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Teaching Resource

Prompt-to-Verification Ladder

A six-rung process that turns an AI response from a polished blob of text into a set of claims you can test, source, revise, or reject.

Use the ladder with any generative AI tool. The point is the workflow, not the brand.

1

Clarify

Define the question before prompting

Write down what you actually need to know, what kind of evidence would count, and what constraints matter.

Example: “Identify three major explanations for declining voter turnout among young adults in the U.S. since 2016. Distinguish claims from speculation.”
2

Generate

Ask for a useful starting point, not the final answer

Use AI to surface possible concepts, vocabulary, counterarguments, or directions. Treat the response as a hypothesis generator.

“Give me possible explanations, key terms I should search, and questions I should investigate. Do not invent citations.”
3

Extract

Separate the response into checkable claims

Underline or list every factual, causal, statistical, historical, or interpretive claim that would need support.

Claim

What is the AI asking you to believe?

Evidence needed

What kind of source would actually support it?

4

Verify

Leave the AI response and search independently

Use library databases, primary sources, official data, scholarly literature, or other sources appropriate to the question.

Existence

Does the cited or implied source actually exist?

Match

Does it support the specific claim?

Authority

Is it appropriate for this question?

Currency

Is it current enough for the topic?

5

Interrogate

Look for what the response leaves out

Ask about uncertainty, disagreement, missing perspectives, bias, power, context, and consequences.

“What important perspectives or counterevidence might be missing from this explanation? Which groups or assumptions should I investigate separately?”
6

Decide

Keep, revise, or reject

After checking the evidence, decide what survives. Replace unsupported claims with sourced material, revise oversimplified reasoning, and reject anything that cannot be defended.

Keep

Supported, relevant, and appropriate.

Revise

Partly supported or missing needed context.

Reject

Unsupported, fabricated, misleading, or inappropriate.

Disclose

Explain how AI contributed when required or useful.

The ladder changes the center of gravity.

The AI output is not the evidence. It is the beginning of a research process that returns authority to sources, context, and human judgment.