Parenting in the digital age: Teaching children about AI
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00:00 We're going to switch gears a little bit now.
00:01 And if you are a parent like I am,
00:04 you may have found yourselves in the midst of tech battles
00:07 with your kids.
00:08 For example, in my house, it seems
00:09 like there's always a fight over screen time or video games
00:12 or TikTok.
00:13 Well, fortunately, at Paris Direct,
00:15 we are lucky enough to have digital parenting coach
00:18 Elizabeth Mlovidov with us on set.
00:20 Hi, Elizabeth.
00:21 We are so happy to have you back here after all this time.
00:24 You have always come on to tell us about different types
00:27 of things when it comes to helping parents navigate
00:29 the tech world for their kids.
00:31 Today, you're going to talk about something
00:32 that has quite a few parents scratching their heads,
00:34 and that's generative AI, or Gen AI,
00:37 as the cool kids say, I guess.
00:38 So set the stage for us first, if you will.
00:40 I'm very familiar with chat GBT.
00:42 Is Gen AI the same thing?
00:44 Yes, it is.
00:44 So first, just quickly, a little primer.
00:47 Artificial intelligence, the science
00:49 of making machines that think like humans, right?
00:52 And so we have pattern recognition with AI.
00:55 But with generative AI, we have pattern recreation.
00:59 So content creation.
01:00 So this is what Gen AI can do.
01:01 It can create content.
01:03 It can brainstorm.
01:04 It can help with math problems.
01:06 This is pretty exciting.
01:07 And so chat GBT, Copilot, they're
01:09 all types of generative AI.
01:11 OK, so that sounds pretty positive.
01:14 Why should parents-- first of all,
01:16 should parents and families be concerned about it?
01:18 And if so, why?
01:18 Yeah, of course, they should be concerned.
01:20 And even though I love technology,
01:22 I think that we have to take it as we get it.
01:24 And so with generative AI, there is problems with deep fakes,
01:28 with misinformation, with just personal bias.
01:31 We don't know who's providing the data
01:33 that the machines are looking at.
01:35 Well, let's say we were trying to explain Gen
01:39 AI to a child.
01:40 How would we do it?
01:41 Right.
01:41 So I think with a younger child, you
01:43 take your child as they are developmentally aged
01:46 appropriate, and you speak to them that way.
01:48 So you can talk about how generative AI is make-believe.
01:51 And like fairy tales, it's real.
01:54 Some things are real, and some things are make-believe.
01:56 Because we don't want children talking to smart speakers
01:58 or their interactive toys and thinking
02:00 that it's a real person.
02:02 With teenagers, it's a little bit different, older children,
02:04 because they already are dealing with algorithms
02:06 in their social media feeds.
02:07 So they understand that this type of technology
02:10 has good and bad uses.
02:12 And so again, it's just trying to talk
02:14 with all of your children, whatever their age,
02:17 and really stressing to them about things
02:19 like personal information, about privacy,
02:23 just trying to use it responsibly.
02:25 And I love it.
02:26 You have a great analogy where you talk about,
02:28 if we compare generative AI, we could compare it, for example,
02:31 to a knife.
02:31 Oh, yeah, exactly.
02:32 So a knife is a great tool, right, like all technology.
02:35 So we can misuse it.
02:36 We can injure someone, unfortunately.
02:39 Different types of knives are prohibited in different places.
02:41 But the other side of knives is we can use them for surgery.
02:45 We can use them for protection.
02:46 We can use them for cooking.
02:48 So that's a great way that you can explain to kids, too,
02:50 as well.
02:51 Exactly.
02:51 So how can parents and how can caregivers
02:55 understand, better understand the risks and the benefits
02:57 of gen AI?
02:58 Yeah, it's always going to be the same thing, Jeannie.
03:00 It's always this critical thinking and communication.
03:03 We've got to have conversations with our families.
03:06 We have to explore this technology together.
03:08 We have to play around with it.
03:09 We have to ask questions.
03:11 We can't be afraid to fail, to mess up.
03:13 It's not going to blow up.
03:15 But we really have to do this with our families.
03:18 Elizabeth, thank you so much for coming in and sharing
03:20 your expertise with us, as always.
03:22 We are so looking forward to having you get back
03:23 in some other time in the future.
03:25 Now, if you at home have your own questions about gen AI,
03:28 about tech in general for your kids or for yourself,
03:30 you can always check out Elizabeth's website,
03:32 which is digitalparentingcoach.com.
03:34 You can also ask your questions in the Digital Parenting
03:37 Community Facebook page, which I know I definitely do a lot.
03:40 Elizabeth, thank you so much.