Prompting 101
Prompting 101 teaches students and professors how to ask better questions of AI systems: scope, citations, revision loops, and academic integrity. Short lessons you can use in office hours or the first week of class.
Here's something that took me years in journalism to learn, and it's exactly what trip up beginners with AI: the tool is incredibly agreeable. Show it a position—any position—and it will flesh it out, strengthen it,…
Read full essayHere's something that surprises most beginners: AI will produce a confident, well-structured argument for absolutely any position you give it. Tell it to defend, and it will. Tell it to defend the opposite, and it'll do…
Most of us approach AI the same way we'd approach a human assistant: we ask it to draft something, then we edit what it produces. This works fine for simple tasks, but it's backwards for complex writing. The more…
Here's something I see tripping up almost every newcomer to AI tools: they either dismiss AI entirely or hand over too much control. The sweet spot? Understanding that AI works best as a research assistant, not a…
If you've ever typed a long, detailed prompt only to get a muddled response, here's a simple technique that changes everything: break your request into smaller steps and send them one at a time. This is called chaining,…
Here's something that took me a while to learn when I started working with AI tools: the response you get is never the final product. It's a conversation, not a command. The moment you treat AI output as a finished…
Here's the truth most beginners don't realize: a bad prompt doesn't always fail visibly. Sometimes it gives you an answer that looks fine but misses the mark entirely. That's why prompt auditing, systematically checking…
Here's something that surprises most people when they first learn it: the more you limit your AI prompt, the better the output tends to be. It feels backwards—you'd think giving a tool more freedom would produce more…
Here's something that trips up a lot of people getting started with AI prompting: whether to give the AI examples of what you want, or just describe it in plain language. The good news is there's a straightforward…
One of the simplest ways to dramatically improve your AI results takes about five seconds to try: tell the system who you want it to be. This technique is called role-playing, and it's surprisingly powerful. Instead of…
In an era where artificial intelligence is becoming an integral part of various fields, understanding how to effectively engage with AI through prompting is crucial. Rather than viewing prompts as mere tools for…
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