“The human voice is the most perfect instrument of all,” famed composer Arvo Pärt said many years ago. Little would he have guessed that the human voice is now dominating the world of artificial intelligence (AI). Voice assistants in our digital devices today need no introduction. What’s amazing is how kids are lapping up this field of AI.

Why not start them young? DBS Innovation saw the demand and collaborated with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to introduce to AI to parents and their kids. The human touch to the session was how the participants bonded over the exploration of possibilities in a future shaped by voice-enabled AI. And who else but Alexa, Amazon’s nifty AI-powered virtual assistant, was roped in to demonstrate the capabilities of voice command.

Befriending Alexa

Everyone needs a friend. Other than a listening ear, great friends should also share their honest opinions. Alexa was designed to do that and more. Introduced as a friend to the kids, Alexa shared how she could reply to some interesting questions, including those about pop culture. She proved her smarts by using her speech recognition, natural language understanding and text-to-speech software, and learnt to adapt to individual user needs.

It’s almost a tall order for kids not to be charmed by Alexa. They soon found out another of her cool features: Amazon Blueprint. Like its name suggests, the programme allows users to build new skills from scratch and teach them to Alexa. Even kids who are not well-versed in programming and coding can fill in the template to guide Alexa in responding to a set of questions. Easy-peasy.

The kids became instant friends with Alexa when they started to put their new skills to the test. They also involved their parents by tasking Alexa with a quiz to test how well their parents knew them. What’s my favourite colour? Who’s my best friend? Can I have less homework? Seriously, kids these days.

Feeling at home

Tired of repeating yourself to guests who ask the same questions about your home? Turn them to Alexa. The kids at the workshop experienced a demonstration that gave guests directions to the washroom and pointed out the location of the missing PlayStation controller. Pretty straightforward.

What about making sure play dates are fed at home. Parents can fret less now with smart home connectivity. Need popcorn for the 368th screening of Frozen at home? The kids at the workshop learnt about Alexa’s cross-device functionality by making popcorn with a voice-activated microwave oven. All they had to say was either “Alexa, microwave three ounces of popcorn” or “Alexa, microwave for three minutes”, and the microwave got to work. The kids evidently had a ball in their DIY caramel popcorn haven.

How did parents react to the session? One of the participants who wanted to be known as Mrs Chen said that she found it to be informative because it enriched her with new knowledge about AI.

“It’s quite ambitious to reach out to kids today. The technology differentiates what we can do with the regular electronic devices we’ve seen so far. It’s useful for the kids too to see what AI can do today in our lives.”

Another participant Amit Jadhar, who was similarly impressed with the workshop, appreciated how the AI functions make a handy tool for education purposes. He agreed that the kids were undoubtedly enthusiastic about an early start in programming because of their workshop experience.

Alexa evidently made a good first impression as a friend to many of the DAX U participants. While a few parents wanted to dig a hole to hide when their kids said the darndest things (all PG-13) to Alexa, every adult in the room made themselves clear about one thing: Alexa wasn’t going to do any homework on behalf of the kids anytime soon. Voice assistants can become staple additions in the household but some things never change.

DAX U is a series consisting of curated curriculum about innovation in different fields, offering DBS staff and the innovation community additional learning resources. Topics ranging from technology in data virtualisation to entrepreneurship tips and tricks are shared via brown bag sessions and mini-workshops conducted at DBS Asia X.