6–16 YearsTechnology & AI
Should Children Use AI?
The useful question is not whether but for what. Where these tools support a child’s thinking, where they quietly replace it, and how to tell which is happening.
Whether is not the useful question, because the answer is already yes for most children over ten and will be yes for the rest. The useful question is what for, and there is a clean line between two kinds of use.
The line
Does the tool support the child's thinking, or replace it?
Everything else follows from that, and it is a line a child can learn to apply themselves, which matters because you will not be in the room.
| Supports thinking | Replaces thinking |
|---|---|
| Explaining something they did not understand in class, a second way | Producing the answer to the question they were set |
| Asking it to quiz them on what they have revised | Asking it to write the essay |
| Arguing with it about a position they hold | Asking it what position to hold |
| Asking why their code does not work, after trying | Asking for code before trying |
| Getting five ideas to react to when stuck | Getting five ideas and picking one to submit |
| Translating a word while reading in another language | Translating the whole passage instead of reading it |
How to tell which one is happening
One question, and it works on any subject: can you explain this to me without the screen.
A child who used it to understand something can. A child who used it to skip something cannot, and both of you will know within thirty seconds. It is not a punishment, it is a check, and it can be a normal part of the household rather than an accusation.
The genuine risks, in order
Confident wrongness. These systems produce fluent, plausible, incorrect statements with no signal that anything is wrong. A child who has not seen this happen will not expect it.
Skipping the difficulty. The struggle in the middle of a hard task is where the learning is. A tool that removes it feels like help and is not, and the cost is invisible for a long time.
Outsourcing judgement. The worry is less that a child cheats and more that they stop forming their own view because a fluent one is always available.
Data. What they type is sent somewhere. Most children need telling that at least once.
What is genuinely good about it
Worth saying, because a purely negative framing is both inaccurate and ends the conversation. It is a patient explainer that never sighs, which matters enormously for a child who is embarrassed to ask again. It will explain the same thing five different ways. It is a tireless quizzer. And for a child who finds writing physically hard, it removes a barrier that has nothing to do with their thinking.
Where it should stay out
Anything that is practice rather than production. Early reading and writing, arithmetic while it is being learned, and the first draft of anything they are meant to be learning to draft. The point of those is the doing.
Your child is not competing with these systems. What is worth building is the thing that decides when to use one, which is judgement, and judgement is built by making decisions rather than by being kept away from them.