> the year 7 comp sci classes they teach in our local high school have what on their curriculum? Yep, that's right, you guessed it: AI. Because that's apparently the absolute basic CS that every student should start with these days.

I think, if you went back to the origin of the term "AI" and tried to teach an introduction to the very fundamentals, this could actually be a fun and inspiring class - one that might not even need a lot of computer knowledge.

There are a number of board games with "self-playing" antagonists that are governed through clever sets of game rules.

There is also the historical predecessor of computer science, cybernetics, that dealt with self-governing analogous control systems, like thermostats.

Finally, there are the classical pathfinding algorithms (Depth-First/Breadth-First, Dijkstra, A*) which I still think are some of the most "bang for the buck" algorithms in terms of "intelligent-looking" behavior vs simplicity of the algorithm.

All that stuff could be engaging for high school students in the author's "hands-on" way.

All that of course if the "AI" class is really about giving a broad introduction to the field, and not just "we have to put ChatGPT into the curriculum somehow".

> After all, flashing screen surely release more endorphins than non-interactive physical exhibits

The irony is that this might not even be true. In the article, the author observed that the physical exhibits were much more interesting to the kids than the screens.

Another funny option could be to have the AI class be a linear algebra class.