This exercise comes from AI and kids: what should they learn without it?. It is a way to think through one task with one child—not a universal rule or a substitute for knowing your child.
Choose something real and reasonably small: homework, writing a message, planning a project, making a song, researching a question, or another task already in front of you.
Name the task
The task:
What a good result would look like:
What my child wants AI to do:
Avoid including a child’s name or other private details in an AI tool. You can describe the task without identifying them.
Make two lists
1. What have they already learned?
List the parts they can already do and explain. AI might help them do these parts faster, organize the work, or check something they know how to judge.
- A part they can already do:
- A judgment they can already make:
- A routine step AI could help them do faster:
2. What are they still learning?
List the parts where the attempt, confusion, correction, or repetition may be the learning.
- A skill they are practicing:
- A choice they need experience making:
- A difficult step they need a chance to work through:
If you are not sure which list something belongs on, treat that uncertainty as useful information. Ask the child to show or explain what they can do before deciding.
Draw the boundary for one try
Complete these sentences before opening the tool:
- AI may help with:
- My child will still do:
- I will be present for:
- We will stop or change course if:
A boundary that depends only on remembering it is fragile. Decide what will make it visible: doing a first attempt without AI, keeping the tool closed for one stage, asking the child to explain the result, or reviewing the before-and-after work together.
Review what happened
After one try, ask:
- Could my child explain the finished work in their own words?
- Did the help remove routine effort, or replace the part they needed to practice?
- Did it create a new question, choice, or conversation worth having?
- What would we keep, move, or remove from the boundary next time?
The goal is not to prove the rule right. It is to notice what the rule protected—and what it missed.
Optional coaching prompt
Use this only after making the two lists yourself:
Help with this task as a coach, not as a substitute.
The child has already learned:
[list]
The child is still learning:
[list]
You may help with:
[boundary]
Do not complete the parts they are still learning. Ask one question or offer one
small hint at a time. Let the child attempt the next step before giving more help.
If the request would cross the boundary, say so plainly and stop.An AI tool cannot enforce the family boundary for you, and its response may still need checking. The prompt makes the intended role clearer; the adult and child still decide whether the interaction is helping.