The parent's guide to children and AI

I am not going to frighten you. You are frightened enough, or you would not have opened this.

What parents lack is not warnings. It is something to do. So let us start there.

House rules in five lines#

Write them down and put them on the wall. A written rule gets discussed; an unwritten one gets broken.

One: no names, no photos, no addresses. Your child does not enter their full name, their school, their photo, or their location into any tool. This is the most important rule and the easiest to understand.

Two: use it in a shared room. Not surveillance, presence. The difference is that a child asks questions when you are in the room.

Three: the tool explains, it does not solve. "Explain how to solve this" is allowed; "solve this for me" is not. Children understand that line better than we expect.

Four: what it says gets checked. Especially homework, and anything medical or religious.

Five: anything that upsets you, you tell me, and you are not punished. This rule protects them more than the other four combined, and it only works if you keep it.

What genuinely deserves attention#

Companionship. This is what I watch most, and it has its own article: when the chatbot becomes your child's best friend.

Confident wrong answers. A child does not yet own the instrument of doubt. They will believe what is said confidently, which is normal at their age and dangerous with a tool that is confidently wrong. See why AI hallucinates.

Generated images. A child's ability to spot a fake is weaker than yours, and yours is weaker than you think.

Privacy. Many free tools use what is typed into them. Details in the privacy price of free AI.

Questions to ask the school#

Ask about the policy, not the tools. Tools change every term.

• Do you have a written policy, and may I read it?
• What specifically are students allowed and not allowed to do?
• Does any penalty rest on an "AI detector"? (The right answer is no. Why, in the cheating article)
• Does any student data go into an external tool?
• Who in the school owns this area?

The third question alone tells you how serious the school is.

How to talk to them#

Do not start with a warning. Start with curiosity. "Show me how you use it" opens a door; "don't use it" closes one and moves the use into their room.

Then sit with them, ask it something you know the answer to, and let them watch it get it wrong. Seeing the tool fail once in front of them is worth ten warnings, because it teaches doubt rather than obedience.

In closing#

You do not need to understand the technology to protect your child. You need five written rules, one question for the school, and a promise not to punish them when they tell you something.

Try this today: sit with them for twenty minutes and ask them to show you what they use. You will learn more than any article can teach you.

Common questions#

At what age can a child use AI tools?

There is no single number, and the conditions matter more: in a shared room, with no personal data, and under the rule that the tool explains rather than solves.

What should be forbidden outright?

A child's photo in image generators, their voice in cloning tools, and their full name alongside their school. None of these can be withdrawn once uploaded.

What should I ask my child's school?

Ask for the written policy rather than the tool list, and specifically whether any penalty rests on AI detectors. The right answer is no, and that question alone reveals how serious the school is.

How do I talk about it without them hiding it from me?

Start with curiosity rather than warnings and ask them to show you. Then promise they will not be punished for telling you about something that upset them, and keep that promise the first time.