As an educator and/or parent, you're probably wondering HOW to teach and work with AI. It isn't easy. The field is constantly changing, and student, parents, and educators don't know where to even start to learn about, utilize, and think about AI.

We all know that students will consider using AI to do their school work this year. And, if they do hit the ‘easy’ button, they’ll most likely be accepting mediocre content. Authentic, human-generated and creative content is becoming a luxury good. Teachers can tell the difference.

I'm so excited to share a critically important new book with you. Prompting Originality: The A.I. Handbook for Humans, by Norty Cohen and Delaney Ehrhardt, offers a clear guide to learning all about AI and how to use it. 

Cohen and Ehrhardt embarked on a mission to discover the truth of originality in creative spaces and how AI can enhance it. They compiled their findings into a graphic, interactive handbook that takes readers on a journey to gain an understanding of AI capabilities and experiences prompting. 

I LOVED this book.

As a writer, educator, publisher, and parent, I have been tracking how AI is used, how we learn and grow with AI, how to spot bad content (and how to work with students to fix it), and more. But it has seemed overwhelming and like a waterfall - SO Much information, so much misunderstanding, always coming at us at full force. 

There is nothing like this book. It helped me understand how to work WITH the waterfall of information and AI, and keep up.  

Readers will learn the following and more:

• How to use AI to ‘prompt’ original content and make it your own
• That AI content is without soul but Human Intelligence will give it life
• What occupations may never return if AI takes your job
• How to beat AI at its own game
• How to use AI to gain confidence, experience and even inspiration
• Picasso, Shakespeare, Google: How the best originals are thieves
• How to use the Suck-O-Meter to see if your ideas, well, suck
• How to use the AI Playbook step-by-step
• How to use AI as your research assistant

“The book offers a myriad of practical prompting tips from using follow-up queries to being specific about how the AI should format the output,” says Dr. Steve Shwartz, an AI pioneer, entrepreneur, investor, and author of several AI books, including Evil Robots, Killer Computers, and Other Myths.

Highly, highly recommended!

We were lucky enough to catch up with Cohen, and ask about the book, the importance of human intelligence, how families and educators can use this book, and more. Here's what he had to say...

Please tell us about your new book, Prompting Originality...
Currently, less than 30% of adults are AI users. Everyone knows about it. And they certainly know how to use Siri to fetch them information. If the Pareto rule holds, 20% of people will never learn how to use it, they'll just let it find stuff, like a Google search on steroids. But they'll be missing out on what it can do. Our book takes the novice into the world of creating new ideas by creatively prompting. It is a mad-libs of how to use Chat GPT and other platforms, such as Gemini or Perplexity.

What led you both to creating this book together?
I was listening to an ad on a podcast that told company owners to ditch their HR departments and use AI to handle recruitment, write letters, etc. And it occurred to me that someone wrote that ad who would soon be replaced by a bot writing ads. Being in the ad business, that isn't good. So I wanted to find out where originality begins and the sea of mediocrity ends.

One of the biggest takeaways I got from reading this was the importance of  human intelligence in utilizing AI. I'd love to hear more about how people can reframe their ideas of AI into actually using it...
AI can do a lot of things. It can make lists of everything and anything in seconds. It can take your problem as you describe it and come up with an idea. What it can't do is tell you whether its ideas are any good. By definition, it's serving the down the middle, most common answer. If everyone keeps doing that, fresh new ideas will become even more valuable. How to get them: mix in human discernment. Without HI, AI is basically just canned everything. Which may work for tuna or green beans but it sucks for originality.

How can families and educators utilize this book (and other resources) in discussions about AI, using it, and adapting to technological change?
We ran an exercise at the University of Missouri while we were researching. We gave  students a problem and had them drag it into Chat GPT to get its perspective on a solution. We then asked six groups of students to build on what they found. Well, there was old Pareto back at work - because 20% basically stopped there. They spent their time chatting and catching up with each other. When we asked why, they said, "Here's a perfectly good answer."

So the thing to teach is HOW NOT TO USE AI. 

I really believe those 20 year olds will do the same thing five years from now. Everyone wants the easy button. The more educators realize that they're up against people who would rather bark at their remote than push the button for Netflix, the more they'll realize this is a heavy lift. Technology makes things easier. It can also ferment the brain.

What's up next for you?
I am working on a noir style defective detective novel, a theatrical production, and new product development around NFC technology.

How can people find your work? 
www.moosylvania.com
www.nortycohen.com
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/moosylvania_moosylvania-artificialintelligence-aiandmarketing-activity-7235007818632720387-lgvp
https://www.linkedin.com/in/norty-cohen-b4a8511/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/delaney-ehrhardt523/

Norty Cohen

Delaney Ehrhardt