Ep 186 | AI – Supporting our Kids to be more human

SPEAKER_01 0:00

You don't want a parent through the lens of surveillance. Uh, you want a parent through the lens of human connection, right? We know that that the single strongest predictor of resilience or a child growing up in a healthy way is having a consistent, caring adult. And that's your role. And as grandparents or as adults, you really fill that role by ensuring that you're constantly present, you're curious, and engaging.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Welcome to the Voices United in Education podcast. Each week, we showcase the teachers, administrators, and community members who go the extra mile to contribute to the success of every child in Escambia County. You'll meet the real people behind the titles and learn about the amazing resources to support your child's success. Parenting and technology. It's a strange thing for parents to witness incredible technology that will likely provide their child with a job in a new career field, while also being the thing that threatens their mental health, makes them vulnerable to predators and victims of bullying. It's a lot to navigate, it's a lot to keep up with, and you shouldn't have to do it alone. My next guest is the senior manager of outreach and training at Common Sense Media, a nonprofit that supports parents, school districts, and state education agencies in integrating digital literacy skills into real life. Today he's going to share how we can stay connected to our kids and keep them safe while setting them up for a future they feel ready for, turning digital distractions into strategic assets, equipping schools and empowering parents. Jamie Nunez, thanks for being here.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Thanks, Meredith. I really appreciate you being alive today. How are you?

SPEAKER_00 1:51

I'm doing good. I'm so excited to talk to you about this. And we're recording this close to Christmas. And as I was kind of organizing my thoughts around it, you know what it made me think of? Is like when you pull out the box from the attic of all of the Christmas ornaments and you pull out that one. You know what I mean? But it's not one. It's like all the little hooks connected to each other. And there was like a couple ornaments stuck in there. It's like a big, you know, cluster of chaos. That's how I feel about this topic.

SPEAKER_01 2:22

There's just so much to cover, and you're absolutely right. I kind of look at it as like uh I grew up in a farm, and so my dad would often give us oranges as Christmas gifts. And the worst is that they were a type of orange that every time you peeled them, there was like another layer of like the skin that we'd have to kind of rip through, and then you'd go in and bite into them, and they were those oranges that had a bunch of seeds inside. Oh, painful. That's the way technology is sometimes, right? Where we attempt to understand something and then there's a new platform or a new trend or a new pain point that comes out. So I hear that.

SPEAKER_00 2:57

My gosh, yes, you nailed it completely. Okay, so let's actually start with Common Sense Media. What is the scope of what Common Sense offers to parents?

SPEAKER_01 3:07

So Common Sense Media has been around for over 20 years. We do a number of things, but one of the things that we'd like to share is that we're the leading advocate to protect kids and safety online. And we do that in a number of ways. We have a research arm where we are researching trends on technology, looking at things like AI or distractions, anything related to digital media. We have an education arm that supports teachers, about 1.5 million educators across the country, uh, in doing a number of things, addressing what we refer to as digital literacy skills. We also have a media site where we are reviewing books, videos, apps, and assessing whether or not that type of media is developmentally appropriate for your child. And then we have an advocacy arm where we believe that tech companies should be held accountable. So we address and create legislation and help to inspire legislation that ensures that tech companies are held accountable for features that they build that potentially can harm our kids. So we know through our research, we know that the average child will receive their first tablet by the age of four. One in four kids are receiving a phone, a device by the time that they're eight. That number goes up to about 52%. And so we know from the time that the child is essentially born to now AI companion bots and engaging with it, uh, we know that they might be distracted. We know that there's a sense of isolation that they might experience when they're overly exposed to the content. And so when you mix in a companion bot, for folks that aren't familiar with that, I think the idea is that there's platforms AI that is marketed to not necessarily kids, but it's marketed to individuals where they want to engage with that child or they want to engage with them, they want to have conversations with them. I I think it's important to kind of note that a child, a young adult, um, they didn't come from a place, they came from a place of isolation, it came from a place of wanting to engage with with someone beyond a human being. So uh it's important to note the level of distraction and the engagement that the child is in before we get into talking about social companion pots and all the horrors that are attributed to it.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

That's a lot. That's so much. I think parents just knowing that common sense media is doing that all in the background is a point of encouragement and comfort because in the last 20 years, that's where we've seen the major skyrocket in technologies and things that we definitely would have put in the sci-fi category are now coming, you know, into real life. It's so comforting knowing there is someone out there doing that work behind the scenes. Because when you're living life, you miss these things. Like I'm just out here doing my thing. And I remember when I first heard that kids were using AI companion bots as friends. And I have, I have adult friends who are using AI companions for romantic relationships. So I guess my question for you, let's let's start there. Are AI companion bots for kids ever a good idea?

SPEAKER_01 6:18

Well, I'll take a step back. Just, you know, if you're listening and you're wondering, what the hell is a companion bot? And how are where did we get to this place? We have to kind of understand what happens to a child and have to understand the role that we play as adults.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

And then so because that is the Christmas ornament disaster that we referred to earlier, right? It's not as simple as this one issue. Is it a red or green light? There's layers to this, and the companion bots are one layer. So a companion bot is like a digital friend, a robot friend that the kid is talking to. Can you kind of unpack the the good and the bad and the ugly of that for those that aren't familiar?

SPEAKER_01 7:03

Yeah. So AI companion bots are just, I would say they're like these training wheels, right? For a type of like emotional expression for a child. They they give kids a place to talk without judgment, which can actually be really powerful. But the potential risk here is when these things go wrong, when that bot becomes the only place they go to, when the bot encourages them to do deviant or act on deviant behaviors. And so it's really, it's important if you're if you're listening, it's really important to understand that um there's a promise to these tools, especially for a child that might feel like a sense of isolation. But we don't, at common sense, recommend that these kids use these things because there is no guardrails in place. And despite companies telling us otherwise, we continue to see that they produce content that's very harmful for our kids, that's developmentally inappropriate, and that could potentially lead to, in the most extreme cases, suicide.

SPEAKER_00 8:06

So yeah, I think we've all read a headline or two about that. I've also read that the prefrontal cortex doesn't register AI as like a human connection. So we don't we don't receive the health benefits from it, but we still develop an emotional attachment to it. If if that is true, how do we, as a parent, how do they navigate the bit that is helpful from the bit that could really stunt the kid's important social cycle brain development?

SPEAKER_01 8:38

In the work that I do, I often hear counselors talk to me about this tension that exists, right? That kids feel more comfortable expressing their feelings to someone that is always going to affirm them, but sometimes often feel less comfortable than talking to a real adult. And that's that's the tension here, right? That if a child doesn't experience discomfort or know how to navigate the nonverbals, that can be really daunting or can be overwhelming. So funny, I I was at a training last week or two weeks ago, and this administrator came up to me and said, uh, we were talking about bots, and she said, you know, my bot just it never gets tired of me, unlike my husband. And what I what I heard beneath that is the real need for someone to feel reliable, that there's a connection that they they're seeking and longing for. I do want to just point out that that that that can be very problematic because that's not the way as humans we engage with. We want that tension, we want that dance. And the false promise here of these companion bots or others is that they promise to do that, but they they don't necessarily, for a child, they that doesn't help with their development, that doesn't actually help to assess what real life is about.

SPEAKER_00 9:58

So you're saying there's real life relationships are more of a struggle. Communicating within those are more difficult, but it's that difficulty that is part of development.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

That's correct. Yeah. That's really what when we talk about building those character skills, a lot of that is actually trying to address and resolve conflicts. There's a there's a real need to highlight and to support our kids as they're navigating some of these issues as they're growing up, right? It's perfectly okay to have an argument with somebody and resolve it. That's just what makes us human. So the fact that these bots promise something else or the kids are are relying on on the, I wouldn't say rely, but often use these tools, a much more underlying problem that we have, which is supporting our kids to be more human.

SPEAKER_00 10:46

Okay, I'm so glad that you said that because that's I think where we all get just starry-eyed. We don't know what we should be doing, right? So let's say we in our county, we have a lot of grandparents raising kiddos. So imagine you're a grandparent raising your grandchild, and the grandchild is using a chat bot and you you somehow gain knowledge of this. How do you suggest a parent has that conversation with their child, like, hey, little Johnny, I know your chat bot is very complimentary of you and it's available all the time, and it sounds like it's really smart and you like talking to it, but it's not healthy for you to do that. That would be so hard because in the child's mind, he or she sees the bot as their friend, but it's actually just a mirror giving you what you want, you know? And so how do you explain that to a kid? What do you suggest?

SPEAKER_01 11:48

That's such a great question. I'd say grandparents are probably the, in many ways, the most wisest individuals because they've lived life, they can understand those experiences, and most importantly, they understand what it feels like to be bored or understand what patience is and just be fully present. And I think the biggest thing you can do as a grandparent is ensure that your grandchild has those moments. It's interesting. I when I engage with elders, I often it's there's a there's a really like imbalance that often takes place. One is, I don't know how to communicate this. Grandparents and adults often feel like they have no place to talk with about technology because it's moving too fast, it wasn't like it. Technology wasn't the same when they grew up, and so there's this sort of imbalance that takes place that they don't have a right to talk to their kids or their grandkids about these real life issues. Uh here's what I would suggest, though. As grandparents, you you have a story to tell. And that story is about you being human, you engaging in experiences that you're that a child or your grandchild has not. And so I would focus less on what the technology is, and I'd focus more on in supporting the well-being of your child or that your grandchild and what those things look like. Taking a moment out of the week to take your grandchild out for a walk, being able to share your challenges and how you've you've resolved your challenges as an adult, being able to model the tensions that you have, the arguments that you have, how you resolve those arguments. And the reason why those are important is because the child doesn't have a reference point. And then technology is often a substitute for that reference point. And this is where you come in, that you provide that guidance and that wisdom that the child might be lacking. Um, and we focus less on the tech is in front of them, and you focus more on the wisdom of what it feels like to be bored, patient, present, engaged in life.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

My gosh. Okay, this is so good because I was gonna ask you, you know, hey, the the red flags keep changing, right? Because as 90s kids, the red flag was a white van, the red flag was this or that. They were specific physical things that we could point out if we saw them on a lineup. But I was gonna ask you, well, like, well, how do parents keep up with the changing red flags now? And you just cut right through the pragmatic, straight to the heart of it. So, what you're saying, if I'm if I'm hearing you correctly, is that through leaning into the human experience and storytelling, a a person raising a child, even with a giant age gap, can still reach that child through that shared human experience, even though there is this thing in the middle called technology that is ever changing.

SPEAKER_01 14:54

Absolutely. I would start with these three things. The first is we want to have guidelines for our kids. We want to make sure that they are aware of what those parameters are. We want to be able to ensure that when they cross those parameters or those guardrails that we put in place, those rules per se, we know what they should be doing when they feel uncomfortable or feel unsafe. I think it's really, really important to start with that. Like you're you're not allowed to use an AI companion bot. And if you do, because you're likely to break this rule and you feel uncomfortable, this is what I expect out of you. But we want to ensure that you're not ready for this. And it does, I don't have to explain that. This is just what I'm asking as a as your guardian. The second thing is you want to be really curious, right? We want to make sure that we're lending and engaging in not technology tool per se, but we want to be curious about what the child is doing when they're on technology. So I'm always grounded in the idea that if I ask enough questions, eventually my child will start to divulge everything about their life, right? And so we we want to make sure that we suspend our judgment enough to be curious with our kids and how they're using tech. You don't necessarily have to understand what a roadbox is or what that companion bot is doing. You just have to ensure that the child is aware of what um of when they feel safe and understand what those flags are. The final thing that I think our grandparents need to be able to share with their their kids is skills needed to navigate tricky situations when they're online.

SPEAKER_00 16:38

I especially love the curiosity part as a tool for caregivers, because if we can question the definition of words that we have long thought we understand, I think I wonder if that's a key. And here's why I'm saying that because I have a specific example story of a friend whose 11-year-old daughter was talking online with a friend. So just take that sentence, talking online with a friend. Okay, fine. That sounds so cool. Yeah, green, green flag, green flag. And until one day, mom was walking by her and saw over the shoulder of the daughter on her phone the friend. And the friend was very obviously a grown person wearing a full face mask, typing. And mom said to daughter, who is that? Mom, it's my friend. I've told you a million times about my friend. She's too shy to talk and too shy to show her face on camera. This girl was 11. Okay. So questioning friend, question, you know, like I kind of wonder if that is curiosity can move from like a nice idea to a really practical tool that we can lean back on over and over again and question in a loving way, in an open way that cultivates this is a safe space to talk to me about what a friend is. Because having talked with this friend for a while, the mom, she would always say, Well, I told my daughter that she can always talk to me about anything. But I think that's kind of a not a always a great approach, right? Because the daughter doesn't know that she should talk to the mom about the friend wearing a full Jason mask while on TikTok or whatever thing she was on, right? So I I really like that framework a lot.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

I'm always very curious about in this case, what makes a good friend, right? I do wonder when we share absolute statements with our kids how much they're picking that up. Like you can always talk to me about anything or don't talk to strangers like that. That doesn't work, right? Especially in the way the ecosystems that are part of our of these tools, whether they're phones or devices, a child can uh speak to a stranger. We know that a child by the time that they're 12 years old will be exposed to inappropriate content like pornography. And so it's just really important to note that we need to move beyond that with the statements that we share with our kids. So in this case, curiosity means what makes up a really good friend. Um, when do you feel uncomfortable with your friends and what do you do? Uh, what does it mean to leave a conversation after an argument? It and then we want to share our expectations. Our expectation very bluntly is that your friends, we get to know your friends. You share qualities about your friends that reinforce the values that we have as a family. We want to be very clear with them that simply saying, uh, I don't want you on a device or I don't want you talking to adults, that doesn't work for kids anymore. We want to make sure that we're very clear and and and curious about what a child and how a child is navigating these spaces, right? I think I I heard from a parent recently that said, uh Jamie, I I don't know a lick about TikTok or AI, but I my daughter sure knows what it feels like to feel courageous in spaces. And and so it feels good to know that you know I've taught her those underlying skills. I said, Well, I don't know about courageous, but certainly I'm glad that you're able to teach her those those lifelong skills that they need to engage in these very tricky online worlds.

SPEAKER_00 20:31

Each child is so different developmentally, right? Especially when you start to to fold in the real life dynamics of neurodivergence. One in 33 children is autistic. So like that has a whole new layer of complexity to it. Do you remember those? Remember the coffee tables of like our childhood? And they were, they were just like death traps. And then those bumpers that you would put on them, you know, to keep toddlers from killing themselves, basically. There may be parents out there with neurodivergent children or children who are just perhaps a little bit delayed in their social maturity. And those parents may desire to have the coffee table equivalent bumper on their phones, on their children's devices. Are there any practical tools like that for parents who need that extra support?

SPEAKER_01 21:24

That's such a great question. You may consider a few things, right? Depending on your parenting style, I think. The first is you might consider putting guardrails, controls up for your child. And we will include a number of those resources that we think could be helpful in monitoring as you engage with with your child. I would recommend against it though, because, however, if you feel the need to know a little bit more about what parameters look like or what controls look like, just so you can double check, then there are there are a number of tools that I'm happy to share. Um Afterwards. The second thing you want to point out though is we want to make sure that you're still teaching your kids what those skills are. And those skills are a number of things that we've covered, but we want to be very clear that those skills need to be taught. If a child doesn't understand how to navigate the online world and not the tool, not the platform that they're on, but navigate their engagement in these tools, then we're not setting them up for success. And so what that looks like is ongoing dialogue, conversations, curiosity instead of judgment, as we pointed out, a number of things that can help a child understand how to how to navigate those tricky situations.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

So tools, but tools with conversation.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

That's it.

SPEAKER_00 22:45

Do you have like a top three tools? Because I know parents will want to know. And I I know I love your human first approach. And I see you and I love it. And I also can hear the voice of the listener in my mind going, Yeah, but tell me the tools. I need to know the tools. Do you have a couple that you find particularly helpful? I mean, I know there are some tools that kind of straddle the line between human-centered living and technology, like, you know, AI that that uses the Socratic method, for example, so that kids aren't having their Amazon smart speakers do their homework. Are there any tools like that that kind of have a nice little middle road that you would recommend?

SPEAKER_01 23:33

Sure. I can list a number of them for you. If you are interested in parental controls, specifically with gaming or apps, one of them is called Bark. It's really great for monitoring a number of devices. It ensures that you can put restrictions on the amount of time that the child is on. There is through typically your phone or your cell phone. There's usually monitoring apps or services that you can offer. You can consider calling your ISP or phone provider to support you with that. There's a tool uh around just activity. It's called Mobi SIP, I think it is, M-O-B-I-C-I-P. And this is really great for if you're trying to schedule activities for your child during this space. So, like this could be things like time balances flagging you if there's certain sites that you don't want your child to be engaging on. So there's a number of parental controls that you can share. And again, I'll share a number of these links on our common sense site as well where we review these apps.

SPEAKER_00 24:39

There's a definite back and forth between that digital literacy and like social know-how, like living in the world. And it's it's like good and bad because on the social side, on the bad side, we have elements like bullying. So we have positive things like dating. And then on the digital side, bullying obviously can be amplified into like legally prosecutable harassment. And the dating stuff can turn into distribution of child pornography because of apps like Undress Me, which are so wicked for parents who are not familiar. It takes a picture of a person fully clothed and makes them look completely nude. And then a child going, Oh my gosh, knowing this is not good, immediately like sends it to someone. And then they are in big trouble because that's a distribution of explicit child material. So are there any resources on Common Sense's website that help parents kind of help their kid be aware that there's a digital life, your real life social life, and there's also these legal sticky points because the lot isn't always catching up. That as a young person, if you make the wrong move, even if you're like 16 or 17, that can totally ruin your whole life. Are there any resources for that? Is there a flow chart of like if this, then that? Can you tell them a bit pragmatic, Jamie?

SPEAKER_01 26:12

You're great, Meredith. It's it's really challenging to come up with a sort of that decision tree or that sort of matrix that that I wish I had. I think the first thing we want to acknowledge is that these engagements that happen, you know, a child when they're engaging in relationships, for example, will want to disclose with their peers. And naturally the space is disclosing pictures of oneself, can engaging in and conversations and when there are moments where the child is in sort of an intimate relationship with someone else. There is the pressure to share through exchanging nude images. That's a that's the number one sort of problem there, right? Is that the child is not aware that that comes with uh repercussions if used inappropriately. And usually the child will say, Well, he really liked me or she really liked me. And I think so the first sort of point of of um that we want to address is we want to make sure that we are teaching the child what it means to have a healthy relationship and exchanging photos is not for legal reasons, but also for your own digital footprint. That's not an area we want to disclose, right? So reinforcing this idea, right? So common sense, we have a number of things. We have what we refer to as carpal conversations. These are minute and a half long uh bits where a child and parent and child and grandparent or a guardian can actually have conversations while they're in the car. You highlight a topic like what do you think about exchanging photos with a loved one? Do you think it's acceptable or not? We want to hear from the child first. I think it's important to note. And then we want to reinforce what those rules are. Uh, with others, we at Common Sense have a number of resources where we share with families what these trends are. I encourage you to look on our site, commonsensemedia.org, where we are highlighting the latest app and assessing why it's problematic for a child, right? We call these our parental guides on a number of tools and topics from uh TikTok to the latest AI tool that I'm, you know, I'm I'm sure it's likely to change, right? On the undress me app for sure. Right. I I again I want to just summarize by simply saying we need to have those conversations. We need to be sharing with our kids what those skills are. And most importantly, we need to continue to have restrictions in place. So when those issues and those errors do happen, the child knows what to do from a legal standpoint, but also they are aware how to avoid it in the future. We all knew, Meredith, right, that if we we scare a child too much, they'll actually turn away from us. And I think the encouragement here is really to explore the idea of what it means to connect with the child, but while still being firm and what we expect from them.

SPEAKER_00 29:09

So well said. You were an economics teacher, a vice principal, an education nonprofit executive, and you're a parent. All of that combination creates a very unique and special vantage point from you know so many perspectives. What do you wish parents could see that they might be missing or might misunderstand?

SPEAKER_01 29:31

So here's what I would encourage. I would I would first start with uh hugging your child before you go to bed tonight, high-fiving them, doing whatever it is that you you need to do to affirm their presence and make sure that they feel loved and cared for. So write that little note down, get that hug ready, blow that child a kiss, whatever it is that you need to do, do me a favor and ensure that the child feels loved and cared for. Whatever that argument that you had today, let it go. Know and let your child know that you care for them, that you enjoy them. And regardless of what mistakes they've made or they're about to make, we want to make sure that we're connected with them. Our kids feel the need to have adults, carrying adults in their life, and it's really important that they share that. The second thing is the administrator and me. Um, if you haven't already done so, you can go to our site to do this, but we need to set some very clear agreements of what is right and what is wrong to do when a child is engaging in technology, whether that's a companion bot or whether they're using social media. It doesn't matter if today's the day that you reset what those tools are, but from this day on, have a clear plan on what those expectations are. Um, and if the child fights and moans and gets angry at you for a few weeks, a few months, I guarantee you it's worth it because they need to understand where those parameters and those guardrails are. Now, some of you might be thinking, well, how do I do that? I don't know how to engage, I'm too old, I don't know anything about technology. It's important because a child, without that guidance, will seek connections with their peers about what is right and wrong. And then the third thing, as I pointed out, is we want to share with a child and model what those skills are when they're navigating tricky situations online. So if they're in front of a stranger that they're considering a friend, we want to be able to say, um, how do you get out of those situations? If they're gaming, uh, if they're talking to an AI bot, we want to pivot them. We want to make sure that they understand the skills necessary to avoid those very challenging and again, tricky dilemmas that they might uh encounter online.

SPEAKER_00 31:43

A world where so many of our skills and tasks are being outsourced to AI, I really appreciate the reminder to not outsource these important moments of communication with the next generation. This has been such a good conversation. You've already shouted out the Common Sense Media website. Do you want to also talk about the petition around AI bots?

SPEAKER_01 32:12

Yeah, happy to share that. We believe in common sense that AI companion bots are not good for our kids. We believe that tech companies need to be held accountable for features that don't protect our kids, that create situations where things are unsafe. It doesn't take us families highlighting their stories in front of Congress to let us know that our kids, when they use social companion bots, can not only be unsafe, but are often exposed to content that they shouldn't be. And so we at Common Sense have started a petition. You can go onto our site to ensure that we create legislation that holds tech companies accountable, that ensures that developers build better guardrails, stronger guardrails, and ultimately ensure that these companies are held accountable for features that impact our kids online, specifically with companion bots. I encourage you to go to our site. I will point that out in order to sign that petition. But do me a favor, really double check and ensure that your child, if they are under 18, is not using companion bots. These are not tools that are made for kids in mine. Um so we want to be mindful not to continue to use them if if at all possible.

SPEAKER_00 33:27

So thank you again for this conversation. I really think that it will encourage parents to move from a place of like fear and helicopter mindset to a place of empowerment and almost like getting back to that human connection without being a Luddite. So thank you, Jamie. I appreciate you. This has been great.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

Thanks, Meredith. I really appreciate you being alive today. And don't forget to hug your loved one in your life. All right.

SPEAKER_00 33:58

Thanks for listening. Be sure to subscribe and share. Voices United in Education is a production of Escamby County Public Schools.