Empowering Curiosity, Creativity, and Criticality in Children as Future Designers in the AI Landscape
Yasmin B Kafai
Over the past three decades, the Interaction Design and Children community has pioneered methodologies empowering youth to create, engage with, and transform their environments. Today, as data-driven and generative AI systems achieve unprecedented sophistication, we face a critical juncture requiring us to reconsider fundamental concepts of learning, pedagogy, creation, meaning-making, and self-expression. My talk will explore the intellectual pathways available to children in our current AI landscape. I argue for a dual approach: facilitating children’s deep exploration of learning processes and self-identity, while simultaneously developing tools and approaches that enhance their creative capabilities and foster critical engagement with AI technologies. This work has become imperative as AI and machine learning increasingly mediate children’s daily experiences—from social connections and music consumption to gaming and education. Combined with growing discourse on algorithmic justice, we must empower youth to navigate, critique, and shape these technological forces that define their world.
Yasmin B. Kafai is the Lori and Michael Milken President’s Distinguished Professor at the Graduate School of Education, University of Pennsylvania, with a secondary appointment in Computer and Information Science. A leading learning designer and researcher, she develops online tools, projects, and communities that foster coding, critical thinking, and creativity.
With colleagues at the MIT, Kafai helped develop Scratch, the widely popular programming language now used by over 100 million young people worldwide who have posted over 1 billion projects. Her current research explores algorithm auditing in machine learning applications, engaging high school students and teachers in examining AI systems. Additionally, through the nationwide Exploring Computer Science curriculum, she has pioneered the use of electronic textiles to introduce computing, engineering, and machine learning in high school classrooms. Kafai is the author of several influential books, including Connected Code: Why Children Need to Learn Programming and Connected Gaming: What Making Videogames Can Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. Most recently, she co-edited Designing Constructionist Futures: The Art, Theory, and Practice of Learning Designs—all published by MIT Press. She earned her doctorate in education from Harvard University while working at the MIT Media Lab. She is an elected Fellow of the American Educational Research Association and the International Society for the Learning Sciences.
Discovering, Dismantling and Delivering Hope-filled Digital Childhoods
Janet C Read
Drawing on over 20 years of research with children in HCI, this keynote will explore ways we can re-imagine technology for children that can bring them rich and hope-filled childhood experiences. With examples from design and evaluation work with children from 3 to 18, and with children from across many parts of the globe; the talk will deliver a positive and practical message to the IDC community.
Janet C. Read is a Professor of Child Computer Interaction at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), where she leads the Child Computer Interaction (ChiCI) research group and directs the UCLan Research Centre for Digital Life.
A pioneer in the field, she has been instrumental in shaping the discipline of Child Computer Interaction (CCI), co-authoring its first textbook and co-founding the International Journal of Child-Computer Interaction.
Her research focuses on designing positive technologies with and for children, emphasizing ethical co-design practices and the development of tools to evaluate children’s experiences with interactive systems. Notably, she developed the Fun Toolkit, including the widely adopted Smileyometer, to assess children’s engagement and enjoyment in HCI studies. Her early work on handwriting recognition for children marked a significant contribution to understanding text input technologies tailored for young users.
Professor Read has played a pivotal role in the IDC community, hosting the inaugural conference in 2003 and again in 2016 in collaboration with the BBC. She has chaired the IFIP TC13 working group on Child Computer Interaction and has delivered courses on CCI in over a dozen countries. Her commitment to ethical research practices is further demonstrated through her involvement with the ACM SIGCHI Ethics Board and her efforts to develop resources that ensure children’s informed participation in research.
With over 200 peer-reviewed publications and a global network of collaborators, Professor Read continues to influence the design and evaluation of technologies that enrich children’s digital experiences.