AI and Your 2e Writer: When to Use and When to Refuse

I’ve been a teacher of writing for 20 years, and let me tell you: Generative AI is here, and it can write anything. It can reproduce the style and tone of famous authors and can even be trained to sound exactly like a particular student. Just upload some samples of written work (mistakes and all), and voila, ChatGPT can complete assignments in that student’s voice.

Schools are in a bit of a crisis mode. Some are banning AI altogether (hello, old-school pencil and paper!), but that move just isn't fair to those neurodiverse learners who benefit from assistive technology such as voice typing and spell check.  On the opposite end of the spectrum, some schools are fully embracing AI, believing it is essential to prepare all students for the future.

So, where does your Twice-Exceptional (2e) child fit into this polarized landscape?

The Writing Hurdle for Our 2e Superstars

Our 2e kids are bright, creative, and independent-minded, yet standard writing assignments (like the 5-paragraph essay based on an assigned book) often lead to frustration and "I hate writing!" moments. Their brilliant potential often gets buried under challenges like anxiety, executive function hurdles, and being forced to write about things they genuinely don't care about.

When faced with a typical essay, 2e writers can hit three major walls:

• Engagement: It's excruciating to sustain attention on a book or a topic they dislike.
  

• Comprehension: Confusing assignment instructions can cause cognitive shutdown.
  

• Paralysis: Organizing their complex ideas into structured paragraphs is a huge executive function challenge.

  
  

The Core Philosophy: Sweeten the Journey, Protect the Struggle

The key is using AI judiciously. We aren't trying to let AI write the essay! We want to use it the way we use spell-check or voice-to-text: as a tool to remove the mental exhaustion from frustrating, often low-level, tasks.

I call this "sweetening the journey". We need to make learning to write accessible while fiercely protecting the critical thinking (the productive struggle) that actually drives learning.

Case Study: How AI Helped Nora Find Her Purpose

Let's consider Nora, a sensitive, anxious 8th-grade 2e student with ADHD. Her teacher assigned a five-paragraph essay on White Fang, a book she found disturbing due to its graphic violence towards dogs, her favorite animal. She was completely overwhelmed by the complex assignment. Take a look at the instructions:

Write a 5-paragraph essay that answers the following question:

To what extent is the main character’s (White Fang) character malleable, and what does this indicate about the role of nature vs. nurture in the development of one’s personality?

Nora was paralyzed.  She didn't want to read the book, understandably, and she was overwhelmed by the thought of developing and organizing her ideas. How can AI be used in a way that allows Nora to learn, to take risks, and to challenge herself? 

Step 1: Piquing Interest in the Book and Assignment (AI for Engagement)

Instead of forcing her to slog through a book she hated, Nora and I used a tool called NotebookLM to let her "chat" with the novel.

Nora uploaded the book and asked her own deep, critical questions about the author of White Fang, for example, "Was Jack London a racist, and should we even read this?" The AI-powered chat answered using information from the uploaded book (and an additional scholarly article critiquing London that I helped Nora find), sustaining her attention and piquing her interest. Importantly, this chat inspired Nora to research the author’s (openly racist) views further, leading to an authentic reason for reading the novel- to see if the author’s personal views affected the story.

Next, to tackle the confusing assignment question, we used ChatGPT in Study Mode. Nora wanted to learn more about the word “malleable” in the context of the novel.

Instead of giving her the definition of ‘malleable’, ChatGPT engaged her with simple questions that led her to an understanding of the word. 

After connecting with the book and understanding the teacher’s instructions, Nora developed a new essay question: 

To what extent do the author’s racist views affect how he writes about White Fang’s Native American and white owners? Are they malleable, or is their behavior determined by their race?

Thankfully, her teacher was flexible and allowed her to proceed. And for those of you wondering, yes, the author’s racist views were quite evident in his portrayal of the Native American and white characters in the novel. But that’s another article.

Step 2: Outlining the Writing (No AI Allowed)

This is the most critical part of the writing process. It’s the Thinking Zone. This is the healthy struggle of analysis, where the learner must fully own their ideas.

Typically, at this point, teachers ask students for an outline. The problem with outlines, as implied by the term, is that they call for linear thinking and information neatly ordered into lines of text.

For a non-linear, highly verbal, perfectionist like Nora, an outline is a deceptively challenging task, one that would quickly tempt student writers to use AI. If ChatGPT can produce a perfectly organized outline in seconds (complete with relevant quotes), why wouldn’t a student outsource this hated part of the assignment?

But this is the time to put one’s foot down. Get the writer to step away from the screen and 

use any– and I mean any–other method to organize their thoughts and work through what they want to say. Consider the following:

• Walk-and-talk with a parent, teacher, or classmate

• Drawing sketches of ideas on index cards (which can be easily rearranged)

• Storyboarding and comics

  
  

I’ve even had students use small Play-Doh sculptures to think through their ideas. One student, a dancer, needed to go to the corner, stretch, and think while moving though dance positions.

Moving from Ideas to Draft

One screen-based but non-AI option involves using a Google Slides template based on the assignment (one slide per paragraph; five slides for a five-paragraph essay). Nora created a slide deck and then used speech-to-text tools (Google Voice Typing) to simply "talk out" her thoughts.   This made the ideas flow easily, a huge relief. The voice-typed transcript served as a first draft that was printed out and discussed.

Step 3: Drafting & Revision (AI for Logistics)

Once her draft was solid, Nora returned to technology to remove the final barriers: the logistics of editing and revising.

Nora used the Read&Write read-aloud function to hear her essay read back to her (AI advances enable reading with natural tone and intonation, important for comprehension). This enabled her to note areas that were unclear and confusing.

She used a chatbot for feedback on grammar, which felt like "a person who never judges," helping her overcome her perfectionism.

Increasing the Threshold for Productive Struggle

In the end, Nora used AI and dove into the task, successfully writing a 5-paragraph essay. Importantly, she connected to the novel and found an argument she was excited to make about it.

In truth, AI does not need to be present for any of this to occur. Conversations with trusted educators, adults, and fellow learners can– and have for centuries–produced the same outcome. But if a writer is resistant and student resources are less than optimal, it’s worth considering these new tools.

The goal of AI is never to remove the opportunity to do the hard work of learning. The goal is to enlarge the territory in which a student is willing to struggle. For this assignment, AI supported Nora so that she could focus on the content and sequence of ideas in her written work. 

By creating a more joyful writing experience, teachers and parents can help students broaden the areas of writing in which they are willing to challenge themselves. Perhaps in future writing assignments, Nora will take the time to struggle more with wording, punctuation, and tone. Or maybe she’ll spend more time identifying and analyzing quotes from the book she is writing about. She can accomplish these tasks with or without AI. 

Before you consider AI for your child, ask yourself: how will using this technology embolden them to struggle more, focus more, think more– not less?

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Dr. Jessica Gerard is an ESL and English specialist at Silicon Valley International School in Menlo Park, CA. She has also taught writing at Stanford, Columbia, and the University of Arizona.

Dr. Gerard is the founder of J. Gerard Consulting, which provides English language arts tutoring and group classes for neurodiverse, home-schooled, and multilingual middle and high school students. She is also the mother of a middle-school 2e learner.