Understand → practice → apply → grow → remain capable
For students
Make AI a learning partner—not a substitute.
Use RAFT to decide when AI helps, when it crosses the line, and how to keep your evidence, reasoning, and voice genuinely yours.
The learning impact test
One question changes the decision.
Am I using AI to enhance my learning—or to bypass it?
Copy → submit → forget → widen the skill gap → depend on the tool
Context matters
Use traffic lights to start the conversation—not replace the rules.
The course and assignment instructions always control. These examples help you recognize when to proceed, pause, or stop.
Generally green
- Generating search terms after your own initial work
- Asking for practice questions from your notes
- Requesting counterarguments to investigate
- Checking grammar without replacing your voice
Pause and check
- Summarizing material you are expected to understand
- Rewriting original work
- AI-assisted data analysis or translation
- Generating creative material when originality is assessed
Generally stop
- Submitting generated work as your own
- Using citations or quotations you did not verify
- Hiding prohibited use
- Outsourcing the central thinking being assessed
Better prompts
Ask AI to strengthen the process, not finish the product.
A bounded prompt makes your role clear and protects the learning goal.
“Here is what I understand so far. Ask me three questions that will reveal gaps in my understanding. Do not give me the answer yet.”
“Identify two reasonable counterarguments to this claim. Give me search terms I can use to research each one.”
“Point out places where my reasoning jumps too quickly. Explain the issue, but do not rewrite the passage.”
“Quiz me on these notes one question at a time. After I answer, explain what is incomplete and ask me to try again.”
Before you submit
The 60-second RAFT check
- Learning: Did I do the thinking this task was designed to assess?
- Evidence: Can I verify every claim and source?
- Voice: Does this reflect what I understand?
- Transparency: Did I follow the AI-use rules?
- Defense: Could I explain this without the AI tool open?