Making the Most of ChatGPT as a Student

Ever since its launch on November 30th, 2022, millions of people have tried out OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which proved revolutionary in various fields, including students who tried applying this new AI software to multiple aspects of their studies. Students using ChatGPT led to a mixed response from institutions, which ranged from crackdowns to adoptions. If you’re wondering how to use ChatGPT and what ChatGPT is in more detail, keep reading.

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT by OpenAI is an artificially intelligent system where you provide instructions to the AI chatbot and receive detailed feedback based on your request/instruction. Using it can best be described as conversing with an AI chatbot by providing commands while receiving feedback or actions, which can be text-based or in other formats. 

You can either create your own prompts or rely on ones found on the internet provided by users who have had successful results. These prompts are commands that will enable ChatGPT to understand what you want. You can always experiment by creating your own ChatGPT prompts, changing the wording, and seeing different outcomes before deciding what works best. To get the best results, you should be clear about what you expect the AI assistant to do by providing details.

This system’s intelligence was made possible through the training of the main model by human AI trainers who simulated conversations, acting both as the AI assistant and potential users. ChatGPT was developed through reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF), which helped fine-tune ChatGPT through human feedback. 

As a result of this breakthrough, various users flocked to open their first OpenAi accounts as it started being applied through various industries and having multiple uses, such as in the real estate industry through listings, helping develop codes, in education by helping come up with lesson plans, and even in personal life where it can be used to boost your productivity through finding new solutions and facilitating various obstacles.

That said, it can significantly benefit your studies, which will be discussed further in the upcoming section.

How Can Students Benefit From ChatGPT?

As previously mentioned, ChatGPT can significantly benefit your productivity. Here are some of the best uses of ChatGPT for students:

Studying Uses

1. ChatGPT as a Summarising Tool

You can use ChatGPT to summarise articles and even books. However, it is not recommended to rely solely on ChatGPT, as it is still a work in progress and may sometimes present inaccurate information. By pasting the article link while asking for a summary or requesting to summarise a book, you will be given a summary of your needed material, which can be helpful for revising.

Summaries don't necessarily have to be in the form of paragraphs but can also be in bullet points, which can help you quickly go over various concepts.

2. ChatGPT as a Revising Tool

Many sources describe ChatGPT as a tool that can help you solve complex problems, especially mathematical questions. This can be very useful when revising, as you can input the questions and ask for a step-by-step solution, which can help you solve the problem on your own. Not just that, ChatGPT can even explain the formulas and concepts used, which helps it act like a personal math tutor.

3. Provides Tips and Tricks

One of ChatGPT’s best features, which also adds to its usage as a revising tool, is providing various shortcuts, tips, and tricks for various math problems. ChatGPT not only explains to you how a problem is solved but also helps you learn more effortless ways to solve the question at hand. This applies to a wide range of STEM subjects.

4. ChatGPT as a Writing Assistance Tool

ChatGPT can greatly improve your writing skills, as it can help expand your horizons to new ways of thinking. By providing you with templates that can be used for various subjects, you can discover new writing formats, as the AI system can write entire reports based on the provided topic. We suggest that you use this only as a reference, however.

You can also use it to get feedback on your writing, including corrections and suggestions. Other highlighted items in your text will include:

• Missing key points

• Improvements based on the intended reader audience

• Sentences that don’t fit in with the rest of the paragraph 

You should, however, never use ChatGPT to cheat. Always use it for inspiration, as a learning aid, or as a polishing tool, but you should never use ChatGPT unethically.

5. Can Plan Your Studies

ChatGPT can also be used to optimise your studying by providing you with the best study plan. You must input your free days and preferred studying time while adding your intended study duration and topics to be covered. With that, ChatGPT can help generate a study plan that can work around your needs.

6. Can to Break Down Complex Topics

You can also rely on ChatGPT to break down complex topics into manageable blocks by simply asking ChatGPT to explain a difficult concept, asking for more examples, or asking for a simplification. ChatGPT can also provide you with real-life examples, further simplifying difficult concepts, and can act as a personal tutor or study assistant, providing you with an engaging study experience.

Other Useful ChatGPT Uses

This smart AI tool does not only come in handy while studying or in other various industries, but can also be used to enhance your personal life. Below are some of the best ways to make the most of ChatGPT as a student:

1. Helps You Draft Professional Documents

Writing in a professional manner can sometimes be hard, especially for first-timers with no experience in writing professional documents, which can include professional emails and college applications, among other forms. After you provide the AI chatbot with the necessary details, you can ask it to compose a professional email or college application. You could even ask the AI chatbot for professional ways to say something without coming off as unprofessional.

2. Helps You Budget Your Finances

Another great use of ChatGPT is using it as a personal consultant and asking it for a second opinion, which also includes helping you budget your finances. If you’re wondering how to use ChatGPT to budget your finances, all you need to do is input your income or allowance, list your expenses, put in your savings goals, and save the results somewhere for later use. This budgeting feature is extremely useful for you as a student, as you’ll always need to keep an eye out for your budget.

3. Helps Plan Trips

When planning your vacation, you can rely on the AI app to help you form an itinerary by simply typing in your destination and length of stay. This is also done when requesting an itinerary for the specified duration of stay and specifying the best and safest places to visit. 

The AI chatbot will later provide you with a detailed plan on what to do and where to go during your stay, which involves some of the safest and top-rated places in your intended destination.

4. Cooking Assistance

Another fun way to use ChatGPT is by letting it assist you with cooking recipes by providing it with the ingredients you already have in stock and getting suggestions on the best ways to use them together. ChatGPT can even recommend what to have in your shopping cart. You can also ask for ingredient substitutions and discover new flavour combinations.

5. Can Make You Healthier

ChatGPT can make you healthier by providing various solutions, including recommending healthy diets, healthier habits, and new workout routines. 

To create a workout routine, input your current fitness level, fitness goal, and preferences, including your equipment and available time. You can even have more personalised requests, such as not lifting weights.

To help ChatGPT create healthy meal recipes, you can provide healthy meal plans as a reference, which can include healthy meal plans from your favourite food creators.

Other uses for ChatGPT to help you become healthier include providing you with mental health guidance, which involves giving you the best mindfulness and meditation tips and tricks as well as techniques. Other mental health uses of ChatGPT include reminding you of daily goals, tracking your progress, and providing you with needed affirmations. 

ChatGPT can also offer sleep-related advice and strategies and can even create a sleep schedule or a relaxing bedtime routine for comfortable sleep.

6. Keeps You Entertained

ChatGPT in itself is a very fun tool to experiment with while discovering new uses for this AI and trying out new prompts you come up with or that you find on the internet. ChatGPT can even recommend what movie to watch next, what songs to listen to, or even tell you a knock-knock joke. 

What Not to Do as a Student Using ChatGPT 

As previously mentioned, ChatGPT is still a work in progress and is continually being updated, so you should never use it blindly. This is why it only knows what it has been taught, which is also similar to various other AI tools that learn through machine learning. Other things to be mindful of and not to do when using the software are the following: 

1. Don’t Let it Write Your Entire Essay (Plagiarism)

Various institutions have reported cases of students submitting entirely AI-generated reports. There are various cases of students’ essays being described as very well-written but full of false information. This brings us back to one of ChatGPT’s flaws, which is sometimes being inaccurate; this is why you shouldn’t solely depend on it.

Using it to form your entire essay is also a breach of your academic integrity code and might lead to action such as having to redo the report, failing the course, or even being expelled. This depends on your institution.

2. Don’t Become Dependent on ChatGPT

We tend to become dependent on technologies that have simplified various aspects of our lives; this also applies to ChatGPT. Be wary of becoming too reliant on ChatGPT, as this might reduce your own personal abilities. This is why it is highly recommended that you use it for reference or as extra support, which goes hand-in-hand with your own personal efforts.

These were some of the best ways to use ChatGPT as a student, both for your studies and personal life. You can also make use of various study tips that Casita provides, such as Tips for Standing Out on Your College Application, Tips on Writing an A+ Research Paper, Budgeting Tips: How to Live on a Budget as a Student,  Time Management Tips & Tricks, and Mental Health Tips for Students.