Kids Game Arcade Classroom Pack · AI thinking · Ages 6 to 8 (Grades 1 to 3)
Teach the robot: learning from examples
Goal
Students explain that AI learns patterns from examples, and that missing or one-sided examples lead to mistakes.
Vocabulary
- artificial intelligence (AI)
- pattern
- example
- mistake
- fair
Materials
- Paper and crayons
- A made-up creature card for each group (a "zibble": round, three legs, spots)
Warm-up (5 minutes)
Ask: "How did you learn what an apple is?" Draw out that they saw many examples.
Activity
- One student per group is the "robot" and waits outside. The others draw five zibbles that all have spots.
- The robot comes back, studies the drawings, and must decide whether new drawings are zibbles. Include one without spots.
- Discuss: the robot thought every zibble needs spots because every example had them. That's a pattern, and a mistake.
- Redo it with more varied examples. Does the robot do better?
- Connect it: "AI is a computer program that learned from lots of examples. If the examples are missing things, it can be wrong or unfair."
Talk about it
- What would a computer need to see to learn what a cat is?
- What could happen if an AI only saw pictures of one kind of person?
- How can people check whether an AI is right?
Check for understanding
Exit ticket: "Draw one way an AI could make a mistake, and write one sentence about why."
No devices?
The whole lesson is unplugged.
Going further
Connects to the AI4K12 big idea "Learning". Follow with the prompt writing lesson.
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