A Chinese father has turned his living‑room TV into a quiz‑based learning tool. The story shows how AI can be used to mix entertainment with study, and it raises a lively debate about the impact on children.

The father, who works as a hired driver transporting customers in their own cars, said his junior‑high son spent long hours watching TV instead of studying. In late October he described his idea to an AI tool, which suggested building a “quiz lock” app and explained how it should work.

The app now shows a Chinese, math or English question every ten minutes, taken from the boy’s textbooks and his school progress. A correct answer lets him keep watching; a wrong answer adds another question, and the system records the mistake to repeat it later.

When the first question appeared, the seventh‑grader cut the power to restart the TV, CCTV reported. The father then closed the loophole and added a “parent unlock” that allows two hours of uninterrupted documentary viewing.

Some social‑media users accused the father of “turning the home into an exam room” and warned that linking entertainment to schoolwork could make children see learning as punishment, Cover News reported. The father, however, describes the system as a game of attack and defence between him and his son.

The example shows that AI can create a gamified study tool that keeps children engaged, but it also illustrates the risk of turning everyday leisure into a constant test. Whether such an approach helps or harms learning remains an open question.