Most of us use AI now. Many of our students do too. The question of whether AI belongs in education anymore has slowly shifted to what happens when students start over-depending on it.

This week's research explores what happens when AI suddenly disappears and students have to keep going on their own. And this week's Tech Tool offers a surprisingly simple way to bring real research skills back into the classroom.

You’re about to become an even better teacher in the next 4 minutes.

🔉But first, a message from this week’s sponsor. A lot more teachers have side hustles than you'd think.

100 Genius Side Hustle Ideas

Don't wait. Sign up for The Hustle to unlock our side hustle database. Unlike generic "start a blog" advice, we've curated 100 actual business ideas with real earning potential, startup costs, and time requirements. Join 1.5M professionals getting smarter about business daily and launch your next money-making venture.

Get the guide

And now, back to making you an even better teacher. ⬇️ 

BRAINY BIT

Is AI Making Our Students Quit Faster?

We’re halfway through 2026, and everyone (and their mothers) seem to be utilizing some kind of AI. The argument is always the same - “it makes life easier”. While that might be true in lots of cases, we’ve got an interesting angle in this week’s study though that argues not that AI is bad, but that it’s robbing students of opportunities to struggle productively.

TLDR: Researchers ran a series of randomized controlled trials involving 1,222 participants and found that just 10–15 minutes of AI assistance made people more likely to give up and less able to solve problems on their own afterward. The biggest declines occurred among participants who used AI to get answers instead of hints. 

The Study: AI hurts persistence

Researchers conducted three randomized controlled experiments with 1,222 participants. Participants solved fraction problems and reading-comprehension questions. Some worked independently, while others had access to ChatGPT. 

Then, without warning, the AI disappeared and everyone had to continue on their own. Researchers measured not only accuracy, but also persistence by tracking how often participants chose to skip questions.

That makes this one of the first large-scale studies to directly test what happens when people become temporarily reliant on AI and then lose access to it. 

The Results:

The pattern appeared again and again.

In the first experiment, participants who used AI solved only 57% of the final problems after AI was removed, compared to 73% for participants who never used it. They were also nearly twice as likely to give up and skip questions (20% vs. 11%).

The most revealing finding came later. 61% of AI users reported primarily using AI to get answers directly. Those participants showed the largest drops in performance and the highest skip rates. Students who used AI for hints and clarification showed far fewer negative effects.

The same pattern even appeared in reading-comprehension tasks, suggesting this isn't just a math problem.

In YOUR Classroom:

This study suggests that one of the most important things we teach isn't content knowledge at all; it's the ability to stay with a problem when the answer isn't immediately available.

Here’s how these results can impact your classroom approach this week:

Strategies That Work:

1. Require a first draft of thinking. Before AI enters the conversation, students should show an attempt, a question, or a strategy.

2. Teach "hint prompts." Model prompts like "What's my next step?" instead of "Give me the answer."

3. Celebrate productive struggle. When students get stuck but keep working, point it out. That's the skill this study suggests may matter most.

One final note: this study is still in pre-print, meaning it has not fully completed its peer review process yet.

The researchers aren't arguing that AI should disappear. They're arguing that learning still requires effort. If AI removes every obstacle, it may also remove some of the growth that comes from overcoming them.

🚀 Noteworthy News

TECH TOOL

Put Real Search Back in Your Classroom

Last week, Google ruffled some feathers by proclaiming their famous Google search tool is now AI-first.

Some feel that this is "force-feeding" AI to users on the world’s most visited site. For us teachers who need students actually finding and evaluating real sources? There's a simple, free fix that's seen its traffic triple since Google's switch.

The Solution: NoAI by DuckDuckGo

This search engine strips AI overviews and returns plain web results (links, sources, pages, etc). No generated summaries or suggestions; just search. DuckDuckGo also doesn't track users or build ad profiles, adding a privacy layer most school networks would appreciate.

Is it as comprehensive as peak Google? Not quite. Niche searches surface weaker results, there have been past accusations/controversies of both bias and no bias in the results, and of course there's no personalization.

But for research assignments where students must find and cite real sources, it removes the shortcut that is now quietly doing the work for them.

Is This For YOUR Classroom?

If your students primarily do quick fact lookups, this won't change much. But if research skills, source evaluation, or media literacy live in your curriculum, removing the AI answer layer forces the actual skill. It's worth bookmarking even if it's not your daily driver.

Strategies That Work:

1. Compare & Contrast Search: Run the same query on Google and noai.duckduckgo.com side-by-side; instant media literacy lesson on AI summaries versus real sources.

2. Source-Required Assignments: Set noai.duckduckgo.com as the required tool for any task where students must cite actual links.

3. Privacy Conversation Starter: Use their no-tracking policy to open a class discussion on digital privacy and data literacy. Have them compare and contrast not just the search engines, but the companies behind them as well to better understand how their data is being used.

AI is a tool, not a replacement for knowing how to find things, and now there's a search engine that agrees.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

We would LOVE to hear from you!

Reply to this email, or send us a message on Instagram! We’re here to walk with you in these crazy times!

Part of what makes The PEN Weekly community so special is the fact that our readers are teachers from around the world! We’re not going to lie, we think that’s pretty darn cool!

We’ll see you again on Monday 🍎

Share this newsletter!

Do you know someone who would appreciate reading the PEN? Share this newsletter with them! Our goal is to reach as many teachers as possible, and to build a community of teachers supporting teachers.