Today, I want to share a new episode with Sue Khim.
As the co-founder of Brilliant, Sue is building an AI tutor to help kids think for themselves. In our interview, she shared why better grades at school don’t always reflect learning and gave a demo of how AI can guide kids to understand problems instead of getting the answer. This episode is a must-watch if you’re a parent.
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“Using AI to skip learning is like bringing a robotic arm to the gym to lift weights for you.” I told Sue I feel this temptation too: It’s easier to ask AI to solve a problem than to understand how to solve it myself. When teaching kids to use AI, teach them to ask it for questions and hints that help them work out the answer instead of just asking for the answer.
Even a good explanation can do the thinking for your child. From Sue: “Cheating and explanations are closer than you’d think.” Both can let a child skip working through a problem themselves. When your child gets stuck, ask them to explain their thinking before you explain the answer. Give them a chance to discover what they’re missing.
Help your kids get absorbed in their interests. Sue pays attention to how deeply her kids explore their interests. It could be monkey bars, chess, or magic tricks. The aim is to experience the effort and satisfaction of improving, without treating learning as something you do to please adults. “It should feel hard to learn something new.”
