How to USE AI The Right Way
A guide to turning a powerful tool into your personal learning supercharger without rotting your brain.
This will only take you about 5 minutes to read! Don’t even think about asking AI for a summary of this text.
Why This Actually Matters for Your Future
Imagine walking into a gym, sitting on the bench press, and letting a robot lift the weight for you. Sure, the bar goes up, but your muscles stay soft. AI can be that robot: it will crank out answers, essays, even code in seconds, but if you never feel the mental “burn,” the parts of your brain that handle problem-solving and creativity don’t get stronger.
Fast-forward a few years: employers are hunting for people who can think analytically, dream up new ideas, and bounce back when plans change. Routine, copy-and-paste work is already being handed to AI. If all you practice is asking ChatGPT to do the heavy lifting, you’re training to compete with the machine on its own turf. That’s a game you can’t win.
How about AI from a faith perspective? Think stewardship. Whether you’re coding, writing, or prototyping a new skateboard rack, work is worship: we’re called to bring our best, not crank out meh work because a bot made it easy. Technology is a gift, a tool that reflects the creativity God gave us. The idea is to steward it well, using AI to help us better serve others and make our work more intentional, not to cut corners.
Why you should never ask AI to do something you couldn’t do halfway decently yourself.
It’s tempting to think AI can instantly level up your skills on a topic you know nothing about, but beware: If you don’t understand the basics of a task (whether that’s drafting a business email or balancing a chemical equation) you can’t judge whether or not AI’s answer is helpful, partially right, or flat-out wrong. It’s like sitting in a first-class airplane seat and assuming you’re now qualified to fly the plane. You saw the fancy controls, but you have no idea what they do.
Ever heard of the Dunning-Kruger effect? It’s a cognitive bias where people with low knowledge in an area overestimate their own competence. Essentially, it’s when you don't know just how little you know about a topic, and therefore you think you are an expert. The Dunning-Kruger effect really comes into play with AI when you lack the expertise to spot errors or subtle flaws, and you can’t tell if the confident, well-written answer the AI gave you is brilliant or just plain wrong. You may assume it’s correct because AI is great at writing things that sound right based on the limited knowledge you do have. You become, as researchers put it, "unskilled and unaware." You can’t judge the quality of information you don’t understand, and you can’t give the AI the right feedback to improve its output. BTW, don’t ever take it for granted that what AI gives you is the best answer, there’s usually plenty of room for improvement, no matter how impressive it may seem at first glance.
Sorry, but there are no shortcuts to expertise. Start by doing the messy first draft on your own (or at least outlining your thought process). Then invite AI in as a second brain, not the only brain.
The students who are using AI as a shortcut right now are basically training themselves to be easily replaceable. But the ones who learn to use AI as a thinking partner to amplify their own creativity and problem-solving are the ones who are going to build up their expertise and become essential.
Don’t be the Average AI user, Become a Savvy AI Editor
Large language models (LLMs are AI focused on writing-related tasks) are confidence machines. They write with perfect grammar even when they invent fake court cases, tell you how many rocks to eat, cite bogus journal articles, or give glue-on-pizza “chef tips.” Don’t assume that fluent text equals true text. LLMs aren’t databases of facts; they are statistical text engines. They are designed to predict plausible words in a sentence, not necessarily to tell the truth (even when they cite sources).
This is why YOU are the most important part of the equation! Your brain, your experience, and your ability to critically evaluate information are what make the tool work.
Fact-check everything important. Dates, definitions, stats: look them up in a textbook, database, or reputable site.
Spot the “too smooth” answer. If the response feels like a movie montage that skips all the hard parts, press for sources or run a few targeted searches yourself.
Ask follow-ups. “Where did you get that data?”, “Link where that quote was from”, or “Give me the opposing view.” Good prompts shake out hidden errors (especially if you get linked citations).
Level up your learning, not your laziness
Ok, so how can you use AI to level up the right way? Think of it less like a genie for answers and more like an expert tutor who is always on call to help you grow and get smarter. Use AI to help you think, not to think for you.
Your 24/7 Brainstorming Buddy
Sometimes staring at a blank page is tough. Use AI to get the ball rolling. But instead of asking it to "write an essay on the Civil War," start a conversation.
Ask for ideas: "I'm researching social media for a sociology paper. Brainstorm five unique angles I could explore."
Drill down: "That idea about music and memory seems good. Break that down into four potential sub-topics."
Use the AI to explore new connections and see your topic from different angles, but use real databases (like Google Scholar, or Inspire from your library's website) to find your actual sources.
Your Always Patient Personal Tutor
Stuck on a concept in chemistry? Having trouble understanding the reasons behind a historical event? This is where AI can be like having a patient tutor available 24/7. But the key is to use it for understanding, not for answers.
Instead of asking "What's the equation for the reaction between aqueous zinc and ammonia?" try "I'm struggling to understand how chemical equilibrium works. Can you explain it using a simple analogy and then give me a series of increasingly difficult example problems, some including zinc and ammonia in water, and let me work through them step by step with you?"
The goal is to use AI to build your understanding so you can tackle similar problems on your own, not to get quick answers that you'll forget as soon as the test is over.
The Feedback Loop that Helps You Grow
Here's where AI can be genuinely transformative: as a feedback partner for work you've already created. Write your first draft yourself, then ask AI to review it with specific criteria in mind.
You might say: "I wrote this persuasive essay about social media regulation for my government class. The audience is my classmates, and I need to be both informative and convincing. Can you give me feedback on the clarity of my arguments and suggest where I might strengthen my evidence?"
The magic happens when you actually engage with that feedback. Don't just accept the suggestions, but think about why they make sense. If AI suggests you need stronger evidence for a particular point, ask yourself: Do I actually understand this topic well enough to make this argument? Where can I find better sources?
This creates a learning loop where you're constantly building your own capabilities instead of just producing better-looking work.
The next time you're tempted to let AI do the thinking for you, pause and ask: "How can I use this tool to become better at thinking for myself?" That question alone will put you on the right path!
Setting Up Future You for Success
Here's what it comes down to: AI isn't going anywhere. It's going to be part of your academic life, your career, and probably most areas of society unless there’s a Dune-style anti-AI uprising. The question isn't whether you should use it, it's whether you're going to use it in a way that makes you stronger or weaker as a thinker, learner, and problem-solver.
The students who figure out how to use AI as a learning amplifier, who maintain their curiosity, develop their critical thinking skills, and stay in the driver's seat of their own education are going to have opportunities that others miss. They're going to be the ones employers want to hire, the ones who can adapt when technology changes again, and the ones who can use these powerful tools to actually make a difference in the world.
The choice you make about how to use AI today is really a choice about who you want to become. Choose to be someone who thinks critically, who isn't afraid of the hard work of learning, and who uses technology intentionally to amplify your own unique, God-given capabilities.
Your future self will thank you for getting into that better position. And honestly? The journey of actually learning and growing is way more satisfying than any shortcut could ever be.
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