Quick Fix: The AI Speech – Teaching AI Literacy through an AI-Written First Presentation

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) allows students to produce presentation content without making many of the rhetorical choices traditionally associated with speech preparation. “The AI Speech” is a low-stakes first presentation in which students use GenAI to generate a complete 2–3 min informative speech and then publicly deliver the resulting material without substantially rewriting it. Grounded in desirable difficulty and productive failure, the activity intentionally allows students to experience the strengths and limitations of AI-generated communication before receiving instruction on effective rhetorical strategies. Following the presentations, students critically evaluate the speeches through structured discussion of prompting, audience adaptation, organization, credibility, originality, language, delivery, and authenticity. The activity provides an experiential approach to AI literacy that moves students beyond generating or accepting AI output toward making reasoned judgments about its rhetorical effectiveness and considering more deliberate and ethical uses of GenAI in future communication.