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When children forget their lunch, can't solve a math problem, or don't know how to get somewhere, the instinct for parents can be to step in immediately. But sometimes, the problem is an opportunity.

Developmental experts and educators say children need chances to struggle with everyday problems because figuring them out is a skill that has to be practiced.

The challenge for parents is knowing when to help and when to step back. There is a difference between helping children through difficult situations and removing the problem before they have a chance to try. At a time when an answer or AI-generated help can be seconds away, giving children room to figure things out for themselves can be hard to do.

What independence looks like depends on a child’s age, abilities, and circumstances, but experts say it means learning to plan, make decisions, solve problems, recover from mistakes, and figure out what to do next.

Children have unprecedented access to information, while technology has given parents more ways to monitor their kids' lives. They can track their children’s locations, see grades in real time, and email teachers immediately. That means parents can intervene before their children have had a chance to realize there is a problem, let alone figure out a solution.

There is a downside to that convenience, said Dr. Dana Suskind, a professor of surgery and pediatrics at the University of Chicago and author of the book Human Raised.

“I think the most important thing we can give children is not the answer, but the experience of figuring it out,” Suskind said. When parents swoop in, she said, children are deprived of opportunities to practice skills like pausing before acting, remembering what worked previously, and trying new solutions.

If children rarely have to struggle, it can lead to severe anxiety when they have to figure out something on their own, said Dr. Stephanie Carlson, director of the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.

Allowing children to be bored, frustrated, impatient, or nervous can support their learning and better prepare them for adulthood, experts say.

Boredom can facilitate creativity and play while helping children build confidence and resilience, said Kiryn Hoffman, CEO of the National Children’s Museum in Washington, D.C.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

Almost 1 billion Africans still rely on wood, charcoal, and other fuels that produce harmful smoke, according to the International Energy Agency. But across Africa, cleaner cooking stoves are being brought into homes by cutting the price of electric and efficient biomass models.

For mother of two Mary Kavutha, cooking inside her own kitchen was a luxury she didn’t have until recently. Two years ago, the Nairobi businesswoman still relied on charcoal, taking the stove outside because the smoke made indoor cooking difficult. Now, breakfast starts with an induction cooker, switched on at the wall and controlled with the turn of a dial.

The change wasn’t driven by climate policy, but by the daily calculations that shape household life here. Things like cost, speed, safety, and whether she can cook near her children without filling the home with smoke.

Kavutha says charcoal used to cost her about 150 Kenyan shillings, or 1 dollar and 15 cents, each day. Electricity tokens worth 100 Kenyan shillings, or about 80 cents, now last into the next day and cover several meals.

Kavutha says, “When I compare it with the charcoal, it is very cheaper. Because, like in a day when I was using the charcoal, I find that I am using around 150 Kenya shillings ($1.15) with the charcoal per day. And with this one (induction stove), when I buy a token of 100 Kenya shillings ($0.8), it lasts me to the second day. You find that I have used it (in preparing) my breakfast.”

Kavutha’s switch is part of a wider push to make clean cooking affordable, not only available. The financing behind it works through carbon credits.

When households use less charcoal, firewood, or other polluting fuels, clean cooking companies can calculate the emissions avoided, have those reductions verified, and sell credits linked to them.

That expected revenue helps companies raise money in advance, lowering the price paid by customers who might not be able to afford a stove upfront.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

The management team at the Paris venue for Celine Dion's grand concert comeback has been bracing to deliver devastating news to hundreds of her fans: ‘Sorry, you appear to have been scammed; your tickets are fake.’

The Grammy-winning star's long-awaited return to the concert stage after years away from touring has unleashed massive pent-up demand for tickets.

It was a perfect storm for scammers who have wormed their way into fans' online communities and set up fraudulent ticketing websites to manipulate and rob fans of both their money and hopes of being able to say, “I was there.”

The Plenitude Arena, hosting Dion for 16 dates in September and October and another 10 in May, said the highest risk of scams is when tickets first go on sale—which was April for the upcoming concerts and June for the 2027 series—and in the shows' immediate build-up.

The shows sold out immediately, although a few VIP packages with Champagne and other perks are still available for between 1,099 euros and 2,990 euros (US$1,276 and $3,473) on the arena's website.

One other possibility was to buy tickets from people who no longer want theirs. But the arena says the only way to do that safely is on three sites that are authorized for resales: AXS France, Ticketmaster France, and Fnac Spectacles.

Generally, just 4% to 8% of people who buy tickets for the arena end up not wanting or not being able to use them.

Group-IB, a Singapore-based cybersecurity firm that works with the international police agency Interpol and others, and the Plenitude Arena both say they found an array of fraudulent websites that impersonated official ticketing platforms as well as the official sites for Dion and for the arena.

The concert series was a major milestone for the 58-year-old Quebec-born singer, her first since she revealed in 2022 her diagnosis with stiff-person syndrome, a rare neurological disorder.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

Families’ interest in their kids’ education is falling in many high-income countries as school systems struggle with plunging test scores, according to newly released results from a standardized test taken by 15-year-olds around the world.

Over 760,000 teenagers in dozens of countries took the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) last year. Results released show average scores in math, reading, and science are all at their lowest point in PISA history among highly developed economies. That includes continued declines in reading and math scores in the U.S.

China, Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea scored the highest marks on the test. Estonia, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand also did well.

The key to why scores are falling so widely may be found in an accompanying survey taken by students.

Compared with the 2022 results, almost every country saw a drop in families' support for their kids' education, especially for boys, as measured by questions about how often parents talk to their kids about their schoolwork or take an interest in their learning.

“Parents see themselves more as a client of the school, not as someone who takes personal interest,” said Andreas Schleicher, director for education and skills for the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, which runs the PISA test.

Students who said a family member asks them at least weekly what they did in school that day scored around 35 points higher on the PISA science test—equivalent to over a year and a half of learning—compared with students whose families take less interest. That number includes adjustments for socioeconomic differences.

Digital distraction is another factor. Over a quarter of students in high-income countries complained that their classmates got distracted by digital devices in most or every science class. In countries with strong policies controlling the use of cellphones in schools, distraction rates were lower.

There’s undoubtedly a strong association between students using digital devices for leisure and lower test scores, Schleicher said. When tech is used for learning, however, the results are more nuanced.

Countries where high schoolers reported using digital devices for around two to three hours per day in school saw higher test scores, but scores fell once tech use climbed beyond that.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

At a museum in eastern France, two men disguised with wigs used a sledgehammer and a hammer to smash a display case and make off with a 2,500-year-old gold necklace. The heist took under four minutes.

In a smash-and-grab robbery at another French museum, three masked robbers stole 27 pieces of jewelry valued at more than 4.5 million euros ($5.2 million), busting through two doors to break in.

Those thefts took place in July. A few weeks ago, thieves sliced through a fence and climbed through the window of a museum on the French Riviera and fled with two paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir. They abandoned two other artworks by the Impressionist master as they made their escape.

The rash of robberies, coming on the heels of last year’s stunning jewel heist in France’s most famous and most visited museum, the Louvre, shows how the country is both blessed and cursed by its troves of treasure accumulated over centuries of conquest, creativity, and having money to spend on art.

France’s passion for paintings, sculptures, ancient artifacts, and other valuables and curios is a source of national pride and identity. Thousands of museums that house collections big and small help transmit France’s love of culture and history from one generation to the next. The biggest also draw millions of tourists who pump money into the French economy.

But keeping all that wealth safe is costly and difficult. Criminals see museums as soft targets. The brazen and agonizing theft of 88 million euros ($102 million) worth of crown jewels from display cases in the Louvre’s Apollo gallery served as a wake-up call. But it was only the most shocking example of broader threats to museums, and not just in France.

European police agency Europol says museum heists are becoming more violent, with sledgehammers, axes, crowbars and even explosives used for break-ins and to smash display cases.

Thieves are also increasingly targeting museum items with gold and other precious metals that can be melted down, and with gemstones that can be removed and sold, the agency said in a report in August. Criminals believe “museum security measures are less robust than those in jewelry stores,” it said.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

Anthropic said it has blocked efforts by bad actors to use its artificial intelligence models for malicious activity such as cyberattacks, surveillance, and research that could have led to biological weapons.

As AI models grow more powerful, elaborate cyberattacks no longer require sophisticated skills, and even lone individuals can create threats that would not have been possible even a year ago, Anthropic said. The company said it has added stronger safeguards in its latest models to restrict biological research that could also be used to make weapons.

The cases we share here aren't typical misuse, but rather examples of the most notable and novel threat activity we've identified to date, Anthropic said in its third report since March 2025 describing AI misuse. The report includes snippets of the malicious code and AI prompts Anthropic said it found, and urges governments and AI competitors to identify and prevent similar abuse.

We're publishing this work because we believe we have a responsibility to disclose malicious misuse of our services. As models become increasingly capable, their risks will increase, unless AI developers and society's defenders act to make them safer, the company said.

The lengthy report by the AI startup, which is planning an initial public offering this fall, was published two days after one of its researchers announced he's resigning over concerns that Anthropic and its competitors are not acting responsibly in AI development. He echoed concerns raised inside and outside of the industry about the technology's potential to elude human control.

Between December 2025 and August 2026, researchers at Anthropic found misuse by actors ranging from spyware vendors and politically motivated individuals to state-sponsored groups spreading propaganda.

Among the findings in the company's report are unnamed actors attempting to use its models for research that could have led to biological weapons. In one instance, Anthropic said its systems blocked a request for Claude's assistance in authoring a grant application for scientific funding.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

Americans' satisfaction with the quality of K-12 education in the country has hit a low point, driven by a growing political divide and concerns that schools are not preparing children for college and future jobs.

Just 32% of American adults say they are completely or somewhat satisfied with the U.S. school system, according to an August poll published by Gallup and the Walton Family Foundation and shared exclusively with The Associated Press. That's an 11-point drop over the past two years and the lowest since Gallup began polling on the subject 27 years ago.

At the same time, dissatisfaction has increased to a high of 67%. Experts on education and school policy say the findings are deeply concerning but not surprising.

Democrats are driving the recent slide, with their satisfaction dropping about 19 points since President Donald Trump's second term began in 2025. Independents' satisfaction appears to be down as well, about 10 points from 2024, while Republicans' satisfaction has also fallen slightly, about 6 points.

The Trump administration has contributed to the erosion in public confidence by depicting schools as political battlegrounds, raising concerns about what teachers should be allowed to say in the classroom, and moving to abolish diversity programs and dismantle the Education Department, said Jack Schneider, director of the Center for Education Policy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

It's terrifying. We're on the precipice of the dissolution of the public education system as we have known it, Schneider said. Democrats, he said, are also particularly concerned by Trump's signature school choice program that will use taxpayer-supported scholarships to pay for kids' private school tuition.

But politics alone does not explain the dissatisfaction. Gallup polling shows public confidence in schools generally has declined since the COVID-19 pandemic closed classrooms, exacerbating academic declines, mental health issues, and other problems.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

The Trump administration officially launched the Foundry School, a new nationwide training initiative aimed at preparing entrepreneurs, engineers, technicians, and industrial leaders to help revive American manufacturing.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President J.D. Vance headlined the launch event at the Trump Institute of Peace in Washington.

The State Department said the program is designed to prioritize American workers, giving them the training needed to help bring manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. and build careers in sectors the department considers vital to national economic security.

We woke up to the reality just a few years ago that we are suddenly, as a nation, dangerously dependent, dangerously dependent on other nations for all sorts of things that we need, not simply for our economic vibrancy, but in many cases for our national security and our very survival as a prosperous nation-state, Rubio said.

And so now we are involved in this endeavor across the board to try to reverse those mistakes, he said.

Officials said the Foundry School is meant to turn recent industrial investment into jobs.

They pointed to trillions of dollars in manufacturing investment already flowing into the U.S. under the administration's reindustrialization push, and said the new program is intended to make sure American workers—not just companies—benefit from that spending.

We're sending a message to all of America's kids, both at the leadership level and those below them, that we believe in making things again and we're going to give you the tools and the education and the networking in order to do it, Vance said.

Working with your hands is very much the work of the future, he said.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

It had been an interesting mix at the giant electronics show in Germany. There was a pocket-sized robot to cheer you up, a watch that can count your calories, and a phone designed specifically to keep children safe. They’re all part of a joint conference led by consumer electronics company Sharp.

Sharp was one of the first brands to kick off the massive electronics show last September 3, and the company’s most eye-catching offering was the pocket-sized robot. It’s all quite different from the full-sized humanoids we have become used to seeing at these conferences.

The AI-driven character first appeared on a phone—now you can hold it in your hand and talk to it, as Sascha Lange, Sharp's Vice President of Sales and Marketing, demonstrated.

He said, “So MIA is 12 centimeters tall, has an integrated camera, and is connected to ChatGPT. It is programmed in a way that it can speak very…Oh, you can’t hear it. It’s programmed in a way that it speaks very emotionally and also moves very emotionally.”

“And MIA is already available in Japan at a retail price of around 300 euros and in Taiwan around 400 euros. So, this is a robot, quite affordable, right? And also Japan, our colleagues in Japan, last week announced the male version because she's a lady; that's the girl. And also the male version, which is a little bit less friendly, more straight, and that would launch in December this year. And then we have the second concept, this is Leomay, that is a European project, where we are focusing less the emotional part of the robot, but more the assistant part, so how it can really support things in life.”

Sharp also highlighted its calorie counting feature for the Karada Mate watch, which claims to track calories as the wearer eats.

IFA opened to the public on Friday, September 4, and continued until September 8.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.

A television game show in Nigeria’s commercial hub of Lagos has an unforgiving rule: Speak English and you lose. For a U.S.-born millennial in the audience and a student of her parents' mother tongue, the high-stakes setting is a perfect classroom.

Meanwhile, a 15-year-old Canadian speaks to a teacher about 13,000 kilometers (8,000 miles) away in Zimbabwe, learning a language her parents feared she would never speak. “Mhoroi,” Nyashadzashe Machingura says cheerfully with a pronounced Canadian accent while greeting in Zimbabwe's vernacular Shona.

The scenes capture a new generation of interest and entrepreneurship around African languages once pushed to the margins by decades of colonialism. Often seen as secondary to English, French, and Portuguese, they are enjoying a renaissance that is also creating business opportunities.

Africa is home to over 1 billion people speaking roughly a third of the world’s languages, with between 1,500 and 3,000 across 54 countries, according to UNESCO.

Experts say the revival in some of them is driven partly by second- and third-generation Africans in the diaspora finding it easier to reconnect with their roots and communicate with older relatives, thanks to social media, online learning, and entertainment.

English remains the dominant language for education, business, and government affairs in the Southern African nation that officially recognizes 16 mostly Indigenous languages.

“When you talk of Africa, you talk of English, French, Portuguese,” said Believe Mubonderi, a linguistics lecturer at Zimbabwe Open University. His research notes the importance of ensuring that African languages have a place in technologies shaping how people communicate, learn and trade. “In most cases, African languages were sidelined. They were never exposed or modernized to be used in commerce, science and technology, he said. When a language has a very low status, there’s a danger that that language eventually becomes endangered.”

Governments and international organizations are trying to reverse that trend.

The African Union’s 2022 decision to adopt Kiswahili, spoken in much of East Africa, as an official working language has raised its international profile.

This article was provided by The Associated Press.