Three questions to ask before your kid uses ChatGPT
Before yes or no, ask them three things. The questions don't give you an answer — they give you something better.
Your kid asks if they can use ChatGPT for homework. Before yes or no, ask them three things.
One: what’s the assignment trying to teach you?
Sometimes the answer is “to read the book.” In that case, ChatGPT subverts the goal. Sometimes the answer is “to write a clean five-paragraph essay.” In that case, ChatGPT might actually be a useful tool to learn from. Same assignment in different schools means different things. Make your kid the one figuring out which is which.
Two: can you spot when it’s wrong?
ChatGPT makes things up. Confidently. Names of books that don’t exist, quotes that were never said, dates off by decades. Before they use it for facts, they need to know that’s normal. Show them an example. Have them ask it about something they already know well — a favorite player, a video game, their own school — then count the errors.
Three: are you using it to think, or to skip thinking?
This is the real one. There’s a version of using AI that makes your brain stronger — testing your ideas against it, asking it to argue back, using it as a thinking partner. There’s another version that makes your brain weaker. Both feel the same in the moment.
The three questions don’t give you a yes or no. They give you something better: a conversation where your kid is the one figuring out what AI is for. That conversation is the actual skill. Whether they use ChatGPT today is a footnote.