Understand AI
What AI is, how it works, and where it already appears in a student's day.
AI Literacy
AI Literacy for Students
The question isn't whether students will use AI. It's whether they'll know how to use it well.
Understand AI
Know what AI can do, and where it can still be wrong.
Question AI
Check an answer before treating it as true.
Use it responsibly
Privacy, academic integrity, and when not to use AI.
What is AI literacy? AI literacy is the knowledge and skills people need to understand, evaluate, use, and create with artificial intelligence. It is broader than prompt engineering, knowing ChatGPT, or learning to code.
- Literacy is broader than prompting or coding
- Six student habits
- Different questions by grade band
- Teachers need a parallel skill set
- Practice belongs in clubs and projects
What Is AI Literacy?
AI literacy is the knowledge and skills people need to understand, evaluate, use, and create with artificial intelligence. It is broader than prompt engineering, knowing ChatGPT, or learning to code.
What an AI-literate student knows
An AI-literate student understands that AI can be incredibly useful — and still get things wrong. AI literacy is a life skill, not just a technology skill.
Ask better questions
Understand what AI can and can't do before you rely on an answer.
Evaluate an AI response
Check important information instead of accepting the first answer.
Recognize mistakes and bias
Notice when an answer is wrong, incomplete, or one-sided.
Protect personal information
Know what should stay private.
Use AI for schoolwork
Use it appropriately, and understand academic integrity.
Create with your own ideas
Use AI without giving up the work, and decide when it shouldn't be used.
Student framework
What Should Students Know About AI?
A HeyOtto framing for K–12. It maps to the broader public idea of AI competency — understand, apply, create, judge — without copying any one framework.
Question AI
AI can be wrong, biased, incomplete, or misleading — and still sound sure.
Use AI
How to prompt, collaborate, research, brainstorm, and learn with AI.
Evaluate AI
How to check sources, outputs, accuracy, and hidden assumptions.
Create With AI
Build projects, stories, games, apps, media, and ideas.
Use AI Responsibly
Privacy, attribution, academic integrity, safety, and human responsibility.
Why Students Need AI Literacy
Students aren't waiting for the AI future. They're already growing up in it.
AI is part of the tools they use to search, learn, create, code, play, and communicate. A student can ask AI to explain a math problem, brainstorm a story, research a topic, write code, or help build an entire project.
That access creates enormous opportunities. It also creates a new responsibility: students need to understand the technology they're using.
AI can help a student learn faster, explore an idea, practice a skill, solve a problem, or turn an idea into something they can create.
But AI can also be wrong.
It can leave out important information, make up facts, reflect bias, or give a confident-sounding answer that isn't true. The more capable AI becomes, the more important it is for students to know when to trust it, when to question it, and when to verify it.
AI can help students
- Learn and practice
- Brainstorm and explore ideas
- Research and ask questions
- Write and revise
- Code and debug
- Solve problems
- Create projects
Students still need to
- Think about the problem
- Question what AI tells them
- Verify important information
- Decide how and when to use AI
- Create something of their own
- Take responsibility for the final result
AI should expand what students can do — not replace the thinking that makes learning meaningful.
The Six Skills of AI Literacy
AI literacy isn't one skill. It's a set of skills students build over time.
- 01
Understand AI
AI is technology created by people. It can recognize patterns and generate answers, but it doesn't know everything — so students should ask what it's doing, what it's good at, and where it might be wrong.
- 02
Question AI
A confident answer isn't a true one. Students learn to ask how they know it's true, what might be missing, and what they should check.
- 03
Use AI
Hands-on practice means clear prompts, useful context, follow-up questions, and using AI to brainstorm, practice, and get feedback. The skill is knowing when AI is actually useful.
- 04
Evaluate AI
Speed doesn't make an answer correct. Students check accuracy, sources, and other perspectives — especially for research, writing, and decisions that matter.
- 05
Create With AI
Students can use AI to develop stories, build games, write code, and turn ideas into projects. Their imagination, decisions, and direction stay at the center.
- 06
Use AI Responsibly
AI use connects to privacy, academic integrity, copyright, safety, and misinformation. The question isn't only whether AI can do something. It's whether a student should use it.
AI Literacy by Age
Students don't need the same AI education at every age.
What a third grader needs to understand about AI is different from what a high school senior needs to know.
Elementary School
Understand AI and use it safely.
Elementary students can start with the basics.
They can learn:
- What AI is
- Where they encounter AI
- What AI can do
- That AI can make mistakes
- How to ask clear questions
- What information should stay private
- When to ask an adult for help
The goal: Build curiosity and healthy skepticism.
Students should begin to understand that AI is a tool — not a person and not an authority.
Middle School
Question, evaluate, and create with AI.
Middle school students are ready to explore AI more independently.
They can learn:
- How prompts affect responses
- How to ask better follow-up questions
- How to check AI-generated information
- How AI can reflect bias
- How to recognize AI-generated content
- How to protect personal information
- When AI use is appropriate for schoolwork
- How to create with AI without handing over the entire project
The goal: Move students from simply using AI to thinking critically about it.
High School
Use AI critically and responsibly.
High school students need practical AI skills they can take into college, careers, and everyday life.
They can learn:
- How to evaluate AI-generated information
- How to verify sources
- How AI can introduce bias
- How to use AI in research and writing
- How to use AI for coding and projects
- Academic integrity and appropriate AI use
- Privacy and data
- Copyright and attribution
- AI-generated media and misinformation
- Responsible AI use in college and the workplace
The goal: Help students become confident, critical, and responsible users of AI.
AI literacy is more than prompting
Prompting is useful, but it isn't the whole skill. A student can write an excellent prompt and still believe everything AI tells them.
Prompt
Communicate clearly with AI.
Question
Challenge the response.
Evaluate
Judge whether the output is reliable.
Verify
Check important information against other sources.
Create
Use AI to develop their own ideas.
Decide
Know when AI should and shouldn't be used.
Own it
Take responsibility for the work and decisions they make with AI.
AI literacy and academic integrity
AI has changed what it means to do schoolwork independently. The useful question for schools isn't “Can students use AI?” It's “How should students use AI?”
The difference comes down to one thing: whether AI is helping a student learn or helping them avoid learning.
Supports learning
Replaces learning
Supports learningAsking AI to explain a concept you're stuck on
Replaces learningAsking AI to do the assignment for you
Supports learningGetting feedback on a draft you wrote
Replaces learningSubmitting AI-generated writing as your own
Supports learningAsking AI why your code isn't working
Replaces learningCopying code you don't understand
Supports learningUsing AI to brainstorm ideas, then choosing your own
Replaces learningLetting AI make every decision in a project
Supports learningChecking AI's answer against your textbook or notes
Replaces learningTrusting the first answer without checking
Rules alone don't settle this. Students need to understand why the line matters: the point of an assignment is the thinking it builds, and AI can't do that thinking for them.
What students should be able to do
- Explain how AI contributed to their work
- Disclose AI use the way their teacher or school policy asks
- Tell the difference between getting help and handing off the work
- Ask their teacher when they're not sure whether AI use is allowed
What schools can do
Set clear expectations
Say when AI is allowed, when it isn't, and how students should disclose it, ideally assignment by assignment.
Design for thinking
Assignments that ask for process, reflection, or personal connection are harder to hand off and more valuable to complete.
Practice the gray areas
Talk through real scenarios with students instead of only posting a rule.
AI literacy and academic integrity go hand in hand. Read our academic integrity guide
How Schools Can Build AI Literacy
AI literacy doesn't have to start with a massive new curriculum.
Schools can start with a few practical steps.
Define what AI literacy means for your students
Create a shared understanding across teachers, students, and families.
Make it age appropriate
Elementary, middle, and high school students should build different skills.
Give students hands-on practice
Let students use AI for real learning, creative work, research, coding, and projects.
Teach verification
Make checking AI-generated information part of the process.
Set clear expectations
Students should understand when AI is allowed, how it should be used, and when it shouldn't be used.
Support teachers
Teachers need practical guidance for using AI themselves and teaching students how to use it.
Keep evolving
AI will continue to change. AI literacy should evolve with it.
Where HeyOtto fits in your AI literacy plan
Built for ages 8+
An AI platform made only for kids and teens, with age-appropriate answers and safeguards. It's a learning tool, not a companion app.
Learn by doing
Students ask, research, write, code, and create with AI, practicing the six AI literacy skills inside real schoolwork instead of a separate lesson.
Advisor oversight
Educators can open a student's conversation and see the prompts and replies, so teachers can guide good habits instead of guessing.
Academic integrity built in
Socratic, hint-first help keeps a clear line between getting help and handing in AI's work, so students learn to use AI honestly.
Real-time alerts
Safety alerts go to a teacher or admin right away, so the right adult can step in when it matters.
Shaped to your mission
School accounts can be personalized to your school's values and mission, including faith-based schools.
FAQ