NSF FF: Planning: Empowering Children to Thrive in the Digital Era through Collaborative Learning Experiences

Award ID: 2627419

This FINDERS Foundry award engages students and families in understanding AI in safe, ageappropriate ways. Many young people use AI without learning what it can and cannot do. This project connects high school students with younger learners so both groups gain confidence with AI concepts where high school students learn to teach AI basics, while younger students are guided through support from a nearpeer mentor. Families, educators, and community members design activities collaboratively to improve how AI instruction is created and deployed. The project builds shared understanding around AI concepts so learners see AI as less mysterious and more like a tool for questioning. This project supports stronger communication across age groups, guided by educators and parents, while preparing students for future learning. This FINDERS Foundry award defines activities, roles, and simple safeguards for using AI alongside a classroom robotic device. The project identifies ageappropriate foundational skills, specifying a safe and developmentally coherent workflow, and outlines essential evaluation steps for a robust wireframe. Technical work includes developing interaction rules to prevent overautomation, designing scaffolded activities that integrate AI predictions with handson robotics, and defining minimalrisk protocols suitable for elementary and middlegrade settings. The resulting structure provides a baseline for responsible AI exploration that supports digital literacy, physical computing awareness, and safe classroom practice. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

NSF Program Director: Lindsay Portnoy