Shadowing Practice: How artificial intelligence is reshaping college for students and professors - Learn English Speaking with YouTube

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AMNA NAWAZ,
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AMNA NAWAZ,
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This year's senior class at universities across the country is the
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first to have spent nearly its entire college career in the age of generative A.I.,
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a type of artificial intelligence that can create new content,
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like text and images.
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As the technology improves, it's harder to distinguish from human work,
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and it's shaking academia to its core with some very big questions.
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Special correspondent Fred DeSam Lazaro has the story for our series, Rethinking College.
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MEGAN FRITZ, And the principle of humanity says treat all people as ends in themselves,
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never merely as means.
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MILES O' About two years ago,
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Megan Fritz, a philosophy professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock,
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began spotting something unusual about her students' writing.
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MEGAN FRITZ, You suddenly get an essay or a test answer,
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some kind of assignment from a student whose normal writing you're familiar with,
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and you get something back that sort of sounds like an official business document or a piece of technical writing,
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writing that sounds very highly polished, but very impersonal.
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MILES O' Impersonal, because it likely wasn't written by a person.
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This was the beginning of a turning point for higher ed, as generative A.I had swept through not only her campus,
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but college campuses across the country.
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A survey last year found that 86 percent of college students are now using AI tools like ChatGPT,
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Claude AI and Google Gemini for schoolwork.
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The reason generative AI has spread so quickly on college campuses is not hard to understand.
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It's transformed tasks that used to take hours,
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even days of writing and revision into something that can be done in mere minutes.
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For example, I can ask ChatGPT,
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write me a 1,000-word essay on the topic of,
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is it OK to lie?
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And using a massive amount of data,
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it predicts and generates sentences on this topic instantly.
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Fritz says the impact has been deeply disruptive.
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FRITZ, If I'm reading the writings of ChatGPT,
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instead of my students, I have lost the very best tool
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that I have to see if I am being effective in my capacity as an instructor or not.
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JOHN YANG, University Policymakers, University Policymakers,
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University Policymakers, University of University BERRY, U.A.
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Little Rock, University University of California,
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University of California, I think the realization over the past year
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and a half is the technology is outpacing our ability to detect it.
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MILES O' Vice Provost of Research Brian Berry leads one of U.A.
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Little Rock's committees tasked with creating clear campus-wide policies on A.I.
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BRIAN BERRY, U.A.
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Little Rock, U.A.
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Little Rock, University of California,
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I think it really comes down to us helping students understand what the students are doing what's at risk,
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helping them understand that if they use AI in the right way,
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it's literally the most powerful tool that they've ever been able to use,
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and it will make huge differences.
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But if they use it in the wrong way,
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it could short circuit their learning process.
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MILES O' The university is finalizing a policy
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that lets professors determine what AI use is acceptable in their classrooms as long as they clearly outline it in their syllabus.
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But for Fritz, who has a strict no-AI policy,
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identifying it has been complicated and time-consuming.
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FRITZ, So, Frasley is one of the softwares that I use.
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If I suspect AI use,
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then the first thing I do is I do use detection softwares.
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I actually use eight different detection softwares.
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FRED DE SAM LAZARO, If her suspicion is confirmed,
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she does meet with the student.
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FRITZ, If they can talk about the thing that they wrote about, then great.
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But a lot of times, they can't.
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That sounds like it's tedious and a lot more work for professors like yourself.
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It certainly cuts into my life quite a bit.
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It at least has sometimes made teaching feel like policing.
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MILES O' And these detection methods are not foolproof.
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Students online say that they're caught in the middle.
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I have been falsely accused by my university of using AI to write a paper.
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My final paper got detected as 60 percent AI.
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We might be about to find out if I'm going to falsely get kicked out of college.
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JEFFREY BROWN, Ashley Dunn, University of Louisiana State University,
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when she was accused of using A.I to write a short essay for a British literature class,
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after a detection tool flagged her writing last year.
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ASHLEY DUNN, University of Louisiana State University,
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And I was like, am I going to fail this class?
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Am I going to get a zero?
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Every college takes plagiarism and that kind of thing very seriously.
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So I was just freaking out.
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JEFFREY BROWN, University of Louisiana State University,
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After communicating with her professor,
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Dunn says she was eventually given an A for the assignment,
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But the response to her on TikTok proves that this is a widespread issue.
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A lot of people ended up making responses to my video,
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pretty much saying that they had gone through the same thing,
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but that they didn't really get as lucky that they ended up either getting zeros or failing the class.
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Some people recently have been making videos about,
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you know, oh, my professor said that my essay was AI because I used an em dash.
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But that's just a regular way of writing,
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especially for a college level.
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You're going to be asked to go out and venture into Gen AI.
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FRED DE SAM LAZARO, Ph.D.: Not all schools are anti-AI.
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Some are actually looking for ways to embrace it.
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Lori Kendall teaches an entrepreneurship class in the Fisher College of Business at The Ohio State University.
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LORI KENDALL, Ph.D.: When Gen AI came out,
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I and every other instructor did, oh, great, now what?
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Do we allow AI?
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Do we not allow AI?
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And the reality is, you know what?
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They may use it anyway.
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FRED DE SAM LAZARO, Ph.D.: She now encourages her students to use AI to critically examine their original work
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and as a learning aid.
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RACHEL GERVES, A lot of people might use AI just to get assignments done,
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plagiarism, but I like to use AI just for a deeper understanding.
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PAUL SOLMAN, RACHEL GERVES, First-Year Student, Majoring in Air Transportation.
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RACHEL GERVES, I oftentimes use AI to create questions regarding this topic,
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so I not only get a better understanding of the actual material,
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but I also can test and see what I need to maybe focus on even more.
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If you don't use AI or the next technology that comes along to be more effective,
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you're not going to be competitive in the job market.
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The job market is changing right underneath your feet.
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RAVI BELLONKORNDA, Chief Academic Officer,
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Chief Academic Officer, I get to decide on academic integrity issues,
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honor code and violations.
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MILES O' Ravi Bellonkonda is executive vice president and provost at Ohio State University.
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He says he was struck by one alleged violation last year,
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a student accused of using A.I.
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It was a case of cheating,
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he says, but it made him think.
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BELAM KONDA SPEERHEADED OHIO STATE'S NEW AI FLUENCY INITIATIVE,
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which requires all undergraduate students across academic disciplines learn and use AI tools.
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DR. HALA HANI, The trick is to figure out,
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like any human interaction with technology,
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what can we offload to technology,
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and what do we need to add the value to?
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Ohio State wants to be at the front of that creation of those rules.
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That's prompted experimentation across the disciplines,
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like music professor Tina Tallon's AI and Music class,
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which explores innovative uses of the technology.
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I always start the class by asking them to think about a challenge in their field.
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At that point, we're not even talking about AI about A.I.
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I just want them to identify something that either they've run up against or that their students or their colleagues have.
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FRED DE SAM LAZARO, University of California,
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One member of her class,
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tuba instructor and doctoral student Will Resch, is using A.I to analyze airflow into his instrument over thousands of repetitions.
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The data will help guide students on how to play the perfect note.
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Another Natalia Moreno-Buitrago is a music education grad student studying how babies acquire musical knowledge.
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She used to spend hours combing through home recordings of research subjects,
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listening for moments when parents or caregivers sing or hum around the infant.
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Now AI does this for her.
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DR. ANNA KALA, If we critically examine the tools that we're engaging with and are actively involved in the development of them,
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I think we can do some pretty incredible things.
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MILES O' But, inevitably, these tools also bring major disruption to academia and to the jobs students hope to someday fill.
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FRED DE SAM LAZARO, How do we go through a transformative moment like this,
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with the disruptions that it is going to cause,
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and yet do this in a way that ultimately is additive to us as a society,
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that it improves our lives as human beings?
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FRED DE SAM LAZARO, A question without a clear answer,
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he says, but one that students should help tackle.
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For the PBS NewsHour, I'm Fred De Sam Lazaro in Columbus, Ohio.
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you Thank
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you.

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About This Lesson

In this lesson, you will practice your English speaking skills by engaging with a transcript that discusses how artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping higher education for students and professors. You will explore the implications of generative AI in academic settings and how it is influencing writing and learning processes. By shadow speaking the dialogue, you will improve your fluency, intonation, and comprehension, which are essential for any English-speaking practice, including IELTS speaking practice.

Key Vocabulary & Phrases

  • Generative AI: A type of artificial intelligence that can create new content, such as text and images.
  • Impersonal: A writing style that lacks personal touch or emotional connection.
  • Detection Software: Tools used to identify whether a piece of writing was generated by AI.
  • Policing: Monitoring student behavior and ensuring academic integrity.
  • Framework: A structured approach to implementing new policies or systems.
  • Short circuit: To interfere with the normal functioning of something.
  • Academic Integrity: Adhering to ethical principles in educational settings, particularly concerning plagiarism.
  • Essay: A short piece of writing on a particular subject.

Practice Tips

To enhance your speaking skills using the shadowing technique, follow these practice tips tailored for the video:

  • Listen Actively: Play the video or audio at a comfortable speed. Focus closely on the pronunciation, tone, and rhythm of the speakers.
  • Repeat Immediately: As you hear each sentence, pause briefly and repeat what you've heard. This will help you mimic the intonation and style of speech.
  • Focus on Key Phrases: Pay special attention to the vocabulary and phrases listed above. Try using them in your sentences to build familiarity.
  • Practice with Varied Speed: Experiment with different playback speeds. Start by shadow speaking at normal speed, then gradually increase the speed as you become more comfortable.
  • Record Yourself: Capture your own voice while shadow speaking. Listening to your recordings will help you identify areas for improvement in your pronunciation and fluency.
  • Engage in Discussions: After practicing, discuss the content with a friend or language partner. This will also prepare you for IELTS speaking practice by developing your conversational skills.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

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