Save The Children, Savoir Devenir, and Tactical Tech, with the support of the EU, are joining forces to create accessible and ready-to-use resources for educators, parents, and caregivers that enable them to achieve that. As they navigate the challenges AI brings, they can do so in a way that supercharges teenagers’ agency, critical thinking, and centres their human strengths.
Supercharged Human
How to supercharge teens to critically use AI? Ready-to-use resources for educators, parents, and caregivers“AI systems are generally smarter than humans.” OK...
“AI is the new frontier for creativity.” Sure...
“AI is inevitable.” If you say so...
Does this sound familiar? We’ve heard it all before. AI is the latest in a long line of technologies hyped as life-changing, humanity-transforming opportunities. But what is behind all the flashy slogans and big promises?
The widespread adoption of AI tools is reshaping how we learn, think, consume, and create information, and even how we connect with each other. As early adopters, teens are experiencing these changes. But here’s the catch: beyond the well-known social and environmental downsides, there’s a sneaky trade-off happening. Giving up our private data for instant answers? Check. Trading our creativity for productivity hacks? Check. Swapping our social skills for chit-chat with a weirdly overpolite chatbot? Check. Sacrificing our environment for ‘free’ access? Double-check.
So, how can educators, parents, and caregivers navigate this complex media and information landscape? How can they engage young people in meaningful conversations and strategies about AI—its possibilities, limits, and impacts? Most importantly, how can they empower young people to use AI critically and exercise their digital rights with a human-centered focus?
The answer: Supercharged Human
“With this project, we want to enable honest conversations about AI. At the moment, it is crucial for teens, educators, and parents to look beyond the narratives of AI being presented to them by tech companies, increase their awareness of the trade-offs currently on the table, and adjust their behaviour accordingly.”Stephanie Hankey, Tactical Tech
What is included in Supercharged Human?
AI systems are quickly entering classrooms and daily life, often promoted as tools to improve literacy and creativity. But their growing use is causing disruption, from spreading false information and increasing polarisation to reinforcing biases, stereotypes, and changing how we think about information and knowledge. The benefits are clear, but so are the rising risks.
Schools, libraries, cultural centers, and youth-focused organisations play a crucial role in creating spaces for the honest and critical conversations we need. But to do so, educators need resources and tools to equip learners of all ages with the knowledge and skills they need to navigate AI-driven media and information systems. This initiative does exactly that by providing:
A multilingual playlist of educational tools and resourcesAligned with the EU and the Citizens 3.0 digital literacy
competence frameworks
A critical AI Literacy field guide for educatorsAdvice for educator engaged in a human-centered critical AI Literacy
An intergenerational AI toolkit for critical use of AI Practical tips and activities for home or the classroom
“At the moment, looking at the risks and the way AI is creating cognitive atrophy and overdependence, it is worrying for young people because they are born into a world with AI. For them, it isn’t a choice anymore. So what I would like from the project is to give them a sense of choice.”Divina Frau-Meigs, Savoir Devenir
It is possible to enjoy the benefits of technology without turning into a productivity machine. It is possible to embrace tech while still creating spaces for human creativity and connection. We can hold on to the joy of learning, making mistakes, and creating without relying only on machines. And we can only achieve all this with the right digital skills and digital literacy.
So “AI systems are generally smarter than humans”? “AI is the new frontier for creativity”? “AI is inevitable”? Here is our response: Thanks, but no thanks. It is time to supercharge humans through competences, knowledge, and connections.
If you are an educator, parent, or an organization working with youth, join our community and be the first to learn about our upcoming resources, opportunities, and tools.
“In my work within schools and informal educational settings to promote and protect children’s rights online and counter educational poverty, I recognise the urgent need to help not only children but also teachers and educators to understand the nature of artificial intelligence systems and how to develop in young people the skills required for their informed and critical use.”Claudio Polini, Save The Children (Italy)
Meet the partners and the funder
Savoir Devenir
Website: Savoir Devenir
Launched in early 2017, the non-profit organization Savoir Devenir is dedicated to empowering all audiences—citizens, educators, policy makers, and other stakeholders—to take control of their media and digital lives. Supported by the UNESCO Chair “Savoir Devenir” at Sorbonne Nouvelle University and backed by an international network of partners, the organization works at the intersection of media and information literacy, digital literacy, AI-literacy, and internet governance, enabling individuals to understand, create, and actively engage with today’s digital environments.
Save the Children Italy
Website: Save the Children Italy (STC)
Save the Children - Since over 100 years, fighting to save children at risk and guarantee them a future. We work every day with passion, determination and professionalism in Italy and around the world to give children the opportunity to be born and grow up healthy, to receive an education and to be protected. In 2014 Save the Children launched “Enlighten the Future”, a campaign to combat educational poverty in Italy through the opening of 26 *Punti Luce - "high-density educational centers" - in the most deprived areas of the country. These area places where children and adolescents can participate to free educational, recreational and cultural activities, discover their talents and cultivate them for their future.
Tactical Tech
Website: Tactical Tech
Today more than ever, we need to reflect critically on our relationship with technology. How do digital technologies impact the way we get informed and make decisions? How can we as a society face the 'side-effects' of an increasingly data-driven world? At Tactical Tech, a Berlin-based non-profit organisation, we design and co-develop playful and forward-looking experiences, interventions, events and educational resources that invite people to think about how technology influences their lives and changes the world they live in. Since 2013, we have joined forces with a global network of partners and civil society organisations, collaborating at the intersection of technology, research, design and art on projects that promote conversations and encourage proactive solutions.
If you are an educator, parent, or an organization working with youth, join our community and be the first to learn about our upcoming resources, opportunities, and tools.