaknesses, and provide feedback.

The central message is simple: critical thinking can be taught, but telling students to “think critically” will not make it happen. Students need repeated opportunities to practise interpretation, analysis, evaluation, inference, explanation, and self-correction.

One of the paper’s strongest findings is that these strategies work particularly well when combined. Give students a meaningful problem, create space for genuine dialogue, and support them with careful questioning and feedback. The problem gives them a reason to think, dialogue exposes them to different perspectives, and mentoring helps them improve the quality of their reasoning.

The paper also found positive effects across educational levels and subject areas. Critical thinking does not belong to one course or discipline. It can be developed through science investigations, historical sources, literary interpretation, mathematical reasoning, media analysis, and everyday classroom decisions.

This is why critical thinking must be designed into instruction. It does not develop automatically through content exposure. We have to create the conditions in which students are expected—and supported—to question, reason, explain, reconsider, and revise their own initial judgments.

Abrami, P. C., Bernard, R. M., Borokhovski, E., Waddington, D. I., Wade, C. A., & Persson, T. (2015). Strategies for teaching students to think critically: A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 85 (2), 275–314. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654314551063

23/08/2026

🏫 WHEN A SCHOOL FAILS, THE ADMINISTRATION HAS FAILED IN ITS DUTIES!

A school does not suddenly become unsuccessful overnight.

Before a school begins to experience declining enrolment, poor academic performance, indiscipline, high staff turnover, financial difficulties, dissatisfied parents, weak supervision, poor record keeping, and damaged reputation, there are usually warning signs that the administration failed to recognise or address.

The truth is simple:

When a school fails, the administration must examine its leadership and management systems.

Teachers certainly have responsibilities. Parents have responsibilities. Students also have responsibilities. But the school administration carries the primary responsibility for creating the systems, policies, structures, supervision, and environment within which everyone operates.

📌 SCHOOL FAILURE OFTEN BEGINS WITH ADMINISTRATIVE FAILURE

A school administrator cannot ignore problems for months and suddenly blame teachers when things go wrong.

Effective school administration requires proper planning, organising, staffing, supervision, coordination, budgeting, communication, monitoring, evaluation, and decision-making.

When these functions are poorly handled, the entire school may suffer.

1. POOR RECRUITMENT CAN DESTROY A SCHOOL

If you employ teachers simply because they are cheap, available, or recommended by someone without considering their qualifications, competence, character, and suitability, you may eventually pay a bigger price.

A strong school needs a structured recruitment and selection process.

Wrong people in the right positions can produce wrong results.

2. LACK OF TEACHER SUPERVISION IS AN ADMINISTRATIVE FAILURE

Employing teachers is not enough.

Who checks their lesson plans and lesson notes?

Who observes classroom teaching?

Who monitors pupils' and students' exercise books?

Who evaluates teachers' performance?

Who identifies teachers who need additional training?

Administration must establish effective supervision and accountability systems.

3. HIGH STAFF TURNOVER SHOULD NOT ALWAYS BE BLAMED ON TEACHERS

When good teachers are constantly resigning, management should ask questions.

Is the salary competitive?

Are salaries paid on time?

How are teachers treated?

Is the workload reasonable?

Is there room for professional development?

Does management communicate respectfully with employees?

Sometimes, constantly replacing teachers does not solve the problem because the real problem may be the management system.

4. POOR ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE REQUIRES INVESTIGATION

When students consistently perform poorly, blaming teachers alone is not enough.

Management should investigate:

- Quality of teaching
- Curriculum implementation
- Availability of instructional materials
- Teacher competence
- Class size
- Assessment practices
- Attendance
- Supervision
- Learning environment
- Parental involvement

Effective administrators investigate problems before making conclusions.

5. FINANCIAL MISMANAGEMENT CAN CRIPPLE A GOOD SCHOOL

A school may have hundreds of students and still struggle financially because there is no proper budgeting or financial control.

School income should not automatically become personal spending money.

There should be proper systems for budgeting, fee collection, expenditure, payroll, procurement, maintenance, savings, emergency funds, and financial accountability.

6. POOR COMMUNICATION CREATES CONFUSION

When teachers hear different instructions from the proprietor, principal, vice-principal, and supervisor, confusion becomes inevitable.

A successful school requires clear communication channels.

Staff members should understand:

Who reports to whom?
Who has authority to make certain decisions?
What are the procedures for handling complaints?
What are the school's policies?

Without structure, everybody begins to operate according to personal understanding.

7. A SCHOOL WITHOUT POLICIES IS RUNNING ON ASSUMPTIONS

What is your school's policy on:

Staff conduct?

Student discipline?

Child protection?

School fees?

Attendance?

Examinations?

Admissions?

Leave?

Complaints?

Health and safety?

Social media?

Emergency situations?

If everything depends on what the proprietor decides that particular morning, the school does not have a strong administrative system.

8. IGNORING PARENTS' COMPLAINTS CAN DAMAGE YOUR REPUTATION

Not every parent is correct, but every legitimate complaint deserves professional attention.

Parents who repeatedly complain without receiving appropriate responses may eventually withdraw their children.

Worse still, they may tell other parents about their experiences.

In education, reputation is an important asset.

9. FAILURE TO TRAIN STAFF IS FAILURE TO DEVELOP THE SCHOOL

You cannot demand 21st-century teaching practices from teachers while refusing to invest in their professional development.

Schools should organise regular training, mentoring, workshops, classroom observations, performance reviews, and professional development programmes.

When teachers improve, the quality of the school can improve.

10. FAILURE TO PLAN FOR THE FUTURE IS DANGEROUS

Successful schools do not only think about today.

Management should be asking:

Where should this school be in the next three to five years?

How can we increase enrolment?

How can we improve academic standards?

What facilities need improvement?

What technology should we introduce?

How can we retain competent teachers?

How can we strengthen our reputation?

How can we remain financially sustainable?

That is strategic school administration.

🚨 BEFORE YOU BLAME THE TEACHERS, CHECK THE SYSTEM

When enrolment is declining, investigate.

When teachers are resigning, investigate.

When parents are complaining, investigate.

When examination results are poor, investigate.

When finances are unstable, investigate.

When discipline is deteriorating, investigate.

When your school's reputation is declining, investigate.

Leadership means accepting responsibility for the systems under your control.

A school cannot consistently rise above the quality of its administration and management.

📚 SCHOOL OWNERS AND ADMINISTRATORS, BUILD SYSTEMS—NOT JUST BUILDINGS!

Beautiful classrooms are important.

School buses are useful.

Uniforms can improve your school's image.

But sustainable schools also require effective administration, policies, procedures, financial controls, competent personnel, proper supervision, documentation, communication, and strategic leadership.

This is why Sapiential Educational LTD has developed the:

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23/08/2026

Parents in better-off areas are raising funds to lower temperatures and Cambridge OCR’s head fears pupils elsewhere will be at a disadvantage in future

23/08/2026

The statement attributed to skeptic James Randi—“No amount of belief makes something a fact”—captures one of the most important principles of rational inquiry: confidence is not evidence. A proposition does not become true because millions believe it, because an ancient book endorses it, because a preacher declares it, or because believing it provides emotional comfort.

It is an argument against treating belief as a method for discovering reality.

By Religion: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

BELIEF IS NOT A TRUTH MACHINE

Human beings are extraordinarily capable of believing things that are false. Psychology has repeatedly demonstrated that our reasoning can be influenced by identity, desires, expectations, social pressure, and confirmation bias. Motivated reasoning can cause people to selectively evaluate evidence in ways that support conclusions they already prefer (K***a, 1990).

That creates an amusing problem for the believer: if sincere conviction were sufficient evidence, contradictory religions could all be simultaneously correct.

Billions of people have sincerely believed incompatible gods, revelations, prophecies, miracles, scriptures, reincarnations, and supernatural claims. Their sincerity demonstrates that humans can be sincere—not that their conclusions are true.

The universe, unfortunately, does not conduct a popularity contest.

FAITH CAN BE POWERFUL—AND STILL WRONG

Faith can provide meaning, community, psychological comfort, moral motivation, and resilience. None of those benefits establish the factual truth of supernatural claims.

A comforting belief can remain false. A frightening belief can remain true. Reality has no obligation to conform to our emotional preferences.

Scientific inquiry therefore operates differently. Evidence is evaluated according to its quality, quantity, reproducibility, and consistency with other observations. The National Academies emphasizes that scientific conclusions depend upon the weight of evidence and remain open to revision when better evidence appears.

That intellectual humility is one of science's greatest strengths: “I don't know” is permitted. “Show me” is encouraged. “I was wrong” is progress.

THE DANGER OF BELIEF BECOMING IMMUNE TO EVIDENCE

A belief becomes particularly problematic when no conceivable evidence could ever count against it.

If a prayer is answered, God did it. If it is unanswered, God had a mysterious reason. If a prophecy fails, it was misunderstood. If scientific evidence contradicts the doctrine, science is accused of being biased. The hypothesis survives every possible outcome.

At that point, the belief has been cleverly redesigned so that reality cannot possibly defeat it.

Psychological research on misinformation similarly finds that people can resist corrective information when it conflicts with existing identities or worldviews (American Psychological Association, 2023).

That problem is not exclusively religious. Political ideologies, conspiracy theories, nationalism, commercial advertising, and even atheists can produce the same cognitive pathology.

The intellectually honest target is therefore not religion alone, but epistemic double standards.

RECOMMENDATIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT

We should teach people the difference between claim, evidence, inference, and fact.

Ask extraordinary claims to produce proportionately strong evidence. Demand independent verification. Distinguish personal experience from reliable evidence. Learn how confirmation bias and motivated reasoning operate. Be willing to investigate evidence that threatens our own conclusions—not merely evidence that embarrasses our opponents.

Most importantly, cultivate the habit of saying:

“I believe this—but what would convince me that I am wrong?”

If the honest answer is “nothing,” the problem is no longer insufficient evidence. The problem is intellectual immunity.

WHAT CAN WE ALL DO?

We can make skepticism a virtue rather than an insult. We can challenge claims without dehumanizing the people who hold them. We can teach children critical thinking rather than merely teaching them which conclusions they are supposed to reach.

We can also apply skepticism consistently. If we demand evidence from someone else's religion but accept unsupported claims from our own ideology, we are not skeptics—we are partisans with laboratory coats.

QUESTIONS FOR THE READER

If sincerity makes a belief true, which contradictory religion wins?

If millions believe something, does that increase its factual accuracy?

What evidence could change your mind about your most cherished belief?

Are you investigating reality—or defending a conclusion you already chose?

And perhaps the most uncomfortable question:

If your beliefs were wrong, would you actually want to know?

The mature alternative to blind certainty is not cynicism. It is intellectual humility: believe in proportion to the evidence, revise when the evidence changes, and never confuse conviction with reality.

REFERENCES

American Psychological Association. (2023). Psychologists are taking aim at misinformation with these powerful strategies. APA Monitor on Psychology.

K***a, Z. (1990). The case for motivated reasoning. Psychological Bulletin, 108(3), 480–498.

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2025). Understanding and addressing misinformation about science. National Academies Press.

Randi, J. (2017). Interview discussing skepticism and belief. Skeptical Inquirer.

22/08/2026

22/08/2026

How students are asked to use AI makes all the difference!

Li and colleagues reviewed 67 empirical studies examining how ChatGPT influences students’ critical and creative thinking.

The central finding confirms something I have argued here for a long time: the outcome does not depend on the tool alone. It depends on how the learning activity is designed.

When students had to compare their work with AI-generated responses, explain their revisions, check the AI’s claims, or assess drafts against a rubric, their critical thinking improved.

They became more attentive to errors, more deliberate in constructing arguments, and more aware of their own thinking. In these cases, AI was something to question and evaluate.

But without this structure, the results often moved in the opposite direction. During loosely designed summarizing and essay-writing activities, students were more likely to accept fluent answers without examining them. They offloaded the thinking to AI, and their reasoning became shallower.

One finding is especially concerning: AI can increase creativity while quietly weakening critical thinking. Students may generate more ideas and produce more polished work, but that sense of productivity can hide the fact that they are reasoning less.

The authors describe the value of epistemic friction, the productive struggle involved in checking, questioning, justifying, and revising ideas. That struggle is not something teaching should remove. It is where much of the learning happens.

If AI makes everything too easy, it may also make it too easy not to think.

Link in the first comment!



Reference

Li, C., Cui, H., & Hagedorn, L. S. (2026). The cognitive impact of ChatGPT in higher education: A systematic review of critical and creative thinking outcomes. Computers and Education: Artificial Intelligence, 10, 100571.