I knew my writing students were using AI. Their confessions led to a powerful teaching moment (opens in new tab)

The problem wasn’t just the perfectly polished, yet mediocre prose. It’s what’s lost when we surrender the struggle to translate thought into wordsI have been teaching fiction writing at MIT since 2017. Many of my students last wrote fiction in middle school, and very few have experienced a proper workshop, so at the start of every semester I offer these directions for writer and reader alike:Read the story at least twice. Mark what works and what doesn’t – underline great sentences, flag clu...