how to cheat on science homework

StudyMonkey

Your personal ai tutor.

Learn Smarter, Not Harder with AI

Introducing StudyMonkey, your AI-powered tutor .

StudyMonkey AI can tutor complex homework questions, enhance your essay writing and assess your work—all in seconds.

No more long all-nighters

24/7 solutions to questions you're stumped on and essays you procrastinated on.

No more stress and anxiety

Get all your assignments done with helpful answers in 10 seconds or less.

No more asking friends for help

StudyMonkey is your new smart bestie that will never ghost you.

No more staying after school

AI tutoring is available 24/7, on-demand when you need it most.

AI Tutor for any subject

American college testing (act), anthropology, advanced placement exams (ap exams), arabic language, archaeology, biochemistry, chartered financial analyst (cfa) exam, communications, computer science, certified public accountant (cpa) exam, cultural studies, cyber security, dental admission test (dat), discrete mathematics, earth science, elementary school, entrepreneurship, environmental science, essay writer, farsi (persian) language, fundamentals of engineering (fe) exam, gender studies, graduate management admission test (gmat), graduate record examination (gre), greek language, hebrew language, high school entrance exam, high school, human geography, human resources, international english language testing system (ielts), information technology, international relations, independent school entrance exam (isee), lesson planner, linear algebra, linguistics, law school admission test (lsat), machine learning, master's degree, medical college admission test (mcat), meteorology, microbiology, middle school, national council licensure examination (nclex), national merit scholarship qualifying test (nmsqt), number theory, organic chemistry, project management professional (pmp), political science, portuguese language, probability, project management, preliminary sat (psat), public policy, public relations, russian language, scholastic assessment test (sat), social sciences, secondary school admission test (ssat), sustainability, swahili language, test of english as a foreign language (toefl), trigonometry, turkish language, united states medical licensing examination (usmle), web development, step-by-step guidance 24/7.

Receive step-by-step guidance & homework help for any homework problem & any subject 24/7

Ask any question

StudyMonkey supports every subject and every level of education from 1st grade to masters level.

Get an answer

StudyMonkey will give you an answer in seconds—multiple choice questions, short answers, and even an essays are supported!

Review your history

See your past questions and answers so you can review for tests and improve your grades.

It's not cheating...

You're just learning smarter than everyone else

How Can StudyMonkey Help You?

Hear from our happy students.

"The AI tutor is available 24/7, making it a convenient and accessible resource for students who need help with their homework at any time."

"Overall, StudyMonkey is an excellent tool for students looking to improve their understanding of homework topics and boost their academic success."

Upgrade to StudyMonkey Premium!

Why not upgrade to StudyMonkey Premium and get access to all features?

Click to choose an image or drag it here

• AI Math Solver

A Simple, Fast, and Intelligent AI Homework Helper

HomeworkAI Is The Ultimate AI Homework Helper You Need

Struggling with piles of homework and tricky assignments? Let HomeworkAI help you out! Our smart AI homework helper delivers detailed, step-by-step solutions, transforming study sessions into smooth sailing.

Covering all subjects, from complex calculus to intricate biology, our homework AI is here to ease the stress and boost your grades. Say hello to effortless learning and wave goodbye to study blues with HomeworkAI!

Get Instant Answers From Our Homework AI

Description: This is how to unlock comprehensive answers and master your studies with our homework AI, in a fast, accurate, and educational fashion.

Upload Your Assignment - Simply upload images, text files, or type your question to get started.

AI Processing - Our advanced AI homework helper will process your assignment and provide detailed, accurate solutions.

Learn & Understand - Review the step-by-step guidance to improve your knowledge and complete your homework with confidence.

Gain Academic Advantages From HomeworkAI's Top Features

Instant Solutions

Quick, clear-cut answers are just a click away with an instant AI homework helper—skip the headache and let our homework AI do the heavy lifting for you.

Maximum Accuracy

Count on Homework AI for spot-on answers. Our advanced AI algorithm digs deep into a vast knowledge base to ensure you get the most accurate solutions every time.

Around-the-Clock Help

Day or night, our homework AI is at your beck and call, ready to dismantle any academic obstacle you encounter, so learning never has to pause for a break.

Comprehensive Support

Whatever the subject, our intelligent AI homework helper has you covered. Get expert help from algebra equations to zoological classifications with ease.

Easy to Use

Enjoy a super user-friendly platform with our homework AI, tailored to empower students and academic professionals at every level to navigate through assignments with confidence.

Our Homework AI Can Help You With All Subjects !

Turn to HomeworkAI for tailored homework and assignment assistance in every subject of your choice.

Mathematics

Solve complex equations and tackle calculus challenges with our AI-powered homework helper that turns numbers into knowledge.

From cellular structures to ecosystem dynamics, easily manage your biology assignments with clear, detailed explanations.

Balance chemical equations and understand reaction mechanisms with a quick online problem solver that simplifies the periodic table.

Analyze literary themes and decipher figurative language with insights that breathe new life into classic texts.

Connect historical dots with ease, as HomeworkAI helps you interpret events and understand their lasting impacts.

Discover Success Stories with Our Homework AI

Ever since using HomeworkAI for my math homework, studying has been way less stressful, and I can say that I'm enjoying math now. My grades are up and I actually get the hang of algebra now!

- Priya K., University Sophomore

I was dreading chemistry all semester, but HomeworkAI totally turned that around. I'm now breaking down reactions and acing quizzes with confidence. The step-by-step solutions it provides are a lifesaver for someone like me! Totally recommended. 

- Marcus D., High School Junior

HomeworkAI made sense of all those crazy bio terms I could never remember. HomeworkAI’s explanations have made it manageable. My test scores are also much better, and I'm not a bundle of nerves anymore!

- Lina J., College Freshman

No more panicking over biology assignments with this AI homework helper!! Nailed my biology midterm, all thanks to HomeworkAI! It's like having a tutor in my pocket, ready to help with homework anytime, day or night.

- Carlos M., High School Senior

Why HomeworkAI Is Your Go-To AI Homework Helper ?

What types of files can I upload to HomeworkAI?

HomeworkAI supports a variety of file formats, including text files such as PDF, DOC, DOCX, and image files like JPEG and PNG. This allows you to easily upload assignments, worksheets, and questions in the format that best suits your needs.

Is HomeworkAI suitable for all educational levels?

Yes, HomeworkAI is tailored for students and educational professionals of all levels—from middle schoolers to university undergrads—providing support and solutions customized to each educational stage.

Can HoweworkAI process practice questions from textbook material?

Yes. Simply upload the textbook material with practice questions, and our homework AI will analyze them to provide detailed solutions and explanations, just as it would with any other homework assignment or study query.

Does getting help from HomeworkAI considered cheating?

HomeworkAI is an AI question answerer designed to aid your learning process, much like a traditional tutor. Thus, utilizing HomeworkAI may not be considered cheating, as long as it aligns with your institution's guidelines for using external help.

Can I use HomeworkAI to prepare for my exam?

Absolutely, HomeworkAI can be an effective tool for exam preparation. It offers practice questions, solutions, and thorough explanations to help reinforce your understanding of the subject matter, giving you an extra edge in your study routine.

How does HomeworkAI handle problems with multiple solution methods?

HomeworkAI does have the ability to handle problems with multiple solution methods. It can provide a primary solution and, where applicable, may offer alternative approaches or explanations to give you a well-rounded understanding of the problem at hand.

Get Your Hands on The Best AI Homework Helper Right Now !

HomeworkAI doesn't just deliver answers—it teaches problem-solving, becoming your ultimate homework companion.

7 Apps That Can Do Your Homework Much Faster Than You

In the field of educational technology, some apps might be getting too smart.

More and more apps are delivering on-demand homework help to students, who can easily re-purpose the learning tools to obtain not just assistance, but also answers. Whether or not that’s cheating—and how to stop it—is one of the concerns surrounding a new app that can solve math equations with the snap of a camera . While the software has inspired teachers to create real-world homework problems that can’t be automatically solved , that strategy doesn’t hold up to other apps that tap into real-life brains for solutions.

Here’s a look at 7 apps that can do your homework for you, and what they have to say about cheating:

Price : Free Availability : iOS, Android app coming in early 2015

The new, seemingly magic app allows users to take pictures of typed equations, and then outputs a step-by-step solution. As of Wednesday, the app is the number one free app on the App Store. But the biggest issue, one teacher argues , isn’t if students will use the app to cheat, because many will. Rather, it’s about how teachers will adapt. A PhotoMath spokeswoman said educators have welcomed the app with positive reviews, but the software remains “quite controversial.”

“We didn’t develop PhotoMath as a cheating tool. We really wanted kids to learn,” said Tijana Zganec, a sales and marketing associate at tech company MicroBlink, which created PhotoMath. “If you want to cheat, you will find a way to cheat. But if you want to learn, you can use PhotoMath for that.”

Whether you’re a high schooler with eight periods of classes or a college student tackling dozens of credits, there’s one thing you’ve got for sure: a mess of assignments. iHomework can help you keep track of all your work, slicing and dicing it in a variety of ways. Sorting it by due date, week, month, or by course, the app is more organized than a Trapper Keeper. And in integrating data from Questia, you can link your reading material to your assignments so you don’t have to dig through a pile of papers to find the right information.

A scheduling feature can help you keep track of those random bi-weekly Thursday labs, and you can even mark the location of your courses on a map so you don’t end up on the wrong side of campus. And finally, with iCloud syncing, you can access all this information on whatever Apple-compatible device you’re using at the moment — no need to dig for your iPad.

Google Apps for Education

Taking the search giant’s suite of free browser-based apps and sandboxing them so they are safe for school use, Google Apps for Education is an excellent alternative to the mainstream installable productivity software, but this one has a perk that almost school board will love—it’s free. Packaging together favorites like Gmail, Hangouts, Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Drive with Classroom, a digital hub for organizing assignments and sending feedback, the goal of this collection is to make learning a more collaborative process.

Though Google Apps for Education is cloud-hosted, the programs can be used offline, ideal for when your student needs to escape the internet and work distraction-free. And since it works on any device, it also helps students avoid buying overly expensive hardware. That means more money for extracurricular activities.

Price: Free, but some homework services require payment Availability: iOS and Android

HwPic is a tutoring service that allows students to take send pictures of their homework to tutors, who will then respond within minutes to your questions with a step-by-step solution. There’s even an option to expedite the answers if a student is in a hurry. HwPic Co-Founder Tiklat Issa said that the app was initially rejected by Apple’s App Store, which believed it would promote cheating, but he successfully argued that just because someone uses the app in a way that it’s not meant to be used doesn’t mean the app should be punished.

Issa added that HwPic prohibits cheating in its terms and conditions. Tutors don’t solve homework that has words like “Quiz” or “Exam,” and they often know if a student is sending a photo during a test if they’ve paid for expedited answers, and if the photo is dim, blurry and taken under a desk. “We’ve minimized cheating,” said Issa. “We haven’t eliminated it. That’s kind of unrealistic.”

Wolfram Alpha

Price : $2.99 Availability : iOS and Android

Wolfram Alpha is similar to PhotoMath, only that it targets older students studying high levels of math and doesn’t support photos. The service also outputs step-by-step solutions to topics as advanced as vector calculus and differential equations, making it a popular tool for college students.

“It’s cheating not doing computer-based math, because we’re cheating students out of real conceptual understanding and an ability to drive much further forward in the math they can do, to cover much more conceptual ground. And in turn, that’s cheating our economies,” said Conrad Wolfram, Wolfram Research’s Director of Strategic Development, in a TEDx Talk . “People talk about the knowledge economy. I think we’re moving forward to what we’re calling the computational knowledge economy.”

Homework Helper

Price: Free Availability: iOS and Android

Chinese Internet search company Baidu launched an app called Homework Helper this year with which students can crowdsource help or answers to homework. Users post a picture or type their homework questions onto online forums, and those who answer the questions can win e-coins that can be used to buy electronics like iPhones and laptops.

The app has logged 5 million downloads, much to the dismay of many some parents who argue that the students spend less time thinking about challenging problems. A Homework Helper staffer admitted to Quartz , “I think this is a kind of cheating.”

Price: Free, but some homework services require payment Availability: iOS

Slader is a crowdsourcing app for high school and college students to post and answer questions in math and science. While students can post original homework for help, many questions in popular textbooks have already been answered on the app, according to Fast Company . An Illinois high school said earlier this year that it suspected students were using the service to cheat on their math homework.

Slader argues that it’s “challenging traditional ideas about math and education,” and said that the ideas behind its app “aren’t a write-off to teachers,” according to its blog . Slader told San Francisco media outlet KQED that it shouldn’t be dismissed as a cheating tool, but rather considered a way for students to access real-time help.

More Must-Reads from TIME

• The 100 Most Influential People in AI 2024
• Inside the Rise of Bitcoin-Powered Pools and Bathhouses
• How Nayib Bukele’s ‘Iron Fist’ Has Transformed El Salvador
• What Makes a Friendship Last Forever?
• Long COVID Looks Different in Kids
• Your Questions About Early Voting , Answered
• Column: Your Cynicism Isn’t Helping Anybody
• The 32 Most Anticipated Books of Fall 2024

Contact us at [email protected]

Homework Q&A

Drag image here or click to upload

• Anatomy & Physiology
• Astrophysics
• Earth Science
• Environmental Science
• Organic Chemistry
• Precalculus
• Trigonometry
• English Grammar
• U.S. History
• World History

HIX Tutor AI Homework Helper

Solve hard problems and prepare for exams with a trustworthy homework AI!

AI Homework Helper That's Got Everything Covered

Say goodbye to your homework and exam stress! Make studying a joy with HIX Tutor, a smart AI homework helper. Get detailed, step-by-step solutions to any hard homework and exam problems.

Accuracy-Guaranteed Homework AI

HIX Tutor uses the power of the latest GPT models but goes beyond just that. With our tailored enhancements, it provides quick, precise, and comprehensive homework assistance for all subjects.

Accuracy rate

Average grade increase

How Our Homework AI Works?

Our homework AI is designed to help you master your study with ease.

Ask Your Question

Upload the document or image of your homework problem, or type your question.

We Run the Analysis

Our advanced homework AI will analyze the questions and prepare the solutions.

Get The Detailed Answer

Get the detailed, step-by-step AI answer, ready to be used on your homework.

AI Homework Helper That Covers All Subjects

HIX Tutor is a trusted AI question solver for your homework in any subject.

From basic arithmetic to advanced calculus, get understandable steps for complex math problems.

Demystify topics ranging from basic mechanics to advanced electromagnetism with detailed solutions

Dive into the depths of prose, poetry, and plays. Analyze themes, decipher metaphors, and understand historical contexts

Chemistry AI

Guide yourself through chemical equation balancing, reaction mechanisms, and periodic trends. Solve chemistry problems faster than ever.

Clarify doubts, and get insights on complex processes and terminologies. Get accurate answers to hard biology questions.

Foreign Languages

Master vocabulary, grammar, and conversation practice. Achieve fluency more easily in any language.

Distinctive Question AI

See why our question AI outperforms other competitors out there:

Well-Explained Answers

HIX Tutor doesn't just give you the answer only, but also offers a comprehensive explanation and a step-by-step guide to enhance your understanding.

Various Inputs Supported

You can simply type your question, or upload the document or image containing your question to ask HIX Tutor for help.

Instant Study Help

HIX Tutor is ready to solve any question you have 24/7. Feed it the problem, and you'll get accurate answers in a flash.

Why Rely On Our AI Question Solver?

What is homework AI?

Homework AI refers to advanced AI tools created to help students with their homework and academic assignments. These tools use sophisticated algorithms to offer immediate solutions, explanations, and assistance in various subjects, such as math, science, and literature.

Is HIX Tutor's question AI free?

Yes, Our question AI is free to try! You can access our features without any cost initially. However, if you require extensive usage beyond the free limit, you will need to upgrade to a paid subscription for continued access.

What's the best AI homework helper?

The best AI homework helper currently available is HIX Tutor. This innovative tool is designed to assist students across a wide range of subjects, providing instant and accurate answers to homework questions. HIX Tutor stands out due to its ability to analyze complex problems and deliver detailed, step-by-step solutions, making studying more efficient and enjoyable.

How does HIX Tutor provide help with homework?

HIX Tutor offers step-by-step solutions and detailed explanations to help you understand and solve homework questions. It can assist with your study in various subjects including math, physics, chemistry, biology, and more.

Is HIX Tutor a homework AI for both high school and college students?

Yes, HIX Tutor is designed to cater to the academic needs of both high school and college students, adjusting the complexity of explanations and solutions to match the level of the student.

As an AI question solver, can HIX Tutor help me prepare for exams?

Absolutely. HIX Tutor's question AI can provide instant answers to practice questions and explain complex concepts to help you prepare effectively for your exams.

How accurate is HIX Tutor as a homework AI helper?

HIX Tutor is built with advanced algorithms and is regularly updated to ensure about 98% accuracy in solving problems and providing explanations. However, as with any tool, it's recommended to cross-check solutions when possible.

Will using our question AI be considered cheating?

Our question AI tool is intended as a study aid to enhance learning and understanding. It's important to use it responsibly and abide by your school or institution's academic integrity policies.

Can this AI homework helper tackle textbook material?

Yes, our AI homework helper can explain concepts presented in textbooks, clarify difficult ideas, and solve practice problems to enhance your comprehension of the material.

Does this homework AI offer personalized learning experiences?

Yes, our homework AI adapts to your own learning requirements, offering personalized feedback and solutions based on your specific needs and progress.

Discover Accurate Answers to Frequently Asked Homework Questions

• How is blood in the feet returned to the heart against the force of gravity?
• Are muscles and glands part of the central nervous system, receptors, part of the peripheral nervous system, or effectors?
• What is the longest cranial nerve?
• What is the pH of carbon dioxide? What is the pH of carbon dioxide?
• What is the medical term for the eardrum?
• How do sweat glands protect the human body?
• What is an infarct of right and left parietal lobes of brain?
• What changes occur in a human body after death?
• Bones are part of which system?
• What is the purpose of the microvilli of the small intestine?
• What is the distance from earth to the planet pluto in meters?
• Do any other planet in our solar system have Iron metal, not necessarily in the core?
• What is the brightest planet seen from earth?
• How does red shift relate to the universe?
• Why do astronomers try to find the distance to stars using parallax?
• Is our solar system really a binary star system?
• Does the solar system change over time?
• How far is the sun from earth in light years?
• What causes day and night and different seasons?
• What is the parallax formula?
• How can meteorites be interplanetary arks?
• How does luminosity differ from the brightness of the same object as seen at the earth?
• How can solar flares affect communications on earth?
• Light from the sun travels through space to Earth's atmosphere. What will light waves do when they move from empty space into matter made up of different gases?
• How can parallax be used to determine distances?
• When can the zodiacal light be seen during the night?
• In which layer of the atmosphere are the ionized particles that cause the aurora borealis?
• What makes the speed of light exactly 299,792,458 metres per second?
• What is the temperature of betelgeuse?
• What is a magnetic field? How were they formed?
• What term defines a gene made up of two different alleles?
• How do stomata help conserve water?
• What is in atp that ADP also has?
• Why do materials diffuse across a membrane?
• How are angiosperms and gymnosperms related?
• How are the long DNA molecules found in eukaryotes packed into short chromosomes?
• Why is a species hard to define?
• What is the importance of matter cycles to an ecosystem?
• Are protists autotroph or heterotroph?
• What is the taxonomic classification of a horse?
• How many electrons are in an isotope of nitrogen with 8 neutrons?
• A given volume of a buffer solution contains #6.85 x 10^-3# mol of the weak acid HY and #2.98 x 10^-3# mol of the salt NaY. The pH of the buffer solution is 3.78. How do you calculate the value of #pKa# for the acid HY at this temperature?
• A sample of hydrogen gas is mixed with water vapor. The mixture has a total pressure of 745torr, and the water vapor has a partial pressure of 24 torr. What is the partial pressure of the hydrogen gas?
• For the reaction, #"2XO + O"_2 → "2XO"_2#, data obtained from measurement of the initial rate of reaction at varying concentrations are?
• How much calcium metal must be added to an excess of water to produce 3.7g of calcium hydroxide?
• What are the mole fractions of each component prepared by adding #5*g# of water to #95*g# of ethanol?
• What is the value of the equilibrium constant at 655 K for each of the following reactions?
• Calculate no. Of photons emitted by a 60 watt light bulb in 10 h if a bulb emitted least 6.62 A°?
• What is the atomic number of carbon?
• Why did Mendeleev have problems arranging the elements #Te# and #I#?
• Why do sedimentary rocks have layers?
• Does every rock go through the complete rock cycle, from igneous rock to sedimentary rock to metamorphic rock and back to igneous rock, each time around?
• What is the difference between lava and magma?
• What are the three factors that contribute the most to the formation of coastal currents?
• What are two recreational activities that can speed up weathering by exposing new rock surfaces?
• What is convection and how is it related to the mantle?
• How does the sun affect the solar system?
• What traps solar energy in the atmosphere?
• What is residence time and what are the average residence time for some of the major water reservoirs on earth?
• How do soils differ from sediments?
• What does the mining reclamation process look like?
• When did the world population reach 1 billion?
• Where is an elephant on the food pyramid?
• Is natural selection a law or theory?
• How does the rock cycle affect the atmosphere of the earth?
• What does the future of nuclear energy around the world look like?
• Do living organisms defy the second law of thermodynamics?
• What are some positive and negative impacts of agriculture?
• What are four examples of air pollutants?
• How can nuclear energy be improved?
• How is #NH_3 # acting in the reaction #H^++:NH_3 ->[H:NH_3]^+#according to the Lewis definition?
• What is ethyl alcohol used for?
• How can benzene be separated from thiophene chemically?
• Are aromatic amines less basic?
• What does "cis" isomer mean in cyclohexane ring?
• How do you draw geometric isomers?
• What amino acid has an aromatic ring in its side chain?
• How are SN1 and SN2 reactions different?
• How can I read a #C^13 NMR# spectrum?
• Why are there different Newman projections for one molecule in organic chemistry?
• If a worker pulls a 10kg bucket up a 25 m well, how much work has he or she done?
• If a projectile is shot at a velocity of #2 m/s# and an angle of #pi/6#, how far will the projectile travel before landing?
• The force applied against a moving object travelling on a linear path is given by #F(x)= sinx + 2 #. How much work would it take to move the object over #x in [ 0, (7 pi) / 8 ] #?
• A charge of #18 C# passes through a circuit every #4 s#. If the circuit can generate #24 W# of power, what is the circuit's resistance?
• A projectile is shot at an angle of #pi/8 # and a velocity of # 8 m/s#. How far away will the projectile land?
• What is the kinetic energy of a #8 kg# object moving at #5/4 m/s#?
• A ball with a mass of #350 g# is projected vertically by a spring loaded contraption. The spring in the contraption has a spring constant of #9 (kg)/s^2# and was compressed by #7/4 m# when the ball was released. How high will the ball go?
• An electric toy car with a mass of #5 kg# is powered by a motor with a voltage of #12 V# and a current supply of #1 A#. How long will it take for the toy car to accelerate from rest to #3 m/s#?
• A projectile is shot from the ground at an angle of #pi/12 # and a speed of #8 /3 m/s#. Factoring in both horizontal and vertical movement, what will the projectile's distance from the starting point be when it reaches its maximum height?
• A model train with a mass of #4 kg# is moving along a track at #9 (cm)/s#. If the curvature of the track changes from a radius of #36 cm# to #24 cm#, by how much must the centripetal force applied by the tracks change?
• How do you simplify #\frac { 18x ^ { 4} y ^ { 3} } { 24x ^ { 2} y ^ { 3} }#?
• How do you factor # 2x^2 - 13x#?
• How do find the vertex and axis of symmetry, and intercepts for a quadratic equation #y=x^2-7x-28#?
• How do you find the c that makes the trinomial #x^2+22x+c# a perfect square?
• What is the vertex of # y= 4(x+2)^2-2x^2-4x+3#?
• How do you write the quadratic in vertex form given #y=x^2-5#?
• How do you factor completely #2x^3+10x^2+14x+70#?
• How do you solve using the completing the square method #x^2 + 2x = 7#?
• What is the axis of symmetry and vertex for the graph #y= -7x^2#?
• How do you write #y = x^2 - 9x - 10# into vertex form?
• What is the derivative of #f(x)=(x^2-4)ln(x^3/3-4x)#?
• How do you differentiate #cos(pi*x^2)#?
• What is the derivative of #y=sin(tan2x)#?
• What is the derivative of this function #arcsec(x^3)#?
• What is the derivative of this function #y=sin^-1(2x)#?
• What is the derivative of this function #sin^-1(x/4)#?
• How do you differentiate #(3+sin(x))/(3x+cos(x))#?
• How do you differentiate #f(x)= 1/ (lnx)# using the quotient rule?
• How do you find the derivative of #y=tan(3x)# ?
• How do you differentiate #g(y) =(60x^2+74)( 2x+2) # using the product rule?
• How can we find the area of irregular shapes?
• A triangle has corners at #(5 ,1 )#, #(2 ,9 )#, and #(4 ,3 )#. What is the area of the triangle's circumscribed circle?
• What is the trinomial that represents the area of a rectangular rug whose sides are (x+3) feet and (2x-1) feet?
• A triangle has corners at #(5 ,6 )#, #(4 ,3 )#, and #(2 ,2 )#. What is the area of the triangle's circumscribed circle?
• What is the area of the quadrilateral bounded by #y=5#; #x=1#; #y=1#; and #y=-2x+9#?
• How is the formula for the area of a parallelogram ABCD derived?
• Circle A has a center at #(2 ,5 )# and a radius of #2 #. Circle B has a center at #(4 ,-1 )# and a radius of #6 #. Do the circles overlap? If not, what is the smallest distance between them?
• An equilateral triangle is circumscribed inside a circle with a radius of 6. What is the area of the triangle?
• Two corners of an isosceles triangle are at #(5 ,8 )# and #(9 ,2 )#. If the triangle's area is #36 #, what are the lengths of the triangle's sides?
• How do you find the circumference of a circle with a diameter of 7.5 in?
• Jeanie has a 3/4 yard piece of ribbon. She needs one 3/8 yard piece and one 1/2 yard piece. Can she cut the piece of ribbon into the two smaller pieces? Why?
• How do you find the GCF of #25k, 35j#?
• How do you write 132/100 in a mixed number?
• How do you evaluate the power #2^3#?
• How do you simplify #(4^6)^2 #?
• How do you convert 3.2 tons to pounds?
• How do you solve #\frac { 5} { 8} + \frac { 3} { 2} ( 4- \frac { 1} { 4} ) - \frac { 1} { 8}#?
• Tiffany pays $40 for 160 minutes of talk time on her cell phone. How many minutes of talk time does she get per dollar?
• Jay made 8 of 10 free throws. Kim made 25 of 45. Who made free throws at the better rate?
• How do you convert the word phrase to symbols. "The product of twenty and eight, increased by ten?"
• How do you describe the end behavior for #f(x)=x^4-x^2-2#?
• How do you find vertical, horizontal and oblique asymptotes for #y = (4x^3 + x^2 + x + 5 )/( x^2 + 3x)#?
• How do you find all the asymptotes for function #y=(3x^2+2x-1)/(x^2-4 )#?
• How do you find the asymptotes for #f(x) = (x^2) / (x^2 + 1)#?
• How do you find #f(x)# and #g(x)# when #h(x)= (x+1)^2 -9(x+1)# and #h(x)= (fog)(x)#?
• How do you determine whether the graph of #y^2+3x=0# is symmetric with respect to the x axis, y axis or neither?
• How do you determine whether the graph of #y^2=(4x^2)/9-4# is symmetric with respect to the x axis, y axis, the line y=x or y=-x, or none of these?
• How do you find the inverse of #y=x^(2)-6x+4# and is it a function?
• How do you write a rule for the nth term of the arithmetic sequence and then find #a_10# for #d=5, a_5=33#?
• How do you solve #2^(x-1)=23#?
• A set of data contains 200 elements. How do you find the median of the data?
• What is the variance of a binomial distribution for which n = 75 and p = 0.20?
• Given 9 starting batters on a baseball team, how many batting orders are possible if the shortstop must bat first and the right fielder must bat fourth?
• What is the value of a? P(X≥a)=0.5
• Can someone help me answer this question?
• If you roll a die three times, how many different sequences are possible?
• What does an R-Squared value indicate about a linear regression?
• On a spinner, #P(3) = 2/5# and the #P(4) = 3/8#, what is the probability of getting 3 or 4?
• What is the z-score of sample X, if #n = 81, mu= 43, St. Dev. =90, and E[X] =57#?
• Suppose that the temperature is normally distributed with expectation 50℃ and variance 4℃.What is the probability that the temperature T will be between 48℃ and 53℃?What is the probability that T≥52℃?
• How can you verify #sinx/(sinx+cosx)=(cotx-1)/(cotx+1)# by only manipulating the left side?
• How do you identify the point (x,y) on the unit circle that corresponds to t=-11pi/4?
• How do you use the half angle formulas to simplify the expression #-sqrt((1-cos8x)/(1+cos8x))#?
• How do you solve this trigonometric equation?
• How do you write #2 +4i# in trigonometric form?
• A triangle has sides A, B, and C. Sides A and B have lengths of 4 and 3, respectively. The angle between A and C is #(pi)/3# and the angle between B and C is # (pi)/4#. What is the area of the triangle?
• If #A = <5 ,2 ,8 >#, #B = <2 ,5 ,6 ># and #C=A-B#, what is the angle between A and C?
• How do you solve (2sinx+1)(sinx-1)=0?
• How do you prove # (cosA - cotA) / ( 1 - sinA) = - cotA#?
• How do you sketch y=2sinx when x is between 0 and 360?
• What is an intransitive complete verb?
• Is "Let's don't." grammatically correct?
• What is the difference between a metaphor and a symbol?
• What is the future tense of "lay"? I am using it in a line of a poem.
• Is "fur coat" a compound noun? For example, "First, its husky build and heavy fur coat allowed the Samoyed to sand changes in temperature."
• What are some examples of antithesis?
• What does this aphorism mean: "the doors of wisdom are never shut."? It is by Benjamin Franklin. What message was Franklin trying to send to the 18th century Americans when he wrote it?
• How can you rewrite the following sentence from the first-person perspective of someone in the sentence?: They bought a coat and gave it to the homeless man on the corner.
• I want to write a counterargument in an argumentative essay, but I have a hard time "un"-proving the point I bring up from the other side of the argument. Should I pick a new point?
• What is the collective noun for whales?
• Why did Lincoln need the support of the border states?
• What proposal was included in Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton's financial plans in the 1790s?
• When did the first American combat troops arrive in Vietnam?
• Which Great Awakening preacher warned people that God would punish them if they did not change their ways?
• What are the advantages to Marshall's "broad" interpretation of the Constitution? What are its disadvantages?
• What act of U.S. expansion was the direct result of Matthew Perry's naval journey to Japan?
• How does the baby boom illustrates a break from Depression Era American life?
• Do you agree with Susan B. Anthony that women should receive equal pay for equal work?
• Under President Ronald Reagan, the United States had the largest peacetime military buildup in history. How was this a challenge to the Soviet Union?
• What was the first act that the Parliament passed in an attempt to raise revenue by taxing the American colonists?
• What other nations joined Germany in forming the Axis Powers?
• Which group has dominated Russia's politics throughout most of its history?
• What kind of relationship did the Soviet Union have with the United States in 1945?
• What does this logo stand for?
• How and why did Africans come to Latin America?
• How did the the Zionist movement lead to the creation of the State of Israel?
• How would you describe USA and Italy's intentions behind the terms of the Treaty of Versailles?
• Bolivia is one of two landlocked countries in South America. What is the other country?
• What inventions sped up communication beginning in the late 19th century?
• How were early factories powered and who created the first factory?

Get Started with Our Free Homework AI Now!

Struggling with homework? HIX Tutor is here to help! Get instant answers and step-by-step solutions—start your free trial today!

• PRO Courses Guides New Tech Help Pro Expert Videos About wikiHow Pro Upgrade Sign In
• EDIT Edit this Article
• EXPLORE Tech Help Pro About Us Random Article Quizzes Request a New Article Community Dashboard This Or That Game Happiness Hub Popular Categories Arts and Entertainment Artwork Books Movies Computers and Electronics Computers Phone Skills Technology Hacks Health Men's Health Mental Health Women's Health Relationships Dating Love Relationship Issues Hobbies and Crafts Crafts Drawing Games Education & Communication Communication Skills Personal Development Studying Personal Care and Style Fashion Hair Care Personal Hygiene Youth Personal Care School Stuff Dating All Categories Arts and Entertainment Finance and Business Home and Garden Relationship Quizzes Cars & Other Vehicles Food and Entertaining Personal Care and Style Sports and Fitness Computers and Electronics Health Pets and Animals Travel Education & Communication Hobbies and Crafts Philosophy and Religion Work World Family Life Holidays and Traditions Relationships Youth
• Browse Articles
• Learn Something New
• Quizzes Hot
• Happiness Hub
• This Or That Game
• Train Your Brain
• Explore More
• Support wikiHow
• About wikiHow
• Log in / Sign up
• School Stuff
• Academic Dishonesty

How to Cheat On a Test

Last Updated: May 18, 2024 References

wikiHow is a “wiki,” similar to Wikipedia, which means that many of our articles are co-written by multiple authors. To create this article, 441 people, some anonymous, worked to edit and improve it over time. This article has been viewed 3,414,593 times. Learn more...

Whether you are simply unprepared, lazy, or otherwise unable to successfully pass an exam, you may feel compelled to use cheating as a strategy to get through a test. Here are some steps and tips to help you accomplish your goal and most likely get that A+ you've always wanted.

• Don't look suspicious. It's important to strike a balance between effectively getting your answers and not making it obvious. To do this, don't overly fidget. If you must look around, never hold your gaze in one place for longer than five to ten seconds. Switch it up by randomly staring in other directions — this way, your test supervisors won't get too suspicious and find out where your accomplice (or cheat sheet) is.
• Don't aim too high. It's not impossible to cheat your way into a perfect score if you really put in the effort, but if everyone else is getting an unremarkable grade on the exam, you will draw attention to yourself. This is fine if you normally get decent marks, but if you're known among teachers as one of the slower students, then there's a chance that they'll find out. Deliberately miss a few questions, though, and you'll be good to go. Try getting a B on a test and continually but slowly raising your average score until it's an A. You can even shoot for ups and downs in your scores, to make it appear more natural.
• Dispose of the evidence. As soon as the test is over, ask to go to the bathroom (if you haven't already gone) to wash off or throw away any evidence of cheating. The longer you hold on to something, then the better your chance of getting caught because one person or another will notice.

Using Cheat-Sheet Methods

• Try the "Body Part Cheat-Sheet" method. Instead of printing out the cheat sheet, try writing it on a part of your body. Good places include your forearm if you are a man or your upper thigh if you are a woman. These are both great because you can wear a dress or long sleeve shirt to cover up your cheat sheet when you aren't using it. It's important to not make it obvious that there is writing on your body. Put the words in a place that faces you only.
• Try the "Water Bottle Cheat-Sheet" method. Print out the cheat sheet on a colored piece of paper that matches that label of your water bottle. Paste it on the label and turn it so that it only faces you. Ideally, you want to mimic the writing on the label to avoid suspicion. [1] X Research source
• Try the "Binder Cheat-Sheet" method. If you have a binder that has a clear slot in the front, slide your cheat sheet into there. Move your binder from under your desk to the side of your desk to peek at your cheat sheet. Try to minimize the number of slides, especially if you don't have carpet in your classroom.
• Try the "Calculator Cheat-Sheet" method. This is common for people who are taking math tests because that's the only reasonable time to have a calculator without being suspicious. Slide formulas or information terms between the back of the calculator and the calculator's cover.
• Another Calculator Method to try: If you have a graphing calculator, save the math formulas into your calculator. Then, put the information into an archive, so you will still be able to get to it if your teacher makes you clear the RAM. Unarchive the information during the test. Clear the memory after the test. This also works if it's the school's calculator because no teacher or student is going to look in the archive. If you don't know how to archive things on a calculator, look it up. [2] X Research source
• Try the "Stashed Cheat-Sheet" method. Hide a cheat-sheet in a separate place altogether to avoid it getting connected back to you. This includes on a bulletin board in the classroom, in a bathroom stall, or on someone's chair.
• Wear a long-sleeved shirt and hide your cheat sheets under the sleeves. It is a very good method because your teacher won't look under your sleeves. And when your teacher isn't looking, you can easily take out a cheat sheet, and it's easy to put it back.

Implementing Partner-Cheating Methods

• Establish hand or foot tapping signals for A, B, C, D, E, and "wrong answer." By creating a signal for "wrong answer" you are going to improve the likelihood of you both doing well on the test by helping each other eliminate wrong answers. Also create a vocal noise for getting their attention that isn't suspicious (like a cough, or foot tap).
• Start by coughing to get their attention.
• Use your fingers to give the number of the question (flash 3 than a 2 to with your hand signal question "32").
• Wait for them to signal their answer (pulling their ear for "B").
• If you need help deciding between 2 answers: cough, give the question number, and signal for the answer you suspect it might be.
• They can nod their head if it's correct. if it's the wrong answer they can send the "wrong answer" signal (put up your hair in a ponytail).

Using Hard-to-Prove Methods

• Claim to be sick, go to the bathroom towards the end of the exam until it's over. Or pace yourself slowly. Be sure that your professor will let you come back before using this method as you could actually do worse if they don’t let you finish.

• Keep in mind that some classrooms have cameras. Avoid this if the one you are in does have a camera because if that is the case, it’s much riskier.

• If your exam paper is a question/answer type then remember to add one important point as the question and the other as the answer. You also have to include the page number and marks per question (if included).
• The next thing to do is a staple this piece of paper with the original question paper during the test without anyone noticing.

Implementing Studying Methods

• For essays , try to remember keywords and points. Usually, professors or teachers look for keywords or important points; the essay's formal "fluff" is less important. If you know the topic or possible topics of an essay question, cram four to five terms or important points you know your professor will be looking for instead of studying everything, thereby reducing the effort required. The same is true for short answers that require one or two sentences with keywords and points.
• For true-or-false exams, try studying the facts enough to pinpoint the details. Typically, there are more true statements on a test than false statements. If you find a statement where you have to change part of it to make it true, it's false.
• For multiple-choice exams , try "chunking" information you know will be on the test. Instead of memorizing a list of words, try breaking it into easier to remember smaller lists. [4] X Research source For example, if studying for a history test , instead of remembering "Jefferson, Hamilton, Franklin, Washington, Grant, Lincoln, and Lee" break it up into the "4 of the founding fathers: Franklin, Washington, Jefferson and Hamilton" and the "3 civil war leaders: Lee, Lincoln, Grant." By memorizing the number of men to a specific topic, it'll be easier to narrow down who you are missing.
• For math exams , try to memorize formulas. Knowing a formula can be more powerful than spending hours doing practice problems. If you can write down a formula enough to memorize it, then you can spend the test trying to apply those to the problems.

Community Q&A

Tips from our Readers

• Try getting to class early and then write everything from the cheat sheet directly onto the desk with a pencil. At the end of the test, you can use your hand to wipe away the evidence.
• You can also try writing your answer on your arm and wearing a long sleeve shirt. Whenever you need to look, pull your sleeve down quickly and you have your answer!
• If you're someone who tends to sit cross-legged in class, you can slip a small page of notes in your shoe or boot.
• In some countries, certain methods of cheating on certain important tests is illegal and could entail jail time. [5] X Research source Thanks Helpful 5 Not Helpful 0
• Other students may suspect you cheating and inform your teacher. Thanks Helpful 3 Not Helpful 1
• If this is a shared computer, you might consider deleting the browser history so you won't get caught by your parents. Thanks Helpful 7 Not Helpful 1
• There is always a possibility of getting caught. If you are found to be cheating, you could receive heavy penalties, such as getting an automatic zero on the test, suspension, or even expulsion. Many schools will even mark on your transcript indicating you violated the honor code. Instead of searching for how to cheat on a test, try finding tips on studying for exams. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 6
• In some countries e.g., those mentioned above, you must not possess any unauthorized material, or electronic equipment e.g., mobile phones in an exam room if you are taking an external exam, such as those detailed above, as this is a serious disciplinary offense. This applies even if you do not intend to use it.
• In many professions, you will need the knowledge you gain by studying instead of cheating. Remember, there is no cheating in the operating room when you're the surgeon operating on the patient or when you're in space as an astronaut flying far from Earth. Thanks Helpful 2 Not Helpful 1
• Don't brag about it. This may seem obvious, but it is something people do. You don't know who could tell the teacher. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
• Always be aware of where the teacher is looking; no method of cheating is successful if the teacher is looking right at you while you hold the notes in your hand and are frantically copying them onto the test. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
• If you are copying off the person next to you lean over and rest on your arm while tilting your head to the side to make sure it isn't obvious. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0
• If you had to cheat because you had no time, remember that it is still worth learning the content after the test. You may have cumulative tests afterward and some of these things could really help you in the future. Thanks Helpful 2 Not Helpful 0
• Partnering is always better than cheat sheets and the hard-to-prove methods are even better. Overall, the less evidence there is - the better it is for you. Thanks Helpful 2 Not Helpful 1
• If you are allowed to chew gum, write the answers in a gum wrapper, then get out a piece of gum. Thanks Helpful 3 Not Helpful 0
• It is never a good idea to do this, because you may feel guilty afterward and get the urge to confess what you did, which most likely will land you in trouble. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1
• Even if you do manage to cheat without getting caught while suffering the stress of doing so, it is very unlikely that the few extra marks you gain will make much difference to the score. And you risk disqualification, expulsion, or being banned. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

• ↑ https://edusson.com/blog/how-to-cheat-in-college
• ↑ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/11/10-crazy-and-inventive-ways-students-have-cheated-in-exams/
• ↑ http://www.creativeteachingsite.com/how-to-cheat-on-a-test.html
• ↑ http://thepeakperformancecenter.com/educational-learning/thinking/chunking/chunking-as-a-learning-strategy/
• ↑ http://time.com/4360968/china-gaokao-examination-university-entrance-cheating-jail-prison/

About This Article

To cheat on a test, try sitting diagonally behind someone who will do well on the topic, which will let you look over their shoulder and see their answers. If you know someone who’s willing to help you, use signs to communicate the right answers during the test, such as signing the shape of a letter for a multiple choice test. You could also try buying the instructor’s edition of your textbook online, since it contains example questions that may be used in the test. If you know that your professor will let you come back later to finish the test, make up an excuse, such as that you’re feeling unwell. Then, memorize the topics in the test so you can check the answers before you come back to finish the test. For tips on how to create a cheat sheet, keep reading! Did this summary help you? Yes No

• Send fan mail to authors

Did this article help you?

Featured Articles

Trending Articles

Watch Articles

• Terms of Use
• Privacy Policy
• Do Not Sell or Share My Info
• Not Selling Info

Get all the best how-tos!

Sign up for wikiHow's weekly email newsletter

This app doesn't just do your homework for you, it shows you how

By Paul Miller

Share this story

A little confession from me. I was homeschooled (that's not the confession part), and in 8th grade my algebra textbook had the answers to half the problems in the back. And when I was stumped, I would cheat.

Sorry, mom!

Of course, cheating at math is a terrible way to learn, because the whole point isn't to know the answer to 2x + 2 = 7x - 5, it's to understand the methodology that can solve any like problem.

But what if you could cheat at your homework and learn? That seems to be the premise behind app called Socratic . Or at least that's my takeaway. The app lets you take a picture of a problem (you can also type it in, but that's a little laborious), and it'll not only give you an answer, but the steps necessary to to arrive at that answer — and even detailed explanations of the steps and concepts if you need them.

The app is actually designed to answer any kind of school question — science, history, etc. — but the math thing is the slickest part. For other kinds of questions, Socratic kind of does a bit of Googling, and in my experience can typically find similar word problems on the wide internet, or from its own database of answers. On about half the middle school science problems I tried, the app was able to identify the topic at question and show me additional resources about the concepts involved, but for others it was no more powerful than a simple web search.

But for algebra this thing is sick. I pointed it at 2x + 2 = 7x - 5, which I wrote down at random, and it gave me a 10 step process that results in x = 7/5. It has trouble with word problems, but if you can write down a word problem in math notation it shouldn't be an issue. I also tried it on a weird fraction from an AP algebra exam, which it kind of failed at, but then I swiped over and it was showing me this graph, which included the correct answer:

I love this app, not just because it would've helped 8th grade Paul out of a jam, but because it's such a computery use of computers. You use the tiny computer in your pocket to be basically smarter than you already are. It's technology that augments a human brain, not just a distraction.

The creator of Socratic just open sourced its step-by-step solver , called mathsteps. There are a lot of computer-based algebra solvers out there, but for Socratic they had to do some extra engineering to get at the steps a human would need to solve the same problem.

Also, I'd be remiss not to mention Photomath , which has been doing this since 2014, and actually has step-by-step explanations in the recently released Photomath+ paid version (there's a free trial). I like the Socratic interface and explanations a bit better, but I'm glad to see this is a vibrant market.

10 years later, Apple Pay is amazing — and about to change

Dji’s $199 neo selfie drone is going to be everywhere, philips hue launches a new smart lighting solution for the kitchen, what to expect from apple’s ‘it’s glowtime’ iphone 16 event, intel strikes back against windows on arm.

More from Tech

Sony’s portable PlayStation Portal is back in stock

The Nintendo Switch 2 will now reportedly arrive in 2025 instead of 2024

The best Presidents Day deals you can already get

Interview: Figma’s CEO on life after the company’s failed sale to Adobe

Choose Your Test

• Search Blogs By Category
• College Admissions
• AP and IB Exams
• GPA and Coursework

The 5 Best Homework Help Apps You Can Use

General Education

We know that homework can be a real drag. It’s time-consuming, and can be difficult to complete all on your own. So, what can you do if you’re struggling?

You might try looking online or in the app store! If you’ve already looked around you probably know that there are tons of homework sites for students and homework apps out there that all say they can help you improve your grades and pass your classes. But, can you trust them? And what are the best apps for homework help?

Below, we answer these questions and more about homework help apps–free and paid . We’ll go over: 

• The basics of homework help apps
• The cost of homework help apps
• The five best apps for homework help
• The pros and cons of using apps that help you with homework 
• The line between “learning” and “cheating” when using apps that help you with homework
• Tips for getting the most out of homework sites for students 

So let’s jump in!

The Basics About Apps that Help You With Homework–Free and Paid

The bottom line is, homework sites and homework apps are intended to help you complete your take-home assignments successfully. They provide assistance that ranges from answering questions you submit through a portal all the way to one-on-one tutoring, depending on the help you need! 

The big plus for both homework help apps and websites is that they usually offer help on-demand. So if you can’t make it to after school tutoring, or if you're studying late into the night (it happens!), you can still access the help you need! 

If you’re specifically looking for an answer to the question: “what is the best homework help website ?,” you can check out our article on those here! [LINK COMING SOON]

What’s the Difference Between a Homework Help Website and an App?

So if they’re both designed to give you a little boost with your take-home assignments, what makes homework apps and websites different from one another? First off, homework help websites are optimized to be used on a desktop, while apps are designed to be run natively on mobile devices. So depending on which devices you have access to, you may decide to use a website instead of an app…or vice versa! 

The other big difference between homework help apps and websites is that they sometimes offer different features. For instance, with the Photomath app, you’ll be able to submit photos of math problems instead of having to type everything out, which is easier to do by using an app on your phone. 

If you’re trying to decide whether to go with a website or app, the good news is that you may not have to. Some homework help websites also have companion apps, so you can have the best of both worlds!

What Makes a Homework Help App Worth Using

Apps that help you with homework should ideally help you actually learn the material you’re struggling with, and/or help you turn in your work on time. Most of the best apps for homework help allow you to ask questions and provide answers and explanations almost immediately. And like we mentioned earlier, many of these apps let you send a picture of a question or problem instead of writing it all out.

But homework help apps offer more than just quick answers and explanations for your assignment questions. They also offer things like educational videos, lectures, tutorials, practice tests and quizzes, math solving tools, proofreading services, and even Q&A with experts.

And the best part is, most offer these services 24/7! 

What You Should Look Out For

When it comes to homework help, there are lots–and we mean lots –of apps willing to prey on desperate students. Before you download any apps (and especially before you pay to sign up for any services), read reviews of the app to ensure you’re working with a legitimate company. 

Keep in mind: the more a company advertises help that seems like cheating, the more likely it is to be a scam. Actual subject matter experts aren’t likely to work with those companies. Remember, the best apps for homework help are going to help you learn the concepts needed to successfully complete your homework on your own. 

If you’re not sure if an app is legitimate, you can also check to see if the app has an honor code about using their services ethically , like this one from Brainly. (We’ll go over the difference between “homework help” and “cheating” in more detail a little later!) 

How Expensive Are Apps That Help You With Homework?

A word to the wise: just because a homework help app costs money doesn’t mean it’s a good service. And, just because a homework help app is free doesn’t mean the help isn’t high quality. To find the best apps, you have to take a close look at the quality and types of information they provide! 

Most of the apps out there allow you to download them for free, and provide at least some free services–such as a couple of free questions and answers. Additional services or subscriptions are then charged as in-app purchases. When it comes to in-app purchases and subscriptions for homework help, the prices vary depending on the amount of services you want to subscribe to. Subscriptions can cost anywhere from $2 to around $60 dollars per month, with the most expensive app subscriptions including some tutoring (which is usually only available through homework help websites.)

The 5 Best Apps for Homework Help

Okay, now that you’re up to speed on what these apps are and how they can help you, we’ll run you through the best five apps you can use. 

Keep in mind that even though we recommend all of these apps, they tend to excel at different things. We’ve broken these apps into categories so that you can pick the best one for your needs! 

Best Free Homework Help App: Khan Academy

• Price: Free!
• Best for: Practicing tough material 

While there are lots of free homework help apps out there, this is our favorite because it actually supports learning, rather than just providing answers. The Khan Academy app works like the website, and offers the same services. It’s full of information and can be personalized to suit your educational needs. 

After you download the app, you choose which courses you need to study, and Khan Academy sets up a personal dashboard of instructional videos, practice exercises, and quizzes –with both correct and incorrect answer explanations–so you can learn at your own pace. 

As an added bonus, it covers more course topics than many other homework help apps, including several AP classes.

Best Paid Homework Help App: Brainly

• Price: $18 for a 6 month subscription, $24 for a year 
• Best for: 24/7 homework assistance 

Brainly is free to download and allows you to type in questions (or snap a pic) and get answers and explanations from both fellow students and teachers. Plus, subject matter experts and moderators verify answers daily, so you know you’re getting quality solutions! The downside is that you’re limited to two free answers per question and have to watch ads for more if you don’t pay for a subscription. 

That said, their subscription fees average around only $2 per month, making this a particularly affordable option if you’re looking for homework help on a budget. Brainly subscriptions not only cover unlimited answers and explanations on a wide variety of school subjects (including Art and World Languages which aren’t always included in other apps), they also provide tutoring in Math and Physics!

Best App for Math Homework Help: Photomath

• Price: Free (or up to $59.99 per year for premium services) 
• Best for: Explaining solutions to math problems

This app allows you to take a picture of a math problem, and instantly pulls up a step-by-step solution, as well as a detailed explanation of the concept. Photomath subscription services also include animated videos that break down mathematical concepts–all the way up to advanced Calculus!--to help you better understand and remember them. 

The basic textbook solution service is free, but for an additional fee you can get extra study tools, access to one-on-one tutoring, and additional strategies for solving common math problems.

Best App for STEM and English Homework Help: Studypool

• Price: Varies; you’ll pay for each question you submit
• Best for: Science and English homework help in one app

When it comes to apps for science and English homework help, there aren’t lots of great resources out there, much less out there all in one place. While Grammarly is a good service for proofreading, SparkNotes has some decent summaries, and Khan Academy covers science, the best of the bunch if you need help with both subjects Studypool. Instead of using lots of different apps for STEM and English help, they’re combined together here! But while Studypool has great reviews, there are some downsides as well. 

The Studypool Q&A model is a little different than other homework help apps. After you create a free account, you ask questions, and tutors submit bids to answer them. You’ll be able to select the tutor–and price point–that works for you, then you’ll pay to have your homework question answered. You can also pay a small fee to access thousands of notes, lectures, and other documents that top tutors have uploaded.  

The downside to Studypool is that the pricing is not transparent . There’s no way to plan for how much your homework help will cost, especially if you have lots of questions! It’s also not clear how they choose their tutors, so you’ll need to be careful when you decide who you’d like to answer your homework questions. That said, if you only need a few questions answered per month, this could be cheaper than other monthly subscription services.

Best Homework Scheduling App: MyStudyLife

• Best for: Keeping track of your schedule and deadlines

If the reason you’re looking for homework help is less about finding answers to questions and more about needing assistance with organization and time-management , MyStudyLife is a great option. This is a cross-platform planner that allows you to store your class schedule, upcoming tests, and homework assignments in the cloud so you can access it all wherever you are, and on any device. 

One of the unique things about it is that it easily works for daily or weekly rotating class schedules that can get confusing, helping you keep track of when you need to finish your homework based on your changing schedule. You can get reminders for upcoming classes and assignments as well as past-due homework and any revisions you may need to do. It can even let you know when you need to start studying for a big test!

Best of all, you can actually schedule assignments and study sessions for multiple nights, and specify how much of the task you got done each night. That way you’ll know how much additional time you’ll need to spend! 

While homework apps might seem like magic, it's important to weigh the pros and cons before you commit to one. 

What Are the Pros and Cons of Using Homework Help Apps?

Homework help apps can be useful tools if you’re struggling in any of your classes. But there are a few problems you might run into if you don’t use them ethically and responsibly. 

Below we’ll cover some of the good and the not-so-good parts of using homework help apps to complete your take-home assignments.

3 Pros of Using Homework Help Apps

Let’s start with the pros of using apps for homework help.

Pro 1: All-Around Better Grades

This is undeniably the main pro and the reason apps that help you with homework are so popular with students. Not only can you potentially get better grades on individual assignments, because they help you learn tricky concepts, you can also earn better grades overall .

Just keep in mind that if you want better grades you have to actually learn the material you’re studying, not just find easy answers. So be sure to use apps that provide good explanations . That way you’ll have the mental tools you need to succeed on your class exams and on standardized tests for college. 

Pro 2: Flexibility

It’s hard to beat homework help that you can access anywhere you are from your mobile device. You can also get assistance whenever you need it since the best apps offer their services 24/7. This is especially useful for students who need to study during hours when their free school resources aren’t available because of extracurriculars, jobs, or family obligations. 

If you need convenient and flexible homework help or tutoring services to fit your schedule, apps can be your go-to resource. 

Pro 3: Individualized Learning

Sometimes the kind of learner you are doesn’t match your teacher’s style of teaching. Or maybe the pace of a class is a little too fast or too slow for your tastes. Homework apps can help by allowing you to learn at your own speed and in ways that support your own learning style. 

You can use their features, such as educational videos, 24/7 conversations with experts and peers, and tutorials to review concepts you may have forgotten. These apps can also let you dive deeper into topics or subjects you enjoy! With homework help apps, you get to choose what you need to learn and how you learn it.

3 Cons of Using Homework Help Apps

Next, let’s look at the cons of homework help apps. 

Con 1: Questionable Info 

Unfortunately there are lots of less-than-reliable homework help apps out there. They might not hire actual experts in their fields to provide answers and create study tools, or they rely on user-submitted answers that they don’t verify. In those cases, you might not be getting the accurate, thorough, and up-to-date answers you need to really learn.

In addition to the possibility of running into plain-old wrong answers, even the best apps sometimes just won’t have a specific answer you need. This could be because you’re enrolled in an advanced class the app doesn’t really cover or because of the algorithm or chatbot a particular app uses. 

If that’s the case , your best bet will likely be to talk to your teacher or a free tutor (if your school provides them) to get help answering your question.

Con 2: Information Overload

While having tons of information at your fingertips can be helpful, the sheer amount and variety of videos, tutorials, expert answers, and resources a homework app provides can be overwhelming . It’s also easy to get sucked into a research rabbit-hole where you learn new things but don’t actually get your work done. This is especially true for students who tend to be easily distracted.

Additionally, you may be learning to do things differently than you’ve learned them in class , which could cause problems. For example, if your math teacher asks you to solve a problem one way, but you learned to do it differently through an app, you could get confused come test time! 

Con 3: Cutting Corners

There are a lot of apps out there that bill themselves as “the best app for cheating.” They allow users to type in a question or take a picture, then instantly provide an answer without any explanation of the material. Many of these are scams or provide unreliable answers, but not all. Some apps are legitimate and provide quick and easy answers that could allow you to do your whole homework assignment in minutes. 

The problem is that even though taking shortcuts on homework to save time is tempting, it can keep you from really learning. The point of practicing concepts and skills is so you develop them and can access them whenever you need to. This is especially true if skills build on one another, like in a math or English class. 

Sometimes s truggling with an assignment or question, trying, failing, then trying again until you succeed can help you learn difficult material. If you don’t let yourself really try, and instead take too many shortcuts, you may end up behind.

When Does “Help” Become “Cheating”?

When it comes to using homework help apps, sometimes the difference between “help” and “cheating” is really clear. For example, if you’re using an app to get answers while you’re taking a test, that’s definitely cheating . But what if you’re struggling with a math problem and need to know the correct answer so you can work backwards to learn the process? Is that “cheating” or is it “help?” 

The truth is, not everyone agrees on when “help” crosses the line into “cheating .” If you’re not sure, you can always check with your teacher to see what they think about a particular type of help you want to get. That said, a general rule of thumb to keep in mind is to make sure that the assignment you turn in for credit is authentically yours . It needs to demonstrate your own thoughts and your own current abilities. Remember: the point of every homework assignment is to 1) help you learn something, and 2) show what you’ve learned. 

So if you’re relying on an app to do all of the work for you, there’s a good chance using it might constitute cheating. 

Think of it this way: say you’re studying for an upcoming math test, and are stumped by a few of the questions on the study guide. Even though you’ve tried and tried, you can’t seem to get the right answer because you can’t remember the steps to take. Using an app to explain the steps as you’re studying is “help.” Using the app to get answers so you can make a good homework grade is “cheating.” 

The same is true for other subjects: brainstorming essay ideas with others or looking online for inspiration is “help” as long as you write the essay yourself. Having someone read it and give you feedback about what you need to change is also “help,” provided you’re the one that makes the changes later. 

But copying all or part of an essay you find online or having someone write (or rewrite) the whole thing for you would be “cheating.” Ultimately, if you’re not generating your own work or learning to produce your own answers, it’s probably cheating. 

5 Tips for Finding the Best Homework Help App for You

If you’re serious about using a homework help app, our expert tips can help you pick one that’s right for you and your budget!

#1: Decide What Tools You Need to Succeed 

While most apps offer Q&A services, the best apps provide study tools to help you learn the material you need to learn . 

For instance, if you’re a visual learner, you might need an app that provides lots of videos. If you learn best by reading, an app that provides lots of in-depth written resources might be better for you. Or, if you learn best by actually doing things, look for an app that provides practice tests and quizzes, along with explanations for correct and incorrect answers.

Before committing to an app, take a quick survey of the tools they offer users to make sure they meet your unique learning needs. 

#2: Decide Which Subjects You Need to Study

Not all homework apps are created equal. One might provide tutoring in math and science, but no proofreading services to help you with writing. Another might be perfect for American History, but what you really need help with is your Spanish class. So, before you can decide which app is best for you, make sure to create a list of the subjects you need the most help in.

#3: Do Your Research

As we’ve said before, there are tons of homework apps in the app store to choose from, and the most important thing you can do is research what they offer students. Services, prices for those services, and subjects that the apps cover all vary, so it’s important that you look into your options. We’ve compiled our all-around favorite (and reliable) apps here, but it’s still a good idea to do your own research to find out what might meet your individual needs best.

#4: Learn Why People Like and Dislike the App

Maybe you’ve heard the phrase “buyer beware?” It means that the person buying something should check for quality before actually handing over their money. This applies to both free and paid homework apps, but especially those that actually cost money.

Before you download anything, be sure to read the user reviews . While all apps will have both positive and negative reviews, you want to look for one that has more positive than negative. And if you’re considering paying for a service, be sure that users think it’s worth the price overall!

#5: Budget Yourself

If you find a paid app that provides the learning tools you need, covers the subjects you need to study, and that has good reviews overall, set a budget to pay for it before you hit that “install” button. The costs for paid homework apps vary, and especially if you’re using one that requires you to pay for individual questions or services, the prices can add up quickly. So make sure there’s money for it in your budget before you commit!

What’s Next?

If you’re not quite sure why you’re struggling with homework, or want to know how you can do your homework as quickly as possible , check out this list of 15 expert homework tips and tricks to make your life a little bit easier!

Effective studying requires the right balance of concentration, understanding, retention and rest. So if you need help striking that balance, read these 16 tips for better study habits in both the short and long-term.

Getting good grades is about more than just answering questions correctly on your assignments. It also requires planning ahead and participation. In this article we cover the academic survival strategies that can help you throughout high school .

Trending Now

How to Get Into Harvard and the Ivy League

How to Get a Perfect 4.0 GPA

How to Write an Amazing College Essay

What Exactly Are Colleges Looking For?

ACT vs. SAT: Which Test Should You Take?

When should you take the SAT or ACT?

Get Your Free

Find Your Target SAT Score

Free Complete Official SAT Practice Tests

How to Get a Perfect SAT Score, by an Expert Full Scorer

Score 800 on SAT Math

Score 800 on SAT Reading and Writing

How to Improve Your Low SAT Score

Score 600 on SAT Math

Score 600 on SAT Reading and Writing

Find Your Target ACT Score

Complete Official Free ACT Practice Tests

How to Get a Perfect ACT Score, by a 36 Full Scorer

Get a 36 on ACT English

Get a 36 on ACT Math

Get a 36 on ACT Reading

Get a 36 on ACT Science

How to Improve Your Low ACT Score

Get a 24 on ACT English

Get a 24 on ACT Math

Get a 24 on ACT Reading

Get a 24 on ACT Science

Stay Informed

Get the latest articles and test prep tips!

Ashley Sufflé Robinson has a Ph.D. in 19th Century English Literature. As a content writer for PrepScholar, Ashley is passionate about giving college-bound students the in-depth information they need to get into the school of their dreams.

Ask a Question Below

Have any questions about this article or other topics? Ask below and we'll reply!

share this!

August 19, 2019

Students are still using tech to cheat on exams, but things are getting more advanced

by Dalvin Brown, Usa Today

In many ways, cheating on high school and college exams used to be a lot harder than it is nowadays.

What used to take an elaborate plot to discreetly spread answers across a classroom can now be done with a swipe on a smartwatch. You used to have to steal the answer key or have a cheat sheet hidden around your desk.

Now, smartphones can be disguised as calculators, information can be spread invisibly via the airwaves and tiny earbuds allow students to listen to content transmitted from a smartphone in their backpack across the room.

The self-identified student cheaters we reached out to wouldn't go on the record to discuss these behaviors (for obvious reasons). However, Twitter is a hotbed for discussion on the topic and smartwatches are a fan favorite as a convenient loophole to classroom smartphone bans.

"An Apple Watch is the go-to way to cheat on any exam. Hands down," Tweets @too_Coziey in December 2018. "I bought an Apple Watch just to cheat on exams in ( high school )," writes @Shymyafaith.

"My teacher collects phones during exams so I brought two phones and an Apple Watch. I will cheat on my exam, (i don't care) if it kills me," writes Twitter user @Wontonpx.

There are even online instructional videos and countless digital forums that teach students how to cheat on tests using their gadgets.

Technology enthusiasts often tout the latest innovations as tools to help students feel more engaged in the classroom. They encourage teachers and schools to adapt to the shifting tech landscape and instructors and institutions often follow suit, introducing Echo Dots and smartwatches to campuses in recent years.

While the gadgets have utility in educational environments, they also open pandora's box, allowing students to pay less attention in class and shortcut their education—aka cheat.

"Technology presents new ways for students to do things that they've always been doing which is avoid doing the work themselves," said David Rettinger, president of International Center for Academic Integrity and instructor of psychological sciences at the University of Mary Washington.

"Forever, students would go to a book and copy things for a paper. Copy and paste plagiarism is as old as reading and writing, but now it's so much easier. You don't even have to leave your desk to do that. The bar has gotten much lower."

In other words, cheating is nothing new, and students have been taking notes on their devices, getting notifications during tests, texting their friends for answers and sending photos of exams to their classmates for years.

However, one of the latest, widespread forms of cheating in the classroom involves students using auto-summarize features in programs like Word to pass off computer-generated essays as original work.

Summarizing tools can also be found on the internet. They take the most important information from a large text and generate a shorter version that isn't easily picked up by anti-plagiarism software, according to Teddi Fishman, the former director of the International Center for Academic Integrity.

She works with educators, students and administrators to identify integrity vulnerabilities and taught at the State University of West Georgia and Clemson University.

What makes today's cheating landscape even more dire is that "teachers are so overworked" Fishman said. "A lot of them are not tenured so they may be working at two or three universities to make ends meet. They just don't have time" to double-check if they suspect a student of cheating.

Along with the auto-summarizing tools, technology now enables students to buy "bespoke essays" from third parties overseas. These so-called "essay mills" don't just let students buy one assignment. They're contracting someone to write all their assignments for a semester or even a year.

If it's an online class, "You can pay somebody in another country to take that course for you. If you do an easy online search for 'take my online class," you see sites where someone can log in, take the class and you can get the credit for it," Fishman said.

"That's a danger for all of us. Imagine if your nurse paid someone to take classes for them."

The Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 requires institutions to verify the identities of remote students by using at least one of the following methods: a secure login and password, proctored exams or other technological practices to accurately identify a person.

In many cases, the use of a secure User ID and password that can be easily exchanged with others and proctored exams are effective only if the instructor actually knows what the student looks like. However, tech such as typing-style verification and speed checks may help to curb cheating in e-learning situations.

Rettinger, who is also an associate professor of psychological science, has started giving his classes shorter exams, which cuts down on the time students could spend trying to figure out how to cheat.

"I've changed a lot of my assessment to be much shorter, lower-stake assessment rather than big exams. (So) students feel less pressure to cheat," Rettinger said.

"When you have a test and it's worth a lot of points, a student is going to put a lot of work into either studying or cheating," he said. "If it's a quick test, there isn't as much time to set up those structures. You're not dumbing down the material. I'm just testing more frequently."

The University of Mary Washington and many others use a student-run honor codes to discourage cheating where the student body self-polices to create a social sanction against being dishonest.

Teachers also use tools like the plagiarism-checking software Turnitin to sniff out academic dishonesty. In March 2019, Turnitin released a piece of software called Authorship Investigate, which creates a digital fingerprint of a writer's writing style so teachers can detect changes over the course of the semester to detect "contract cheating."

Alexis Redding, a lecturer in the Higher Education Program at Harvard who studied cheating, warns that if instructors don't go through those types of plagiarism reports with students, they "become confused about what they're doing right and what they're doing wrong."

Some institutions and departments across the country mandate that students submit all essays through plagiarism detection programs. "That feels like a very dangerous direction to go in," Redding said. "It sends a negative message to students that we are expecting them to do something for which we need to catch them."

Still, advances in technology will continue to make information sharing easier and more discreet. With teens and young adults being digital natives and early adopters of innovative communications, experts say teachers will always be slower to catch up.

"By the time you try to figure out how to outsmart the people who want to cheat, you've already lost the battle," said Howard Gardner, a research professor of cognition and education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Instead of getting into a technological arm's race with students, Gardner said instructors and parents should help students understand "why one shouldn't cheat and why it's destructive to them. It's easy to say that and be completely ignored, but otherwise, it's a (game of) cops and robbers."

Explore further

Feedback to editors

AI helps distinguish dark matter from cosmic noise

3 hours ago

Plant thermogenesis has played key role in attracting pollinating insects for at least 200 million years, study suggests

Hijacking the command center of the cell: Nuclear parasites in deep-sea mussels

Deep imaging techniques reveal that galaxies are much much bigger than previously thought

Feeling the heat as Earth breaks yet another record for hottest summer

'Some pterosaurs would flap, others would soar'—new study confirms flight capability of these giants of the skies

7 hours ago

AI meets biophysics: New approach identifies critical interaction points in cancer-related proteins

15 hours ago

Study shows how amateur astronomers can aid in Jupiter weather monitoring

Guardians of the reef: How parrotfish promote coral health

New mRNA and gene editing tools offer hope for dengue virus treatment

Relevant physicsforums posts, are excuses for academic parties getting thinner or is it just me.

Sep 2, 2024

AAPT 2024 Summer Meeting Boston, MA (July 2024) - are you going?

Rip edward "joe" redish (1942 - 2024), physics education, incandescent bulbs in teaching.

Aug 21, 2024

How to explain Bell's theorem to non-scientists

Aug 18, 2024

Free Abstract Algebra curriculum in Urdu and Hindi

Aug 17, 2024

More from STEM Educators and Teaching

Related Stories

Don't assume online students are more likely to cheat. The evidence is murky

Jul 27, 2018

How disliked classes affect college student cheating

Oct 4, 2017

Doing away with essays won't necessarily stop students cheating

Dec 20, 2018

High achievers in competitive courses more likely to cheat on college exams

Aug 25, 2017

Professors need to be entertaining to prevent students from watching YouTube in class

Jun 26, 2019

US teens use smart phones for cheating: study

Jun 19, 2009

Recommended for you

Virtual learning linked to rise in chronic absenteeism, study finds

20 hours ago

AI tools like ChatGPT popular among students who struggle with concentration and attention

Aug 28, 2024

Researchers find academic equivalent of a Great Gatsby Curve in science mentorships

Aug 27, 2024

More academic freedom leads to more innovation, reports study

Statistical analysis can detect when ChatGPT is used to cheat on multiple-choice chemistry exams

Aug 14, 2024

Larger teams in academic research worsen career prospects, study finds

Let us know if there is a problem with our content.

Use this form if you have come across a typo, inaccuracy or would like to send an edit request for the content on this page. For general inquiries, please use our contact form . For general feedback, use the public comments section below (please adhere to guidelines ).

Please select the most appropriate category to facilitate processing of your request

Thank you for taking time to provide your feedback to the editors.

Your feedback is important to us. However, we do not guarantee individual replies due to the high volume of messages.

E-mail the story

Your email address is used only to let the recipient know who sent the email. Neither your address nor the recipient's address will be used for any other purpose. The information you enter will appear in your e-mail message and is not retained by Phys.org in any form.

Newsletter sign up

Get weekly and/or daily updates delivered to your inbox. You can unsubscribe at any time and we'll never share your details to third parties.

More information Privacy policy

Donate and enjoy an ad-free experience

We keep our content available to everyone. Consider supporting Science X's mission by getting a premium account.

E-mail newsletter

The ultimate homework cheat? How teachers are facing up to ChatGPT

ChatGPT took the internet by storm when it launched in late 2022, impressing by generating stories, poems, coding solutions, and beyond. Its potential to answer questions has seen New York City's education board ban it from schools - but could it really provide a homework shortcut?

By Tom Acres, technology reporter

Monday 9 January 2023 13:11, UK

"Have I seen this somewhere before?"

It's a question teachers have had to ask themselves while marking assignments since time immemorial.

But never mind students trawling through Wikipedia, or perusing SparkNotes for some Great Gatsby analysis, the backend of 2022 saw another challenge emerge for schools: ChatGPT.

The online chatbot, which can generate realistic responses on a whim, took the world by storm by its ability to do everything from solving computer bugs, to helping write a Sky News article about itself .

Last week, concerned about cheating students, America's largest education department banned it.

New York City 's teaching authority said while it could offer "quick and easy answers to questions, it does not build critical-thinking and problem-solving skills, which are essential for academic and lifelong success".

Of course, that's not going to stop pupils using it at home - but could they really use it as a homework shortcut?

More on Artificial Intelligence

Silicon Valley star A16Z eyes stake in British start-up 11xAI

Champions League draw: UEFA insists no risk AI-assisted system will be manipulated by cyber attacks

Gooey gel can play video game Pong and learns how to improve over time, scientists find

Related Topics:

• Artificial Intelligence

Teachers vs ChatGPT - round one

First up, Sky News asked a secondary school science teacher from Essex, who was not familiar with the bot, to feed ChatGPT a homework question.

Galaxies contain billions of stars. Compare the formation and life cycles of stars with a similar mass to the Sun to stars with a much greater mass than the Sun.

It's fair to say that ChatGPT let the mask slip almost immediately, as you can see in the images below.

Asking ChatGPT to answer the same question "to secondary school standard" prompted another detailed response.

The teacher's assessment?

"Well, this is definitely more detailed than any of my students. It does go beyond what you'd expect for GCSE, so I would be very suspicious if someone submitted it. I would assume that they'd copied and pasted from somewhere."

Teachers vs ChatGPT - round two

Next was a Kent primary school teacher, also unfamiliar with ChatGPT, who gave it a recent homework task.

Research a famous Londoner and write a biography of their lives, including their childhood and their career achievements.

No problem, said ChatGPT, though it's fair to say that any nine-year-old who submitted the answer below is either being fast-tracked to university or going straight into a lunchtime detention.

"Even just glancing at that, I'd say they copied it straight off the internet," said the teacher.

"No 11-year-old knows the word tumultuous."

'Key decisions' facing schools

So just as copying straight from a more familiar website is going to set alarm bells ringing for teachers, so too would lifting verbatim from ChatGPT.

But pupils are among the most internet-savvy people around, and ChatGPT's ability to instantly churn out seemingly textbook-level responses will still need to be monitored, teachers say.

Jane Basnett, director of digital learning at Downe House School in Berkshire, told Sky News the chatbot presented schools with some "key decisions" to make.

"As with all technology, schools have to teach students how to use technology properly," she said.

"So, with ChatGPT, students need to have the knowledge to know whether the work produced is any good, which is why we need to teach students to be discerning."

Click to subscribe to the Sky News Daily wherever you get your podcasts

Given its rapid emergence, Ms Basnett is already exploring how her school's anti-plagiarism systems will cope with auto-generated essays.

But just as teachers must consider teaching students about the benefits and pitfalls of using AI, Ms Basnett said her colleagues should also be open to its potential.

"ChatGPT is incredibly powerful and as a teacher I can see some benefits," she said.

"For example, I can type in a request to create a series of lessons on a particular grammar point, and it will create a lesson for me. It would take a teacher to analyse the created lesson and amend it, because the suggested lesson, whilst not bad, was not ideal. But, the key elements were there and it could be really useful.

"I could imagine using a created essay from ChatGPT and working through it with my students to examine the merits and faults of the essay."

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Dr Peter Van der Putten, assistant professor of AI at Leiden University in the Netherlands, said institutions which chose to prohibit or ignore the technology would only be burying their head in the sand.

"It's there, just how like Google is there," said Dr Van der Putten.

"You can write it into your policies for preventing plagiarism, but it's a reality that the tool exists.

"Sometimes you do need to embrace these things, but be very clear about when you don't want it to be used."

'Bull****er on steroids'

For students and teachers alike, it's an opportunity to improve their digital literacy.

While it has proved its worth when tasked with being creative, such as to problem-solve or come up with ideas, true comprehension and understanding remains beyond it.

Developer OpenAI acknowledges answers can be "overly verbose" and even "incorrect or nonsensical", despite sounding legitimate in most cases, like some sort of desperate, underprepared job interviewee.

As Dr Van der Putten says, ChatGPT is often little more than a "bull*****er on steroids".

Teaching students about those limitations is the best way to ensure they don't over rely on it - even in a pinch.

Related Topics

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories .

• The Big Story
• Newsletters
• Steven Levy's Plaintext Column
• WIRED Classics from the Archive
• WIRED Insider
• WIRED Consulting

AI Is Making It Extremely Easy for Students to Cheat

Denise Garcia knows that her students sometimes cheat, but the situation she unearthed in February seemed different. A math teacher in West Hartford, Connecticut, Garcia had accidentally included an advanced equation in a problem set for her AP Calculus class. Yet somehow a handful of students in the 15-person class solved it correctly. Those students had also shown their work, defeating the traditional litmus test for sussing out cheating in STEM classrooms.

Garcia was perplexed, until she remembered a conversation from a few years earlier. Some former students had told her about an online tool called Wolfram|Alpha that could complete complicated calculations in seconds. It provided both the answers and the steps for reaching them, making it virtually undetectable when copied as homework.

For years, students have turned to CliffsNotes for speedy reads of books, SparkNotes to whip up talking points for class discussions, and Wikipedia to pad their papers with historical tidbits. But today’s students have smarter tools at their disposal—namely, Wolfram|Alpha, a program that uses artificial intelligence to perfectly and untraceably solve equations. Wolfram|Alpha uses natural language processing technology, part of the AI family, to provide students with an academic shortcut that is faster than a tutor, more reliable than copying off of friends, and much easier than figuring out a solution yourself.

Since its release, Wolfram|Alpha has trickled through the education system, finding its way into the homework of college and high school students. Use of Wolfram|Alpha is difficult to trace, and in the hands of ambitious students, its perfect solutions are having unexpected consequences. It works by breaking down the pieces of a question, whether a mathematical problem or something like "What is the center of the United States?", and then cross-referencing those pieces against an enormous library of datasets that is constantly being expanded. These datasets include information on geodesic schemes, chemical compounds, human genes, historical weather measurements, and thousands of other topics that, when brought together, can be used to provide answers.

The system is constrained by the limits of its data library: It can’t interpret every question. It also can’t respond in natural language, or what a human would recognize as conversational speech. This is a stumbling block in AI in general. Even Siri, which relies heavily on Mathematica—another Wolfram Research product and the engine behind Wolfram|Alpha—can only answer questions in programmed response scripts, which are like a series of Mad Libs into which it plugs answers before spitting them out of your speaker or onto your screen.

Using Wolfram|Alpha is similar to executing a Google search, but Wolfram|Alpha delivers specific answers rather than endless pages of potentially relevant results. Anyone can go to the Wolfram|Alpha website, type a question or equation into a dialogue box, hit enter, and receive an answer. If you’re trying to solve x2 + 5x + 6 = 0, Wolfram|Alpha will give you the root plot, alternate forms, and solutions. If you are looking for a step-by-step explanation, there is a pro version available for $6.99/month with discounted options for students and educators.

I first heard about Wolfram|Alpha in my parents' kitchen. My father had come home from his job at a private school in Dobbs Ferry, New York. He dropped his bag on the floor, and asked me what I thought about Wolfram|Alpha. Earlier that day he had been confronted by STEM teachers who were frustrated with their students' use of the tool. It was, they said, blatant cheating. My father had left the office unsure of how to proceed. Should the school crack down on Wolfram|Alpha? Or did the school need to catch up to this new beat in education?

I’d never heard of it, but a quick post to Facebook revealed that many of my friends had—especially those studying math. Some had used it to get through college calculus, while a few were still using it at their jobs as engineers or quantitative analysts. The rise of Wolfram|Alpha had completely passed over my humanities-minded head, just as, for millions of minds, it had become ubiquitous. Turning to the tech for answers was, they said, normal. At the same time, all made it clear that they didn’t want their use of Wolfram|Alpha to be made public.

Though Wolfram|Alpha was designed to be an educational asset — a way to explore an equation from within— academia has found itself at a loss over how to respond. What some call cheating, others have heralded as a massive step forward in how we learn, what we teach, and what education is even good for. They say that Wolfram|Alpha is the future. Unsurprisingly, its creator agrees.

Stephen Wolfram, the mind behind Wolfram|Alpha, can’t do long division and didn’t learn his times tables until he’d hit 40. Indeed, the inspiration for Wolfram|Alpha, which he released in 2009, started with Wolfram’s own struggles as a math student. Growing up, Wolfram’s obsession was physics. By 12, he’d written a dictionary on physics, by his early teens he’d churned out three (as yet unpublished) books, and by 15 he was publishing scientific papers.

Despite his wunderkind science abilities, math was a constant stumbling block. He could come up with concepts, but executing calculations was hard. His solution was to get his hands on a computer. By programming it to solve equations and find patterns in data, he could leave the math to the machine and focus his brain on the science. It worked. In 1981, Wolfram became the youngest person to ever receive a MacArthur Fellowship. He was only 21.

Yet the tool that helped Wolfram build his reputation with physics ended up pulling him away from science. Wolfram became obsessed with complex systems and how computers could be used to study them. Five years after receiving his MacArthur Fellowship, Wolfram began developing Mathematica, and in 1988 Wolfram Research announced the release of its flagship product.

Wolfram never planned for his tool to become highbrow CliffsNotes, but he’s not too concerned about it, either. “Mechanical math,” Wolfram argues, “is a very low level of precise thinking.” Instead, Wolfram believes that we should be emphasizing computational thinking —something he describes as “trying to formulate your thoughts so that you can explain them to a sufficiently smart computer.” This has also been called computer-based math. Essentially, knowing algebra in today’s technology-saturated world won’t get you very far, but knowing how to ask a computer to do your algebra will. If students are making this shift, in his mind, they’re just ahead of the curve.

Alan Joyce, the director of content development for Wolfram Alpha, says that cheating is “absolutely the wrong way to look at what we do.” But the staff understands what might make teachers uncomfortable. Historically, education had to emphasize hand calculations, says John Dixon, a program manager at Wolfram Research. That’s because there wasn’t tech to fall back on and, when tech did start to appear, it wasn’t reliable. Only recently can computers calculate things automatically and precisely, and it’ll take some time for curriculums, and the teachers that are beholden to them, to catch up. Wolfram Research, Dixon says, wants to engage with teachers like Garcia, who are frustrated by the tool, to help them understand how it can help their students.

Indeed, the people who are directing the tool’s development view it as an educational equalizer that can give students who don’t have at-home homework helpers—like tutors or highly educated and accessible parents—access to what amounts to a personal tutor. It also has enormous potential within the classroom. A "show steps" button, which reveals the path to an answer, allows teachers to break down the components of a problem, rather than getting bogged down in mechanics. The "problem generator" can pull from real datasets to create relevant examples. “When you start to show educators the potential,” Dixon says, “you can see points where their eyes light up.”

For every teacher who’s converted to Dixon’s camp, there are multitudes of students who have been there for a while. As Alexander Feiner, an aspiring engineer and high school freshman told me, Wolfram|Alpha is a study aid, not a way of avoiding work — something that Dixon insists is the norm when it comes to out-of-classroom student use.

Still, the prevailing notion that Wolfram|Alpha is a form of cheating doesn’t appear to be dissipating. Much of this comes down to what homework is. If the purpose of homework is build greater understanding of concepts as presented in class, Joyce is adamant that teachers should view Wolfram|Alpha as an asset. It’s not that Wolfram Alpha has helped students “‘get through’ a math class by doing their homework for them,” he says, “but that we helped them actually understand what they were doing” in the first place. Dixon believes that Wolfram|Alpha can build confidence in students who don’t see themselves as having mathematical minds. Homework isn’t really about learning to do a calculation, but rather about learning to find and understand an answer regardless of how the calculation is executed.

That’s the route down which education appears to be headed. Once upon a time, education was all about packing as much information as possible into a human brain. Information was limited and expensive, and the smartest people were effectively the deepest and most organized filing cabinets. Today, it’s the opposite.“The notion of education as a transfer of information from experts to novices—and asking the novices to repeat that information, regurgitate it on command as proof that they have learned it—is completely disconnected from the reality of 2017,” says David Helfand, a Professor of Astronomy at Columbia University.

The technology isn’t going anywhere: Like copying out of the back of a book or splitting a problem set among friends, students aren’t likely to stop using Wolfram|Alpha just because a teacher says so. Even Garcia can see a future where Wolfram|Alpha fits in. “I think, in an ideal world, teachers, myself included, need to do a better job of incorporating technology…and finding ways of using it in productive ways,” she says.

Just as robotics has transformed manufacturing, tools like Wolfram|Alpha are forcing us to rethink an educational system by challenging it to rise to the new technological standard. Either we reshape our schools to embrace tools like Wolfram|Alpha, or we risk becoming living artifacts in a rapidly progressing world.

• Skip to main content
• Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

A new AI chatbot might do your homework for you. But it's still not an A+ student

Emma Bowman

Enter a prompt into ChatGPT, and it becomes your very own virtual assistant. OpenAI/Screenshot by NPR hide caption

Enter a prompt into ChatGPT, and it becomes your very own virtual assistant.

Why do your homework when a chatbot can do it for you? A new artificial intelligence tool called ChatGPT has thrilled the Internet with its superhuman abilities to solve math problems, churn out college essays and write research papers.

After the developer OpenAI released the text-based system to the public last month, some educators have been sounding the alarm about the potential that such AI systems have to transform academia, for better and worse.

"AI has basically ruined homework," said Ethan Mollick, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business, on Twitter.

The tool has been an instant hit among many of his students, he told NPR in an interview on Morning Edition , with its most immediately obvious use being a way to cheat by plagiarizing the AI-written work, he said.

Academic fraud aside, Mollick also sees its benefits as a learning companion.

Opinion: Machine-made poetry is here

He's used it as his own teacher's assistant, for help with crafting a syllabus, lecture, an assignment and a grading rubric for MBA students.

"You can paste in entire academic papers and ask it to summarize it. You can ask it to find an error in your code and correct it and tell you why you got it wrong," he said. "It's this multiplier of ability, that I think we are not quite getting our heads around, that is absolutely stunning," he said.

A convincing — yet untrustworthy — bot

But the superhuman virtual assistant — like any emerging AI tech — has its limitations. ChatGPT was created by humans, after all. OpenAI has trained the tool using a large dataset of real human conversations.

"The best way to think about this is you are chatting with an omniscient, eager-to-please intern who sometimes lies to you," Mollick said.

It lies with confidence, too. Despite its authoritative tone, there have been instances in which ChatGPT won't tell you when it doesn't have the answer.

That's what Teresa Kubacka, a data scientist based in Zurich, Switzerland, found when she experimented with the language model. Kubacka, who studied physics for her Ph.D., tested the tool by asking it about a made-up physical phenomenon.

"I deliberately asked it about something that I thought that I know doesn't exist so that they can judge whether it actually also has the notion of what exists and what doesn't exist," she said.

ChatGPT produced an answer so specific and plausible sounding, backed with citations, she said, that she had to investigate whether the fake phenomenon, "a cycloidal inverted electromagnon," was actually real.

When she looked closer, the alleged source material was also bogus, she said. There were names of well-known physics experts listed – the titles of the publications they supposedly authored, however, were non-existent, she said.

"This is where it becomes kind of dangerous," Kubacka said. "The moment that you cannot trust the references, it also kind of erodes the trust in citing science whatsoever," she said.

Scientists call these fake generations "hallucinations."

"There are still many cases where you ask it a question and it'll give you a very impressive-sounding answer that's just dead wrong," said Oren Etzioni, the founding CEO of the Allen Institute for AI , who ran the research nonprofit until recently. "And, of course, that's a problem if you don't carefully verify or corroborate its facts."

Users experimenting with the chatbot are warned before testing the tool that ChatGPT "may occasionally generate incorrect or misleading information." OpenAI/Screenshot by NPR hide caption

An opportunity to scrutinize AI language tools

Users experimenting with the free preview of the chatbot are warned before testing the tool that ChatGPT "may occasionally generate incorrect or misleading information," harmful instructions or biased content.

Sam Altman, OpenAI's CEO, said earlier this month it would be a mistake to rely on the tool for anything "important" in its current iteration. "It's a preview of progress," he tweeted .

The failings of another AI language model unveiled by Meta last month led to its shutdown. The company withdrew its demo for Galactica, a tool designed to help scientists, just three days after it encouraged the public to test it out, following criticism that it spewed biased and nonsensical text.

Untangling Disinformation

Ai-generated fake faces have become a hallmark of online influence operations.

Similarly, Etzioni says ChatGPT doesn't produce good science. For all its flaws, though, he sees ChatGPT's public debut as a positive. He sees this as a moment for peer review.

"ChatGPT is just a few days old, I like to say," said Etzioni, who remains at the AI institute as a board member and advisor. It's "giving us a chance to understand what he can and cannot do and to begin in earnest the conversation of 'What are we going to do about it?' "

The alternative, which he describes as "security by obscurity," won't help improve fallible AI, he said. "What if we hide the problems? Will that be a recipe for solving them? Typically — not in the world of software — that has not worked out."

Become an Insider

Sign up today to receive premium content.

Deep Dive Into AI

How can AI improve and optimize your customer experience?

EdTech Goes Undercover: An Insider’s View of What Students Post on Contract Cheating Sites

Amelia Pang is a journalist and an editor at EdTech: Focus on Higher Education. Her work has appeared in the New Republic, Mother Jones, and  The New York Times Sunday Review, among other publications.

Editor’s Note: This is part 1 of a 2-part investigation. Part 2 covers how IT departments can detect and prevent contract cheating in higher education.

“Please complete my assignment,” a student posts on a microtutoring website that universities say  facilitates contract cheating . The assignment is on the history of public health. APA format. Three sources. At least 750 words. In less than 15 minutes,  EdTech  sees a university ghostwriter accepting the assignment for $20.

There are hundreds of “homework help” websites that have seen an  exponential increase in customers  since the start of the pandemic. The services offered on sites like these typically run the gamut of legitimate tutoring to selling exam documents and answers. Some flat out offer to take an entire online course or exam for students.

The shadow industry of contract cheating falls into a legal gray area. When students and tutors make an account on a homework help site, they must sign a terms-of-service agreement and honor code that forbids academic cheating. But an undercover  EdTech  investigation found this agreement appears to be rarely enforced.

“I have definitely seen an increase in customers since the pandemic began,” Alex, an academic ghostwriter who currently works for a homework help site, tells  EdTech.  “Specifically, there has been an increase in the number of students posting that they want full online classes done for them. Most of the time, students have no problem finding a contractor.”

What Is Contract Cheating, and How Does It Work?

To avoid legal liability, some homework help sites are using automation tools to edit the language of posts. Whenever students submit a post, the first line always says something like “I need help understanding the assignment,” or “Help me learn.”

But  EdTech  saw this as mostly a cursory statement. Many students will also directly say, “Please complete my assignment.” Some even go so far as to request that the “tutor” be available at a certain date and time to take an online exam for them.

“I would say that 30 percent of the requests are for ‘help’ versus completing assignments,”  a tutor for one of these sites told BRIGHT Magazine in 2016.  “It is largely a place for students to cheat.”

When  EdTech  created a tutor account at a homework help site earlier this year, we found that not much has changed since the BRIGHT Magazine article came out five years ago.

An insider's view of what students post on contract cheating sites.

Although students are blatantly asking for “tutors” to complete assignments and exams for them,  EdTech  saw academic ghostwriters making bids and accepting the work — often within minutes.

Students Hire Academic Ghostwriters to Take Online Courses for Them

Former and current academic ghostwriters also say that taking an entire online course for students is a common practice in the industry — a practice that has existed since the inception of online education. “That was always standard operating procedure,” says Dave Tomar, a former academic ghostwriter who started his decade-long career in contract cheating in 2000. He is currently the managing editor of  Academic Influence , where he  shares his insights  on how educators can counter the surge of contract cheating during the pandemic.

“When I started doing this, I would frequently get these full online modules at the beginning of a rolling semester," Tomar says. “I got the full syllabus, and everything that I was expected to do over the next couple of months. Now, with countless students forced into remote learning, you have a whole new customer pool that is growing.”

As for how much students are willing to pay, the contractors charge “anywhere from $300 to $700 for a full class depending on the student, the subject and the difficulty,” says Alex, who currently works for a homework help site.

INSIDER EXCLUSIVE:   Read Part 2 – What can universities do about contract cheating?

Fake Tutors Entice Unknowing Students to Engage in Contract Cheating

Academic cheating sites also strongly encourage students to sell their coursework— an act that may be illegal in 17 states.

“Distributing any post-secondary assignment for a profit with reasonable knowledge that it will be submitted by another person for academic credit is a crime in many US states,” Citron Research, an investment research firm that investigates overvalued fraudulent companies, stated in  a report.

It’s a big problem for many institutions. According to Douglas Harrison, vice president and dean of the school of cybersecurity and information technology at the  University of Maryland Global Campus , some of these contract cheating websites are “facilitating massive transfers of institutional proprietary material into their file-sharing systems.”

Harrison says many students may not even realize they are cheating when they download a university’s copyrighted classroom assessment materials because these websites reframe downloading answers to tests as a form of studying or tutoring. “They reframe file-sharing as educational, even though these are behaviors that conventional norms of academic integrity would consider misconduct,” he says.

Dave Tomar former academic ghostwriter.

To make matters worse, these websites have mastered sophisticated techniques to lure unsuspecting students. Several of these prominent homework tutoring sites will offer to give students a discount if they let their academic ghostwriter have access to the online course. This often results in the contract cheater stealing other students’ personal information.

“So the contract cheater then reaches out to other students and says, ‘I’m a tutor in your course. And I’ve helped another student in your class with their assignments. Would you like a little help?’” Harrison says, describing how the contract cheater pitches cheating “services” to other students.

This can be especially confusing for students, who may not know how to tell the difference between a contract cheater and a legitimate tutor who is affiliated with the university.

“Most of the students who we find in academic misconduct settings after inappropriately using materials on these sites, they did not set out to be malicious cheaters. Now that doesn’t mean we don’t hold them accountable, but we have to hold them accountable in proportion to the root cause of the situation,” Harrison says.

Who Is Using Academic Ghostwriters?

According to the ghostwriters who are contracted to help students cheat, their customers are usually underserved students who need access to remedial courses, and nontraditional students who struggle to balance coursework with full-time employment.

“I would argue that what is facilitating the surge of contract cheating is the fact that students are increasingly desperate and lacking support,” says Tomar.

During Tomar’s time as an academic ghostwriter, he caught glimpses into their personal circumstances. “Some would tell you they are a parent working full time. And they just can’t deal with this challenge right now. Some say, ‘I’ve invested X number of dollars into this education, and I cannot afford to fail this class. But I don’t know how to do this assignment.’”

Alex mentions that many are also English language learners. “As I noted, some students are asking for whole classes to be done, and a lot of those are English or writing-intensive courses,” he says. “That does not mean that they are ESL, but [my sense is] most of them are.”

To fundamentally address the cheating pandemic, universities and colleges may need to invest in more resources for vulnerable student populations.

“It begins with figuring out who’s struggling, why they’re struggling and what we can do to help them before they end up as contract cheating customers,” Tomar says.

• Blended Learning
• Distance Learning
• Online Learning
• IT Governance

Related Articles

Copyright © 2024 CDW LLC 200 N. Milwaukee Avenue , Vernon Hills, IL 60061 Do Not Sell My Personal Information

ChatGPT was tipped to cause widespread cheating. Here's what students say happened

ABC Science

Topic: Science and Technology

Many students found it easy to evade bans on accessing ChatGPT on school devices. ( Getty Images: Izusek )

As teachers met before the start of the 2023 school year, there was one big topic of conversation: ChatGPT.

Education departments banned students from accessing the artificial intelligence (AI) writing tool, which could produce essays, complete homework, and cheat on take-home assignments.

Some experts said schools would be swamped by a wave of cheating.

And then? Well, school continued.

The expected wave never broke. Or if it did, it was difficult to detect.

Many teachers said they strongly suspected students were cheating, but it was hard to tell for sure. 

Meanwhile, some schools went in the opposite direction, embracing the new AI tools. Principals said students needed to learn how to use a technology that would probably define their futures.

But there was one perspective missing in all this: that of the students themselves.

As the school year drew to a close, we spoke to Year 11 and 12 students about how they actually ended up using generative AI tools.

Overall, these are stories from a historic moment, and an insight into the future of education. This is the first year where high school students could easily access high quality AI writing tools.

Here's what they had to say.

'The chatbot could smash it out in seconds'

Some were initially curious, but also cautious.

Some used it once then stopped. Others kept going.

Some got caught, but many didn't.

ChatGPT was launched in late 2022 and soon racked up over 100 million users. ( ABC News: Gian De Poloni )

For Eric, who asked to remain anonymous, the arrival of ChatGPT in the summer of 2022–23 was a mixed blessing.

To stop students using AI to cheat on take-home assignments, his school switched to more in-class assessments.

But Eric, who has ADHD, struggles to concentrate in exams.

"That sort of crippled my chances at doing great in school," he says.

"Exams are the death of me."

But the new AI writing tool had its uses. In term one, he experimented with cheating, using ChatGPT to write a take-home geography assignment (though it didn't count towards his HSC).

He wasn't caught and got a decent grade.

Next, he gave ChatGPT his homework. 

"It's just meaningless, monotonous work. And, you know, the chatbot could just smash it out in seconds."

Eric estimates that, over the course of 2023, ChatGPT wrote most of his homework.

"So around 60 per cent of my homework was written by ChatGPT," he says.

AI cheating creates divide among classmates

Students at other schools told similar stories.

Chrysoula, a Year 11 student in Sydney, initially used ChatGPT "very often to complete homework I deemed just tedious".

A lot of her classmates were doing the same, she says.

"Any time someone read a good answer out in class discussions, there was someone leaning over whispering 'Chat[GPT]?'

"Everyone doubted the authenticity of everyone's answers."

But as the year drew on, Chrysoula found her "critical and analytical thinking was slightly impaired".

"I was beginning to form a dependence on the AI to feed me the knowledge to rote learn."

Worried about AI harming her learning abilities, Chrysoula blocked herself from accessing the ChatGPT website.

The students who are still cheating are easy to spot, she says.

They often waste time in class and leave coursework to complete at home, when they can access AI tools. Their essays overuse words that ChatGPT favours, like "profound", or "metaphors for things like tapestries".

"They even hand in entire assessments written entirely by AI."

Phil, a Year 12 student at a different high school, also sees a divide that's formed among his classmates, based on how much each student uses AI to do their coursework.

His school allows students to use ChatGPT for ideas and research but not to directly write assessments.

But many students still cheat on take-home assignments, Phil says. He's worried they "aren't learning anything" and their poor performance in the HSC exams will ultimately hurt his ATAR.

"There's a significant population of the school who just aren't doing any work, and that drives us down because of how the ATAR system works."

Harry, a Year 11 student at another school, uses ChatGPT for some homework, but not for assignments.

His reason? The AI's answers aren't good enough.

"When you want to get the top marks, I'd say that's when you do want to use your own brain and you do want to critically think."

How common is AI cheating in schools?

Many of the high school students we spoke with weren't using AI to cheat, even though they could get away with it.

Whether this is representative of students in general is hard to say, as there's very little reliable data on cheating rates.

But at least one survey suggests that rates of AI cheating among students may be lower than generally assumed.

In mid-2023, the Centre for Democracy and Technology asked US high school students how much they used generative AI tools to do their coursework, and then compared this with the estimates of teachers and parents.

The use of AI in classrooms as customised learning chatbots may change the role of teacher. ( Supplied: Dyslexia Mid North Coast )

Kristin Woelfel, a co-author of the report , says teachers and parents consistently overestimate how many students use AI to cheat.

"While 58 per cent of students report having used generative AI in the past year, only 19 per cent of that group reports using it to write and submit papers," she says.

She says the survey data doesn't support the inflammatory predictions about cheating made at the start of the year.

"Students are primarily using generative AI for personal reasons rather than academic."

But Kane Murdoch, head of academic integrity at Macquarie University, says that even if the rate of AI cheating is low now, it's likely to go up.

He believes students will gain confidence, and learn how to use AI to automate more of their coursework.

"It could be 2023 was the year they dipped their toe in the water, but 2024 and moving ahead you’ll get increasingly large body parts into the pool.

"And soon enough they’ll be in the deep end."

Banning AI cheating hasn't worked

Many of the students we spoke to say teachers have little power to stop them from using AI tools for homework or assignments.

The past year proved blocking access to AI tools, as well as detecting AI-written coursework, was ineffective.

Students described numerous ways of evading the blocks on accessing ChatGPT on school computers, or through a school's Wi-Fi network.

They also told how they copied their ChatGPT-written answers into other AI tools, designed to confuse the schools' AI-detection software.

"Nearly every AI detector I've come across is inaccurate," Chrysoula says.

Mr Murdoch agrees.

"There's lot of skepticism about the efficacy of detection — and I'm among those who are skeptical."

He says educators were reluctant to rely on flawed plagiarism-detection tools to accuse a student of cheating.

"As an investigator [of cheating] I'm unwilling to accept the detectors word on it," he says.

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI has warned that there is no reliable way for educators to work out if students are using ChatGPT.

Several major universities in the US have turned off AI detection software, citing concerns over accuracy and a fear of falsely accusing students of using AI to cheat.

Mr Murdoch says Australian universities are also wary of relying on detection software.

But they disagree over what to do next. Some believe that better detection is the answer, while others are pushing for a change to the way learning is assessed.

"Programmatic" assessment, such as interviews and practical exams, may be one answer.

"It would mean we don't assess as much, and what we do assess we can actually hang our hat on," Mr Murdoch says.

"It's more like turning the ship in a very different direction rather than a slight course change.

"It's a much more difficult thing to grapple with."

Schools may go from banning bots to letting them teach

While the impact of AI on students has won most of the public attention, some education experts say the bigger story of 2023 may be how this technology changes the work of teaching.

Over the course of the year, schools have broadly gone from banning the technology to cautiously embracing it.

In February, state and federal education ministers slapped a year-long ban on student use of AI at state- and government-run schools.

Then, in October, the ministers agreed to lift the ban from term one next year.

The announcement brought public schools more in line with the approach of private and Catholic schools.

Federal education minister Jason Clare said at the time that "ChatGPT was not going away".

"We've got to learn how to use it," he said.

"Kids are using it right across the country ... we're playing catch-up."

But some observers are worried this new embrace of AI will replace in-person, teacher-led instruction.

The education industry is now promoting an idea of "platformisation", says Lucinda McKnight, a digital literacy expert at Deakin University.

"This is the idea that bots deliver education. The teacher shortage is solved by generative AI."

Custom-built chatbots, personalised for each student and loaded with the relevant curriculum, would teach, encourage and assess. Teachers would be experts in teaching , rather than the subject being taught.

But robo-classrooms like this have their drawbacks, Dr McKnight says.

Interacting with (human) teachers plays an important part in a child's emotional and social development.

"It's not the robots that are the problem, it's the fact students are going to be treated like robots," she says.

Macquarie University's Kane Murdoch says education institutions made a series of kneejerk reactions and false starts, such as the ChatGPT ban, in response to emergent AI technology in 2023.

Next year will see them make big changes, he predicts.

He's concerned that AI cheating will ultimately devalue educational qualifications.

"We can't expect this to go away. It is a game changer — it is existential," he says.

"If the public lose faith in what we do, we lose."

Student accounts suggest that, although not all want to cheat when they can, many are happy to automate tasks they see as rote learning rather than true tests of knowledge.

For Eric, who used ChatGPT to do most of his homework this year, the AI tool provided a shortcut through an already flawed system.

"I would have had such a worse time this year if ChatGPT wasn't prominent," he says.

"I think it would be very difficult for you to find a student that was sitting the HSC right now that hasn't used it for something."

Listen to the full story of how students used AI in 2023 and subscribe to RN Science Friction .

Science in your inbox

• Science Notes Posts
• Contact Science Notes
• Todd Helmenstine Biography
• Anne Helmenstine Biography
• Free Printable Periodic Tables (PDF and PNG)
• Periodic Table Wallpapers
• Interactive Periodic Table
• Periodic Table Posters
• Science Experiments for Kids
• How to Grow Crystals
• Chemistry Projects
• Fire and Flames Projects
• Holiday Science
• Chemistry Problems With Answers
• Physics Problems
• Unit Conversion Example Problems
• Chemistry Worksheets
• Biology Worksheets
• Periodic Table Worksheets
• Physical Science Worksheets
• Science Lab Worksheets
• My Amazon Books

Biology Worksheets, Notes, and Quizzes (PDF and PNG)

This is a collection of free biology worksheets, notes, handouts, slides, study guides and quizzes. Most content targets high school, AP biology, genetics, anatomy/physiology, immunology, and biology 101 and 102 in college. There is also biochemistry and physics for biologists. However, some resources are at the grade school and middle school level.

The files are PDF, PNG, JPG, and formats using Google Apps for Google Classroom. Most of the time, these formats are interchangeable. So, if you see something you like, but want a different format, just let us know. Print these resources, make transparencies and slides, etc.

In the interest of quick load time, not all of the images are shown. If you’d rather see them all, just contact us!

Biochemistry

[ Google apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ answers PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Enzymes Definitions

[ Google Slides worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ answers PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

• 20 Amino Acids [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Amino Acid Side Chains [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Identifying Type of Biological Macromolecules [ Google Slides worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ answers PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Disaccharide Examples [ PNG ]
• Products of Photosynthesis [ JPG ]
• Anabolism vs Catabolism [ PNG ]
• 3 Parts of a Nucleotide [ PNG ]
• Fermentation Definition and Examples [ PNG ]

General and Cell Biology

Organelles and Their Functions

Parts of a Plant Cell

Label Parts of a Chloroplast

[ Google Apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ answers PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Label Parts of a Mitochondria

Label the Animal Cell

[ Google Apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Prokaryotes vs Eukaryotes Worksheet

Steps of the Cell Cycle

Steps of Mitosis

Membrane Transport Terms and Definitions

Membrane Transport Worksheet #2

The Plasma Membrane

Label a Bacterial Cell

• Label a Bacteriophage [ Google Apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Evidence of Evolution Worksheet [ Google Apps worksheet ][ Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet PNG ][ Answers PNG ]
• Evolutionary Processes Worksheet [ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Major Receptor Families [ Google Apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Label a Bacterial Cell Membrane ( E. coli ) [ Google Apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Anatomy and Physiology

These worksheets are only a portion of the available anatomy and physiology worksheets. Human anatomy and physiology worksheets have their own section.

Label the Heart

Label the Eye

[ Google Apps worksheet ][ worksheet PDF ][ answers PDF ][ worksheet PNG ]

Types of Blood Cells

[ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Label the Muscles

[ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Label the Ear

[ Google Apps worksheet ][ Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet PNG ][ Answers PNG ]

Label the Lungs

Label the Kidney

Label the Liver

Label the Large Intestine

Label the Stomach

[ Google Apps worksheet ] [Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet PNG ][ Answers PNG ]

External Nose Anatomy

[ Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet Google Apps ][ Worksheet PNG ][ Answers PNG ]

Parts of the Nose

Label Bones of the Skeleton

Label the Lymph Node

Label the Parts of the Brain

Label the Lobes of the Brain

Brain Anatomical Sections

Arteries of the Brain

Label the Pancreas

Label the Spleen

Label the Digestive System

Label the Respiratory System

Parts of a Neuron

Label the Lips

Label the Skin

Label the Circulatory System

The Urinary Tract

[ Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet Google Apps ][ Worksheet PNG ][ Answer Key PNG ]

The Bladder

• The Female Reproductive System [ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Parts of a Flower

Label the Orchid Plant

[ Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet Google Apps ][ Worksheet PNG ] [Answer Key PNG ]

Parts of an Orchid Flower

Parts of a Monocot Seed

Parts of a Fern

Parts of a Tree Trunk

Parts of a Tree

[ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Parts of a Mushroom

Label the Shark

Label the Fish

Parts of a Bird

Bird Anatomy

Frog Life Cycle

Parts of a Mosquito (Insect)

Bones of the T. rex Skull

[ worksheets PDF ][ worksheet Google Slides ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Holes of the T. rex Skull

• Label the T. rex Skeleton [ worksheets PDF ][ worksheet Google Slides ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Label Human Teeth [ Worksheet PDF ][ Worksheet Google Apps ][ Worksheet PNG ][ Answer Key PNG ]
• Monocot vs Dicot Seeds [ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet Google Slides ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Label the Moss [ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet Google Slides ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Diagram of the Human Eye [ JPG ]

Use a completed worksheet as a study guide.

Cells of the Immune System

Immune Cell Functions

[ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG #1][ answers PNG #1][ worksheet PNG #2][ answers PNG #2]

Methods to Study Virus Structures

[ worksheet Google Slide ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Icosahedral Virus Capsids

Human DNA Viruses

Human RNA Viruses

This is selection of worksheets relating to DNA, RNA, transcription, translation, genetic crosses, plasmid mapping, etc. See the full collection of genetics worksheets if you’re don’t see what you need.

DNA Replication

Types of Mutations

Monohybrid Cross Worksheet #1

Monohybrid Cross Worksheet #2

Monohybrid Cross Worksheet #3

Monohybrid Cross #4 – Multiple Alleles

• Monohybrid Cross Worksheet #5: Multiple Alleles [ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Monohybrid Cross #6 – Sex-Linked Inheritance

Monohybrid Cross #7 – Sex-Linked Inheritance

Dihybrid Cross Worksheet #1

Dihybrid Cross Worksheet #2

Dihybrid Cross Worksheet #3

Dihybrid Cross Worksheet #4

Dihybrid Cross #5 – Epistasis

Dihybrid Cross #6 – Epistasis

Incomplete Dominance Worksheet #1

Incomplete Dominance Worksheet #2

Natural Selection Worksheet

Convergent vs Divergent Evolution Worksheet

Intro to Pedigrees Worksheet #1

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #2

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #3 – X-Linked Dominant Traits

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #4 – X-Linked Recessive Traits

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #5 – Autosomal Dominant Traits

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #6 – Autosomal Recessive Traits

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #7 – Comprehension Skills

Pedigrees/Genealogy Worksheet #8 – Identifying Inheritance Patterns

Autosomal vs Sex-Linked Inheritance

Plasmid Mapping

• Genotype vs Phenotype [ PNG ]
• Genetic Codon Chart [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• RNA vs DNA [ JPG ]

Use labelled diagrams as study guides.

Ecosystems Worksheet

Levels of Organization (Ecosystem)

Primary Succession

Secondary Succession

Label the Insect

Label the Bee

Chicken Life Cycle (Basic)

Bird Life Cycle (Basic)

Butterfly Life Cycle

• Biotic and Abiotic Factors [ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]
• Kingdoms of Life Graphic [ PNG ]
• Autotroph vs Heterotroph Graphic [ PNG ]
• Commensalism Definition and Examples [ PNG ]
• Difference Between Butterflies and Moths [ JPG ]
• Difference Between Bugs and Insects [ PNG ]

Parasitology

Schistosome Life Cycle

Schistosome Anatomy

• Giardia Life Cycle [ worksheet Google Apps ][ worksheet PDF ][ worksheet PNG ][ answers PNG ]

Physical Science for Biology

There is also an entire section devoted to physical science worksheets and study guides.

• Adhesion vs Cohesion Graphic [ PNG ]
• What Is Entropy? [ PNG ]
• Freezing Point of Water [ PNG ]

Biology Labs

• How to Extract DNA From a Banana [ PNG ]

Biology Word Search Puzzles

• DNA Replication Word Search
• Gel Electrophoresis Word Search
• Citrus Fruits
• General Biology Word Search Puzzle [ PNG ]
• Life Science Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Cell Biology Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Amino Acid Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Biome Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Environmental Science Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Photosynthesis Word Search [ PNG ]
• Human Skeleton Bones Word Search [ PNG ]
• Dinosaur Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Different Dinosaur Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Wild Cats Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Shark Word Search [ PNG ]
• Trees Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Flowers Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Butterfly Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]
• Genetics Word Search [ PNG ][ PDF ]

Miscellaneous Biology Notes and Resouces

• How Long Can Germs Live on Surfaces? [ PNG ]
• 10 Radioactive Foods [ PNG ]
• Examples of Organic Compounds [ PNG ]

Biology Notes Terms of Use

You are welcome to print these resources for personal or classroom use. They may be used as handouts or posters. They may  not  be posted elsewhere online, sold, or used on products for sale.

This page doesn’t include all of the assets on the Science Notes site. If there’s a table or worksheet you need but don’t see, just let us know.

Related Posts

Navigation Menu

Search code, repositories, users, issues, pull requests..., provide feedback.

We read every piece of feedback, and take your input very seriously.

Saved searches

Use saved searches to filter your results more quickly.

To see all available qualifiers, see our documentation .

• Notifications You must be signed in to change notification settings

Sparxmaths Solver | Removes Bookwork codes | SparxSolver

NajmAjmal/sparxmaths

Folders and files.

Repository files navigation

Sparxsolver.

This repo is now archived, no further updates will be made.

Welcome to SparxSolver , a Free browser extension designed to assist you with your sparx maths homework. Before using this extension, please read the full terms and conditions here .

✩ If you like this project, consider giving it a star! ✩

• Table of Contents

🎬 Autosolve

Installation, statistics starting from: 15/11/2023, 👏 acknowledgements.

• Bookwork-code bypass
• Stores answers (so you don't need to write them down)
• Automatically highlights the correct bookwork check answer

These instructions explain how to Install SparxSolver browser extension on your computer.

Download the Extension:

• Visit the Latest Release page.
• Download the extension.zip file.

Extract the Zip File:

• Unzip the downloaded file to a location convenient for you, such as your desktop or documents folder.

Open Your Browser:

• Launch your browser.

Access Extensions:

• Navigate to chrome://extensions/ .
• Navigate to edge://extensions/ .
• Navigate to opera://extensions/ .

Enable Developer Mode:

• In the Extensions tab, toggle on the "Developer mode" switch in the top-right corner.

Load the Extension:

• Click the "Load unpacked" button in the top-left corner.
• Select the folder where you extracted the extension's source code.
• Click "Open" to install the extension.

Verify Installation:

• The extension should now appear in the Extensions tab.
• Refresh the Sparxmaths website to see the extension in action. (If website is already open)

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

• Thanks to Glitch for hosting the " sparxmaths.glitch.me " website
• Thanks to Shields.io for providing the status badge in this README
• Thanks to Caio Rordrigues for Bookmarklet Maker
• Thanks to all contributors who have helped improve this project

THIS PROGRAM HAS NO CONNECTION WITH SPARXMATHS. SPARX MATHS IS OWNED BY SPARX LTD.

Code of conduct

Security policy, contributors 2.

• Future Students
• Current Students
• Faculty/Staff

News and Media

• News & Media Home
• Research Stories
• School’s In
• In the Media

You are here

What do ai chatbots really mean for students and cheating.

The launch of ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots has triggered an alarm for many educators, who worry about students using the technology to cheat by passing its writing off as their own. But two Stanford researchers say that concern is misdirected, based on their ongoing research into cheating among U.S. high school students before and after the release of ChatGPT.  

“There’s been a ton of media coverage about AI making it easier and more likely for students to cheat,” said Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE). “But we haven’t seen that bear out in our data so far. And we know from our research that when students do cheat, it’s typically for reasons that have very little to do with their access to technology.”

Pope is a co-founder of Challenge Success , a school reform nonprofit affiliated with the GSE, which conducts research into the student experience, including students’ well-being and sense of belonging, academic integrity, and their engagement with learning. She is the author of Doing School: How We Are Creating a Generation of Stressed-Out, Materialistic, and Miseducated Students , and coauthor of Overloaded and Underprepared: Strategies for Stronger Schools and Healthy, Successful Kids.  

Victor Lee is an associate professor at the GSE whose focus includes researching and designing learning experiences for K-12 data science education and AI literacy. He is the faculty lead for the AI + Education initiative at the Stanford Accelerator for Learning and director of CRAFT (Classroom-Ready Resources about AI for Teaching), a program that provides free resources to help teach AI literacy to high school students. 

Here, Lee and Pope discuss the state of cheating in U.S. schools, what research shows about why students cheat, and their recommendations for educators working to address the problem.

Denise Pope

What do we know about how much students cheat?

Pope: We know that cheating rates have been high for a long time. At Challenge Success we’ve been running surveys and focus groups at schools for over 15 years, asking students about different aspects of their lives — the amount of sleep they get, homework pressure, extracurricular activities, family expectations, things like that — and also several questions about different forms of cheating. 

For years, long before ChatGPT hit the scene, some 60 to 70 percent of students have reported engaging in at least one “cheating” behavior during the previous month. That percentage has stayed about the same or even decreased slightly in our 2023 surveys, when we added questions specific to new AI technologies, like ChatGPT, and how students are using it for school assignments.

Isn’t it possible that they’re lying about cheating? 

Pope: Because these surveys are anonymous, students are surprisingly honest — especially when they know we’re doing these surveys to help improve their school experience. We often follow up our surveys with focus groups where the students tell us that those numbers seem accurate. If anything, they’re underreporting the frequency of these behaviors.

Lee: The surveys are also carefully written so they don’t ask, point-blank, “Do you cheat?” They ask about specific actions that are classified as cheating, like whether they have copied material word for word for an assignment in the past month or knowingly looked at someone else’s answer during a test. With AI, most of the fear is that the chatbot will write the paper for the student. But there isn’t evidence of an increase in that.

So AI isn’t changing how often students cheat — just the tools that they’re using? 

Lee: The most prudent thing to say right now is that the data suggest, perhaps to the surprise of many people, that AI is not increasing the frequency of cheating. This may change as students become increasingly familiar with the technology, and we’ll continue to study it and see if and how this changes. 

But I think it’s important to point out that, in Challenge Success’ most recent survey, students were also asked if and how they felt an AI chatbot like ChatGPT should be allowed for school-related tasks. Many said they thought it should be acceptable for “starter” purposes, like explaining a new concept or generating ideas for a paper. But the vast majority said that using a chatbot to write an entire paper should never be allowed. So this idea that students who’ve never cheated before are going to suddenly run amok and have AI write all of their papers appears unfounded.

But clearly a lot of students are cheating in the first place. Isn’t that a problem? 

Pope: There are so many reasons why students cheat. They might be struggling with the material and unable to get the help they need. Maybe they have too much homework and not enough time to do it. Or maybe assignments feel like pointless busywork. Many students tell us they’re overwhelmed by the pressure to achieve — they know cheating is wrong, but they don’t want to let their family down by bringing home a low grade. 

We know from our research that cheating is generally a symptom of a deeper, systemic problem. When students feel respected and valued, they’re more likely to engage in learning and act with integrity. They’re less likely to cheat when they feel a sense of belonging and connection at school, and when they find purpose and meaning in their classes. Strategies to help students feel more engaged and valued are likely to be more effective than taking a hard line on AI, especially since we know AI is here to stay and can actually be a great tool to promote deeper engagement with learning.

What would you suggest to school leaders who are concerned about students using AI chatbots? 

Pope: Even before ChatGPT, we could never be sure whether kids were getting help from a parent or tutor or another source on their assignments, and this was not considered cheating. Kids in our focus groups are wondering why they can't use ChatGPT as another resource to help them write their papers — not to write the whole thing word for word, but to get the kind of help a parent or tutor would offer. We need to help students and educators find ways to discuss the ethics of using this technology and when it is and isn't useful for student learning.

Lee: There’s a lot of fear about students using this technology. Schools have considered putting significant amounts of money in AI-detection software, which studies show can be highly unreliable. Some districts have tried blocking AI chatbots from school wifi and devices, then repealed those bans because they were ineffective. 

AI is not going away. Along with addressing the deeper reasons why students cheat, we need to teach students how to understand and think critically about this technology. For starters, at Stanford we’ve begun developing free resources to help teachers bring these topics into the classroom as it relates to different subject areas. We know that teachers don’t have time to introduce a whole new class, but we have been working with teachers to make sure these are activities and lessons that can fit with what they’re already covering in the time they have available. 

I think of AI literacy as being akin to driver’s ed: We’ve got a powerful tool that can be a great asset, but it can also be dangerous. We want students to learn how to use it responsibly.

More Stories

⟵ Go to all Research Stories

Get the Educator

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter.

Stanford Graduate School of Education

482 Galvez Mall Stanford, CA 94305-3096 Tel: (650) 723-2109

• Contact Admissions
• GSE Leadership
• Site Feedback
• Web Accessibility
• Career Resources
• Faculty Open Positions
• Explore Courses
• Academic Calendar
• Office of the Registrar
• Cubberley Library
• StanfordWho
• StanfordYou

Improving lives through learning

• Stanford Home
• Maps & Directions
• Search Stanford
• Emergency Info
• Terms of Use
• Non-Discrimination
• Accessibility

© Stanford University , Stanford , California 94305 .

Professors want to 'ChatGPT-proof' assignments, and are returning to paper exams and requesting editing history to curb AI cheating

• College professors are looking to "ChatGPT-proof" assignments to curb cheating.
• Some professors suggest returning to paper exams and asking students to show editing histories. 
• Changes to assignments come as teachers debate the usage of generative AI in the classroom. 

Since OpenAI's ChatGPT came out last November, a number of teachers have caught their students using the chatbot to cheat and plagiarize on their assignments.

Now, professors at colleges across the US and beyond are trying out ways to "ChatGPT-proof" their assignments, as concerns grow that students may be missing out on learning by using AI cut corners and tools that detect AI-generated text have been found to be prone to errors.

Bonnie MacKellar, a computer science professor at St. Johns University in New York, said that she is making students in her intro courses take paper exams instead of digital ones and having them handwrite their code. Paper exams will be a bigger portion of her students' grades this fall, she said, compared to previous semesters. In turn, students will be disincentivized to outsource their logical thinking to AI, which she said could stunt their learning and leave them unprepared for more advanced computer science classes down the line.

"I hear colleagues in humanities courses saying the same thing: It's back to the blue books," MacKellar said.

Other professors seek to curb AI cheating by reframing assignment questions so students are required to "show their work," William Hart-Davidson, an associate dean at Michigan State University who leads AI workshops for faculty members, told Insider over email.

Assignment questions, Hart-Davidson said, "should include a request for students to be explicit and reflective about the moves they are making."

"We don't just want them to reproduce a fact or a rote response, but to learn to account for their reasoning in a deliberate way," he said.

For instance, ChatGPT can easily answer a straight-forward question like "Tell me in three sentences what is the Krebs cycle in chemistry?" he said.

To avoid this, Hart-Davidson told Insider that teachers should reframe the question to something like "revise an existing passage" on the Krebs cycle, which would require students to point out errors, identify writing for clarity and accuracy, and explain how the writing could be improved.

That way, students are forced to think through their answers, rather than regurgitate what a chatbot tells them, which Hart-Davidson said could help improve their writing.

Related stories

Some professors suggest students show their work by including their editing history and drafts along with their completed assignments. A document that logs all the typos corrected and the sentences rephrased in an essay can prove that a human wrote it, Dave Sayers, a professor at the University of Jyväskylä in Finland, wrote for the Times Higher Education , an education blog.

A guide from Butler University in Indianapolis on how to chatbot-proof assignments suggests that teachers could eliminate the essay, issue impromptu oral exams, and foster classroom discussions around how to best use the chatbot's responses.

The changes to school assignments come as teachers grapple with how to best integrate AI tools like ChatGPT into their classrooms. While some professors require their students to use ChatGPT to generate project ideas , some schools have outright banned the usage of AI to avoid cases of academic dishonesty.

Despite the controversy, some teachers are using AI chatbots themselves to streamline their workflows. Shannon Ahern, a high school math and science teacher in Dublin, Ireland, previously told Insider she used ChatGPT Plus to write lesson plans , generate exercise worksheets, and come up with quiz questions, which she claimed saved her hours of time.

As far as cheating goes, some teachers don't see that changing — with or without AI.

"I worried that my students would use it to cheat and plagiarize," Ahern said. "But then I remembered that students have always been cheating — whether that's copying a classmate's homework or getting a sibling to write an essay — and I don't think ChatGPT will change that."

Are you a student that secretly uses AI for your school work? Reach out to Insider's Aaron Mok at [email protected], or by encrypted messaging app Signal at 718-710-8200. Your identity will remain anonymous.

Watch: What is ChatGPT, and should we be afraid of AI chatbots?

• Main content

Get the Reddit app

All about studying and students of computer science.

I can’t stop cheating and I don’t know how to help myself

I am in my second year of undergrad as a cs major. I was caught my freshman year for copying code. It was stupid of me and I only changed the variables. Lesson learned, I swore never again. However, with everything online I have found myself getting into iffy situations. I now have the ability to text friends during exams and get help. I know it’s wrong but I’ve found myself sharing code again, I’m not blatantly copying it but it would be considered cheating still. I am trying so hard to not cheat but then when an exam comes around I see my classmates sharing code and it’s too much temptation to not look. Then from there, once u see the code it’s hard to forget it. And mine ends up being similar. I’d rather not get kicked out of school for cheating or get caught again. But somehow I always find myself crossing the line. It’s out of panic usually that I’m going to miss a deadline or fail an exam. And it’s been so so easy with online school. I really want to help myself and stop doing this, but I keep going back to my old ways. One mistake and I could fail a class or even worse get expelled from my school and have it on my permanent record. Does anyone have any advice, I know it sounds like I just have no self control. But it’s so easy to cheat now. I don’t know how to avoid it

By continuing, you agree to our User Agreement and acknowledge that you understand the Privacy Policy .

Enter the 6-digit code from your authenticator app

You’ve set up two-factor authentication for this account.

Enter a 6-digit backup code

Create your username and password.

Reddit is anonymous, so your username is what you’ll go by here. Choose wisely—because once you get a name, you can’t change it.

Reset your password

Enter your email address or username and we’ll send you a link to reset your password

Check your inbox

An email with a link to reset your password was sent to the email address associated with your account

Choose a Reddit account to continue