Best Apps for Teaching About AI

You've heard about ChatGPT and are likely one of the hundreds of millions who have used it. It is impressive, but have you noticed its flaws?

Talk with your kids about cases where people have relied upon its output and fell foul of AI's tendency to hallucinate. Lawyers have used ChatGPT to submit cases to courts and found that the AI has very confidently cited cases it has made up!

You can often see simple examples of AI getting things wrong by asking it to write a haiku. The output is often in the spirit of a haiku, with a line pattern of short-long-short. However, a haiku should have a syllable pattern of 5-7-5, and AI-produced haikus often neglect to reflect this. Learning point: AI needs fact-checking—don't rely on it.

Teaching kids about computer-assisted tools used to be about not unthinkingly relying on spell checkers. Now spell checkers are also grammar checkers that use AI and are much more capable of offering context-aware corrections, it is more complex.

Firstly, apps like Grammarly will be right more often than they are wrong when they offer corrections. However, they can't read your mind. The change may make perfect grammatical sense but change your intended meaning, perhaps subtly.

Secondly, because AI-supported grammar apps are so good now, they work as a great teacher of grammar rules helping to raise your awareness of where writers typically miss out on commas or mix up words.

We have a guide to Using AI spelling and Grammar Checkers to help to learn.

See also: Best AI Learning Tools

Learning point: Don't be passive – notice what AI does and learn from it.

It isn't just professional computer scientists experimenting with the nuts and bolts of AI. Computer science students and hobbyists have installed Large Language Models (LLMs) on their home computers. LLMs are the engines behind chatbots like ChatGPT and Google's Bard. The most popular coding language for interacting with the models is Python.

Also, view our Best Coding Apps for iPad

Learning point: You can learn how AI works, not just how to use it.

We all have different strengths, and it can be frustrating when we can't do them justice because we don't have the same expertise or talent elsewhere. Kids feel this too. They might have made excellent progress, but because their presentation and design skills aren't strong, they feel disappointed when they compare their projects to those made by their classmates.

There is already support for this in many graphic design apps, but increasingly, we're seeing these supported by generative-AI technology. These let kids produce a project as visually impactful as it is well-researched and without taking time away from the key objective of improving their education.

See also: 12 Best AI Presentation Makers - EducationalAppStore

Learning Point: Use AI to support your strengths.

Artificial intelligence-based apps offer a tremendous amount of potential to learners with special educational needs and people with disabilities, but they are not often first in mind when considering AI's applications.

People with dyslexia can enter a few keywords and have an app like ChatGPT output an email or invoice. Combining AI-based image tools with chatbots has already resulted in apps that help people with vision difficulties live more independently.

Use these tools to show kids how others might use them to help raise awareness of the difficulties some people face and help them think of technology from a broader point of view than their own.

See also: 10 Best Apps for Kids with Dyslexia and Learning Disabilities

Learning point: Consider new technology from the perspective of others with different needs.