Between Promise and Peril: Ethical and Pedagogical Challenges of ChatGPT Use in Classrooms

This qualitative study explores how private school teachers in Pakistan perceive and navigate the integration of ChatGPT into their teaching practices, focusing on its impact on critical thinking development, the challenges of implementation, and ethical concerns.Grounded in the interpretivist paradigm and using a phenomenological approach, data were collected through semistructured interviews with teachers from various urban private schools.Findings reveal that teachers see ChatGPT as a tool that fosters inquiry-based learning, promotes student engagement, and supports analytical reasoning.However, multiple challenges emerged, including limited digital infrastructure, a lack of AI-specific professional development, concerns about the accuracy of AIgenerated content, and the risk of academic dishonesty.Teachers also expressed ethical concerns regarding plagiarism, data privacy, and the cultural relevance of content.In response, they employed strategies such as classroom guidelines, digital ethics discussions, and supervision of student use.The study underscores the critical role of teachers as ethical mediators in AI-enhanced education and calls for context-sensitive policies, structured training, and curriculum flexibility.These findings contribute to the global discourse on ethical AI integration and provide practical recommendations for stakeholders in Pakistan's evolving educational landscape.