This session introduces participants to Mike Caulfield’s evolving project — from SIFT Toolbox to Deep Background — and demonstrates how educators and learners can use “AI superprompts” to enhance fact checking, contextualization, and critical reasoning. We’ll explore the theory behind the method, see real-world demonstrations, and then move into an interactive breakout room activity where participants will get hands-on practice: entering a claim, deploying the Deep Background prompt in Claude (or a compatible LLM), iterating, and interpreting the responses.
You’ll leave this session with:
- A conceptual understanding of how Deep Background adapts the SIFT methodology into an AI co-reasoning prompt
- Strategies and sample “superprompts” you can use in your classroom or research
- Firsthand experience applying the tool in small groups
- Ideas for scaffolding this practice for students or workshop participants
Date: Monday, November 3, 2025
Time: 12 pm EST | 6 pm CET | 10:30 pm IST
LOCATION: Register here for the webinar series.
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Recommended Media (please preview before attending)
- Deep Background: A "Superprompt" to change the way you use LLMs (A research project by Mike Caulfield)
- SIFT Toolbox on GitHub
Optional Media (enrich your learning)
- article: Live Demo of Deep Background for Claude (Mike Caufield, 1 Jul 2025)
- podcast: “Deep Background: Using AI as a Co-Reasoning Partner with Mike Caulfield” (Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, Episode 590, 2 Oct 2025)
- video: Interview: “AI is less like programming and more like spreadsheets” — AACE Review interview with Caulfield on Deep Background and future skills (44 min, 13 Aug 2025) - transcript
- video: Trying Mike Caulfield's New SIFT Toolbox for Claude and ChatGPT (11 min, Teaching in Higher Ed YouTube channel, 2 Apr 2025)
- article: SIFT Toolbox Update (Mike Caufield, 14 Jun 2025)
- article: AI will change how you consume result sets - and that's good (Mike Caufield, 28 Apr 2025)
- article: New SIFT Toolbox Release - and a note about why I do this (Mike Caufield, 17 Apr 2025
- article: SIFT Toolbox for Claude Released (Mike Caufield, 31 Mar 2025)
- book: Verified: How to Think Straight, Get Duped Less, and Make Better Decisions about What to Believe Online (Caulfield & Wineburg)
- Mike Caufield’s SubStack: mikecaulfield.substack.com
Host: Dr. Wesley Fryer
Wesley Fryer, PhD, is a middle school STEM and media literacy middle school teacher at Providence Day School in Charlotte, North Carolina. As an educational technology “early adopter / innovator” since the late 1990s, Wes continues to share regularly on social media. Learn more on wesfryer.com.
Please get in touch with us if you want to suggest future Media Club meeting topics to discuss an article, book, podcast, video or any media related to our interests.
Dr. Wes Fryer, Webinar Series Manager | wes.fryer@providenceday.org
* AI Image (for this webinar) generated by Wes Fryer using ChatGPT 5.