Machine Learning for Kids

Machine Learning for Kids

by Dale Lane
Released January 2021
Publisher(s): No Starch Press
ISBN: 9781718500563

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Book description

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability of computers to simulate human thinking. Machine learning (ML) is one of the building blocks of AI. It’s based on the idea that computers can be taught to do things on their own from the data and feedback you give them.

Machine Learning for Kids consists of this book and a kid-friendly companion website paired with the educational coding platform, Scratch. Together, they provide an easy-to-use guided programming environment for adding ML capabilities to your own AI projects!

As you work through each chapter you’ll discover how ML systems can be taught to recognize text, images, numbers, and sounds, and different ways of training ML models to improve their accuracy. You’ll turn your models into fun computer games and apps (and see what happens when an AI system gets confused by bad data) while building:

•A Rock, Paper, Scissors game that knows your hand shapes
•A smart question-answering chatbot
•A computer character that reacts to insults and compliments
•An interactive virtual assistant (like Amazon’s Alexa) that obeys commands
•An AI version of Pac-Man, with a character trained to avoid ghosts

Requirements:No experience in machine learning or basic coding is necessary! This book includes a Scratch tutorial for beginners, and step-by-step instructions for every project.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Titlepage
  3. Copyright
  4. About the Author
  5. About the Author
  6. About the Technical Reviewer
  7. Acknowledgments
  8. Foreword
  9. Introduction
    1. Scratch
      1. Working in the Scratch Interface
      2. Coding in Scratch
      3. Saving Your Work
    2. Machine Learning for Kids
    3. What’s Next?
  10. Chapter 1: What Is Artificial Intelligence?
    1. Coding
    2. Machine Learning
    3. Artificial Intelligence
    4. Neural Networks and Deep Learning
    5. What You Learned
  11. Chapter 2: Introducing Machine Learning for Kids
    1. Logging In
    2. Creating a New ML Project
    3. Phases of an ML Project
      1. Train
      2. Learn & Test
      3. Make
    4. Creating an Account
    5. What You Learned
  12. Chapter 3: Sorting Animal Pictures
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Project
      3. Test Your Model
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  13. Chapter 4: Playing Rock, Paper, Scissors Against Your Computer
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Game
      3. Test Your Game
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  14. Chapter 5: Recognizing Movie Posters
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Model
      3. Test Your Model
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  15. Chapter 6: Mail Sorting
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Project
      3. Test Your Project
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  16. Chapter 7: Insulting a Computer
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Prepare Your Game
      2. Code Your Game Without ML
      3. Train Your Model
      4. Code Your Game with ML
      5. Test Your Game
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
      1. Using Speech Input Instead of Typing
      2. Recognizing Speech That Isn’t a Compliment or Insult
      3. Learning from Mistakes
    3. What You Learned
  17. Chapter 8: Recognizing Language in Newspapers
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Project
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
      1. Measuring Performance: Accuracy
      2. Measuring Performance: Confusion Matrix
      3. Measuring Performance: Precision and Recall
      4. Improving Your ML Model
    3. What You Learned
  18. Chapter 9: Finding an Object in a Picture
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Project
      3. Test Your Project
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. Real-World Applications for Complex Image Recognition Systems
    4. What You Learned
  19. Chapter 10: Smart Assistants
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Code Your Project Without ML
      2. Train Your Model
      3. Code Your Project with ML
      4. Test Your Project
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
      1. Using Your Model’s Confidence Score
      2. Using Speech Input Instead of Typing
      3. Collecting Training Data
    3. What You Learned
  20. Chapter 11: Chatbots
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Prepare Your Character
      2. Train Your Model
      3. Prepare Your Project
      4. Test Your Project
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
      1. Responding and Recording When Users Report Mistakes
      2. Recognizing When a User Isn’t Happy
      3. Answering Only When the ML Model Is Confident
    3. ML and Ethics
    4. What You Learned
  21. Chapter 12: Avoiding the Monster
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Describe the State of the Game
      2. Train Your Model
      3. Test Your Game
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  22. Chapter 13: Tic Tac Toe
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Prepare Your Game
      2. Train Your Model
      3. Test Your Game
    2. Review and Improve Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  23. Chapter 14: Confusing the Computer
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Project
      3. Test Your Project
    2. Review and Fix Your Project
    3. What You Learned
  24. Chapter 15: Biasing the Computer
    1. Build Your Project
      1. Train Your Model
      2. Prepare Your Project
      3. Test Your Project
      4. Introduce Bias
      5. Test Your Biased Project
    2. Review Your Project
    3. The Case for Bias
    4. AI and Ethics
    5. What You Learned
  25. Afterword
    1. The Future
    2. Next Steps

Product information

  • Title: Machine Learning for Kids
  • Author(s): Dale Lane
  • Release date: January 2021
  • Publisher(s): No Starch Press
  • ISBN: 9781718500563