Discovering Artificial Intelligence

PROJECT INFORMATION
INSTITUTION NAME	Aberystwyth University
ESTIMATED DURATION	Between 1h and 3h – elements can be omitted from the long version without damaging the flow.
AGE OF KIDS ADRESSED	9-18
MATERIALS	Printed ordering game (1 copy). Worksheets. Pens, paper. Two mobile phones. Computers. A projector is useful but not necessary if you are confident with the material
TECHNOLOGY	Computers with access to a chatbot (an AI conversational agent): suggestions are jabberwacky.com, cleverbot.com although language specific ones may help. If you search you can find chatbots in many languages. Access to youtube.com is useful for examples
Nº OF STUDENTS	30
Nº OF STUDENTS/TEACHER	15-30
Nº OF STUDENTS/RESOURCE	2 students per computer.

CODING ACTIVITY GOAL

Understand what we mean by Artificial Intelligence.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS
	Knowledge level	Skills required
Teacher	Should know about the concept of AI and of the Turing Test – it might be useful to read Alan Turing’s 1950 paper http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html	—
Student	No pre-requisites	—
To take into account	This is not a coding activity, it is a theoretical activity

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

This workshop questions what it means to think, what it means to be a computer, and the difference between natural and artificial intelligence. This activity is not a coding activity, but instead a set of hands-on exercises and thought experiments designed to get kids thinking about Artificial Intelligence. Some of the activities involve moving around, some involve pen and paper, others involve any device that can access a chatbot.

STEPS TO FOLLOW TO CARRY OUT THE ACTIVITY

The attached zip has a presentation and various handouts to help with running the workshop in detail. This is just a summary. To carry out the full workshop will take about 3 hours. You can make it shorter by omitting any of the above steps (apart from the first).

•   Communicate the idea of AI to the students, and the idea of the Turing Test.
•   Ask the student to vote, if they think computers can be intelligent. This should be repeated after every exercise to test whether opinions have changed.
•   Do the “Turing test” using text messaging and an adult helper and a child participant. Can the class guess whether they are talking to the child?
•   An intelligence ordering game, where each kid gets a different thing to be (from a range of natural and artificial intelligences – cat, robot, washing machine, Sherlock Holmes) and they have to get into order of intelligence. Once they are in order, you can investigate different properties of intelligence by asking the kids to put their hands up if they can speak, be creative, form relationships, have emotions, and so on.
•   A scientific experiment where students write down questions for a Turing test, and then try these questions on a couple of chatbots.
•   A “program a robot” exercise where one student plays the part of a robot, and the other students write instructions (turn left, turn right, etc.). Bonus: do this bit blindfold.

These activities are supplemented by some videos of robots and intelligent machines; the aim is to get children thinking really hard about what makes something intelligent. Does embodiment matter? How about perception?

FOTOS/VIDEOS OF THE ACTIVITY

The result of five votes on whether computers can think, in one classroom: vote 1 15 say yes, 2 say maybe, 4 says no.
By the end of the day (vote 5) everyone said computers could think.
Note: this is not what always happens!

CODE
no code is developed

LINKS RELATED TO THE PROJECT

http://users.aber.ac.uk/hmd1/ai.zip

The workshop materials in a zip, featuring
– 2 sets of slides (short version, long version)
– Intelligence ordering game (to print double sided)
– Speaker notes
– Worksheets
– Voting forms
– List of video links, some of which are repeated below

PROJECT INFORMATION

INSTITUTION NAME

Aberystwyth University

ESTIMATED DURATION

Between 1h and 3h – elements can be omitted from the long version without damaging the flow.

AGE OF KIDS ADRESSED

9-18

MATERIALS

Printed ordering game (1 copy). Worksheets. Pens, paper. Two mobile phones. Computers. A projector is useful but not necessary if you are confident with the material

TECHNOLOGY

Computers with access to a chatbot (an AI conversational agent): suggestions are jabberwacky.com, cleverbot.com although language specific ones may help. If you search you can find chatbots in many languages. Access to youtube.com is useful for examples

Nº OF STUDENTS

30

Nº OF STUDENTS/TEACHER

15-30

Nº OF STUDENTS/RESOURCE

2 students per computer.

CODING ACTIVITY GOAL

Understand what we mean by Artificial Intelligence.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

Knowledge level

Skills required

Teacher

Should know about the concept of AI and of the Turing Test – it might be useful to read Alan Turing’s 1950 paper

http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html

—

Student

No pre-requisites

—

To take into account

This is not a coding activity, it is a theoretical activity

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

STEPS TO FOLLOW TO CARRY OUT THE ACTIVITY

FOTOS/VIDEOS OF THE ACTIVITY

LINKS RELATED TO THE PROJECT

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