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Codemoji Coding Hour · Lesson plan

🕵️ Become an AI detective

Grades 3-5 · 60 minutes · No typing · Start at codemoji.com/lessons/ai/investigator/1

Students will

explain in their own words what AI is, how it learns from examples, and why it can be wrong.

The big idea

AI learns patterns from lots of examples, so it is only as good, and as fair, as the examples it learns from.

Before the hour

  • Do case file 1 yourself (about 12 minutes).
  • Decide on accounts: students can play as guests, or join your class with its code so their progress (and certificate) is saved.
  • Think of two everyday AI examples your class knows: a voice assistant, video suggestions.

Warm-up (away from screens)

Is it AI? Read out five things (a light switch, a calculator, video suggestions, a voice assistant, a door handle) and students stand up for "AI" and sit for "not AI". Ask how they decided.

The hour

  1. 0-5 minWarm-up. The "Is it AI?" game.
  2. 5-10 minGet started. Open case file 1 and meet Cody the robot. Each case has an activity, a talk question and a short quiz.
  3. 10-45 minInvestigate. Case files 1-3: what AI is, how it learns, and AI that makes new things. Pause the class after each case for its talk question.
  4. 45-55 minClass discussion. Use the questions below. This is the most important part of the hour.
  5. 55-60 minWrap-up. Certificates. Ask: what is one thing you would check before trusting an AI answer?

The lessons

  1. 1. What Even Is AI?
  2. 2. How AI Learns
  3. 3. Generative AI: Making New Things

Where students get stuck

  • Not sure in the AI or Not sort

    Ask: does it learn from examples, or always do the same thing?

  • Rushing the quiz

    Each quiz needs 2 of 3 right; have them reread Cody's case notes first.

Talk about it

  • How did the AI in case 2 learn? What would happen with bad examples?
  • Can an AI be wrong? How would you find out?
  • Where do you think you used AI this week?

Fast finishers

  • Keep going with case files 4-7: hallucinations, fairness and spotting AI.
  • Write three rules for using AI safely at school.

Words to know

AI:
Artificial intelligence: computers that learn patterns from examples.
Training data:
The examples an AI learns from.
Bias:
When examples are unfair, so the AI is unfair too.

After the hour

Hand out Codemoji Coding Hour certificates: students who finished signed in to your class have theirs ready in your class's Certificates tab, and you can print any class by name. Standards: CSTA 1B-IC-18 / 2-IC-20: discuss computing technologies and their impact, fairness and bias.

Try the activityMake a class