Open Educational Resources
Document Type
Assignment
Publication Date
2026
Abstract
This assignment guides students through the process of developing strong, focused, and measurable research questions while critically engaging with ChatGPT as a collaborative tool. Students begin by identifying a broad topic, narrowing it to a specific and feasible area of inquiry, and determining the purpose and type of research question (descriptive, explanatory, comparative, or evaluative). After drafting their own question, they use ChatGPT to generate feedback and suggested refinements, which they must evaluate critically using the FINER criteria (Feasible, Interesting, Novel, Ethical, Relevant). Through comparison of AI-generated and human-generated revisions, students assess the strengths, limitations, and ethical considerations of AI in academic research. The assignment strengthens critical thinking, academic writing, interdisciplinary reasoning, and reflective AI literacy while reinforcing the foundational role of well-crafted research questions in scholarly inquiry.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Comments
For context and a deeper discussion of this assignment’s design and learning goals, please visit the Pressbook Flipping the Pyramid: Developing Critical Thinking Skills with GenAI, where it is featured and analyzed in detail.
https://pressbooks.cuny.edu/flippingbloomai/