Beijing has become the first municipality in China to make artificial intelligence (AI) a compulsory part of public education, with more than 1,400 schools now teaching the technology that is reshaping modern life, China Daily reports.
From this semester, students in the capital’s primary and secondary schools will spend at least eight hours per term learning about AI – from building basic AI awareness to hands-on applications to programming. Tools include block-based programming platforms, robots, generative AI and large language models.
Haidian Experimental Primary School’s information centre head, Shi Yuan, said the new curriculum was about “helping each [child] understand and interact confidently with AI.” He compared these lessons to “people learning to use the computer” 20 to 30 years ago, noting that “the age of AI has come and we are not turning back.”
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At the high school level, schools collaborate with the likes of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Huawei to offer more specialised courses. These cover topics like brain-computer interfaces, autonomous driving and humanoid robots. Extracurricular clubs and science festivals give those with deeper interest the chance to experiment further.
Director of Guangqumen Middle School’s talent cultivation centre, Pei Yi, said that his school prioritised the application of AI across disciplines – such as analysing movement in physical education classes and creating interactive games in English classes.
Educators told China Daily that they viewed AI as a tool to enhance but not replace traditional learning.
While Beijing is the first place in China to make AI mandatory at schools, general AI education has already been rolling out in cities like Guangzhou and Chengdu since earlier in the year.
