Introducing this Spark
This AI Spark learning activity provides a way to help students learn about the topic of the class and about AI. Students often struggle to differentiate between broad, generalized cultural advice found across the open web and rigorous, theory-driven interventions grounded directly in vetted scholarship.
Learning Outcome
Upon completing this activity, students will be able to:
- Identify cultural challenges related to addressing specific social change issues.
- Identify appropriate responses or interventions to address the cultural challenges.
Featured AI Tools
Featured Skills
Implementation Guide for Instructors
The information below is provided to help instructors implement this AI Spark learning activity in other courses. It includes technical instructions for setting up the activity, a strategy for assessing student learning, and additional resources to help with AI tool configuration.
This AI Spark requires students to use Gemini to identify cultural challenges related to their leadership proposal topic, ask at least two follow-up questions, use Gemini Notebook to generate appropriate responses from the course readings, ask at least two follow-up questions, and observe how Notebook can turn the results into a video, mind map, or infomercial. This will be followed by listing and discussing the pros and cons of using AI.
- Tool Provisioning: Ensure students have links to FSU AI Literacy Training (optional), FSU Google, Gemini, and FSU secured Gemini Notebook.
- Gemini Notebook Knowledge Setup: Build a shared or reference Notebook containing the required course readings (e.g., Hofstede's Cultural Dimensions, Intercultural Competence frameworks) titled Address a Challenge with Intercultural Competence.
- Canvas Setup: Create an assignment in Canvas outlining the comparative prompt sequence. Require students to submit their three distinct conversation transcripts (Gemini discovery, Gemini Notebook grounded inquiry, and open Gemini inquiry) and participate in a shared debrief. Include the Qualtrics survey links specific to undergraduate or graduate cohorts.
- Class Demonstration: Demonstrate live in class how synthesized student outputs can be converted into visual mind maps, infographics, or multimedia formats.
Student learning is evaluated through multiple artifacts:
- Students generate and refine a shared list of challenges and responses.
- Students incorporate culturally competent strategies into their final issue-specific leadership proposals.
- Students incorporate these lessons into their Intercultural Leadership Guides.
- Submissions of raw chat transcripts verify genuine iterative prompting and comparative analysis.
- Sample Gemini Notebook: Infographic Artifact
- Pros and Cons of Using AI Identified Through Class Debrief:
- Pros: Quicker way to get, summarize, and understand information; expands investigations; helps with database research without reading the whole document; allows elaboration on key points; assists in brainstorming and narrowing focus; explains complex concepts in simple terms.
- Cons: Discourages personal creativity; can be overly formalized; questionable credibility; introduces bias that is difficult to verify; feels mechanized rather than personalized.
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Qualtrics Surveys:
- Undergraduates (INR 3932): INR 3932 Survey Link
- Graduates (INS 5935): INS 5935 Survey Link
Instructions for Students
In addition to helping students understand the purpose of this AI-based learning activity, the information below provides step-by-step instructions for completing the assignment and includes a micro training on how to use the featured AI tool(s).
In this activity, you will compare answers generated from your assigned course readings loaded into Gemini Notebook with the broader open-web resources accessed by Google Gemini. You will investigate how cultural challenges impact real-world leadership initiatives and test how well different AI tools formulate evidence-based solutions.
- Preparation: Read the assigned readings for the module. Explore FSU AI Literacy Training as needed to understand AI better (optional).
- Select Topic: Describe a topic that you want to address in your leadership proposal—one that you are interested in, that you know something about, and that you can find more information on as needed (e.g., human trafficking, immigrant detentions, entrepreneurship in Kenya, etc.).
- Step 1 — Broad Challenge Identification (Gemini):
- Log in to Google Gemini using your FSU ID.
- Prompt: "What are potential cultural challenges in working with stakeholders related to [Your topic of interest]?"
- Ask at least two clarifying follow-up questions.
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Copy and save the full chat transcript.
Step 2 — Grounded Strategy Inquiry (Gemini Notebook):
- Pick one specific cultural challenge identified in Step 1.
- Log in to Gemini Notebook using your FSU email and open the notebook Address a Challenge with Intercultural Competence.
- Prompt: "How can stakeholders address [your challenge] and provide citations from the Gemini Notebook sources?"
- Ask at least 2 clarifying follow-up questions.
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Copy and save the chat transcript.
Step 3 — Comparative Open Inquiry (Gemini):
- Return to Google Gemini.
- Ask the identical question: "How can stakeholders address [your challenge] and provide citations?"
- Ask at least 2 clarifying follow-up questions.
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Copy and save the chat transcript.
Step 4 — Class Collaboration & Debrief:
- Observe the in-class demonstration showing how Gemini Notebook outputs convert into visual mind maps, infographics, or video scripts.
- Contribute your observations to the collaborative class list comparing the pros and cons of using Gemini versus Gemini Notebook.
- Step 5 — Complete Survey: Complete the required FSU AI Sparks Qualtrics survey for your course section.
What to Submit:
- Gemini Chat Transcript 1: Initial discovery dialogue on potential cultural challenges (including two follow-up questions).
- Gemini Notebook Chat Transcript: Sourced strategies and citations addressing your chosen challenge (including two follow-up questions).
- Gemini Chat Transcript 2: Comparative open-web responses to the same challenge (including two follow-up questions).
- Survey Confirmation: Verification of completed Qualtrics survey.
Full Conversation Transcript: Save and upload your full conversation transcript as a PDF to Canvas for extra credit.
What is Google Gemini? Google Gemini is an AI-powered productivity tool designed to enhance your work and learning experience across the Google Workspace. Read more at Google Gemini.
- How to login to Google Gemini:
- Navigate to https://gemini.google.com/
- Enter your FSU email address (fsuid@fsu.edu)
- Enter your FSU password
- Confirm on Duo, if needed
- Select the I understand button to acknowledge the Terms of Service (first time only)
- Always access the tool via your FSU institutional account; personal accounts will default to an unconfigured model that produces generic, overly harsh, or ungrounded responses.
What is Gemini Notebook? Gemini Notebook (formerly NotebookLM) is an AI study tool from Google that works only from the files you give it. Upload your course materials, then ask questions or generate study aids; every answer is drawn from your sources, with citations. Read more about Gemini Notebook.
- Sign in. Go to notebook.google.com and sign in with your FSU Google account.
- Create a notebook. Click “Create new notebook”, then upload your first source. Click the notebook title at the top to rename it.
- Add sources. In the left Sources panel, click + Add. You can upload PDFs, Google Docs/Slides, paste a website link, or add a YouTube video. Uploaded sources appear in the list with a checkbox – leave them checked so Notebook uses them.
- Know the three panels. Left = Sources (your files). Middle = Chat (ask questions; answers include numbered citations you can click to see the original passage). Right = Studio (one-click study aids).
- Generate a study aid. In Studio, click a tile such as Flashcards, Quiz, Mind Map, Infographic, Report, Slide Deck, or Audio Overview. Generation takes a few seconds to a few minutes; the finished item appears in the Studio list.
- How to play an Audio Overview:
- Locate the Notebook guide: Look at the top-right corner of your screen for the Notebook guide panel. If it isn't visible, click the Notebook guide button in the upper right to open it.
- Find the Audio Overview tile: Inside the Notebook guide panel, locate the section labeled Audio Overview. If one has already been generated, you will see an audio player card displaying a title and playback duration.
- Press Play: Click the circular Play button on the audio card.
- Use playback controls: Once playing, a player bar appears where you can pause, skip backward or forward 15 seconds, adjust volume, or change the playback speed (e.g., 1.25x or 1.5x). You can also click the three-dot menu on the card to download the audio file to your device.
- Customize or revise. Before generating, click the pencil icon on a tile to describe what you want (e.g., "focus on chapters 3-4, harder questions"). To revise something already made, type the change in Chat or regenerate with a new prompt.
- Good to know. Upload only course materials and reliable sources – Notebook is only as accurate as what you give it. Your notebooks save automatically and stay in your account. Take screenshots with Win + Shift + S (Windows) or Cmd + Shift + 4 (Mac).