How AI Could Teach Chinese Kids Their ABCs

This article is part of a series that explores how artificial intelligence could change life in China. Lü moved to Shanghai in 2014 from his hometown in central China's Henan province, one of the country's poorer provinces, to work at an app development company. A year later, his wife joined him, leaving their son back in Henan with his grandparents. Living some 800 kilometers away is not an ideal situation, says Lü, but it's a necessary compromise to give the whole family a better life. Because he's only able to visit his son around six times a year, Lü spends generously on whatever he thinks will help the boy's intellectual development -- from cheap toys and storybooks to a 1,200-yuan ($180) robot playmate named Ledi, who's powered by artificial intelligence (AI).