"This 'AI slop' harms children's development by distorting their sense of reality, overwhelming their learning processes and hijacking their attention, thereby extending time online and displacing offline activities necessary for their healthy development."
On Monday, the Danish toy maker debuted a new computer science and AI curriculum for K-8 classrooms, Lego's first foray into AI that comes more than three years after the debut of OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot. The "Lego Education Computer Science & AI" kits include Lego bricks and other interactive hardware components, as well as online education materials intended to take children from the beginning stages of AI literacy through hands-on experimentation.
Lego's new Smart Play system, announced at CES earlier this week, is an embrace of digital technology the likes of which we haven't seen from the company before. And while the demonstration it gave on Monday was a good start towards showing just what Lego's Smart Brick is capable of, there's no substitute for seeing it in person. Fortunately, an extended demo answered a lot of my questions on how the system will work once
As a parent myself, I know what I'm mostly looking for when buying another toy is that it'll ACTUALLY keep my kids engaged long enough to bring a sliver of peace to my home (a tough task, to say the least!). From Magna-Tiles and the new Toniebox 2 to colorful sensory tubes and a LeapFrog Touch and Learn eReader, my kids have tried out enough of these items to lead you in the right shopping direction!
Kids have been telling their parents they're bored for as long as there have been parents. Nothing new there. But lately, it seems different. Many 21st-century kids, especially bright or neurodivergent kids, report being bored a lot. They're bored at school. They're bored on short car trips. They're bored when they're home and stuck inside without a friend. They're bored outside if there's nobody nearby to play with.
For years, my 8-year-old son has been asking for a phone. I'm sure he likes the idea of being social and playing games, but he also loves talking. Copper FaceTimes with friends on my phone (calling their Mom's phone) and regularly calls his grandparents to check in. We wanted to give him an age-appropriate amount of freedom and stumbled across a landline-esque phone for kids, the Tin Can.
