In the age of AI, does your child still need strong English reading and writing skills? It’s a common question I hear from parents across Asia and North America.
After teaching thousands of students and leading Dragon Knight League Reading and Writing Studio (DKL) for over a decade, I can confidently say that English mastery is more essential than ever. Here are seven important reasons why:
1. AI Cannot Replace Cultural and Emotional Intelligence
AI can generate text and mimic conversation, but it falls short when it comes to cultural context, subtext, irony, and emotional depth.
True understanding goes beyond vocabulary. It means grasping unspoken cues, understanding symbolic meanings, and getting the cultural nuance behind words. While AI can offer an initial road map, human fluency lets your child truly explore the landscape.
I have seen many students who initially struggled with reading comprehension. However, when vocabulary is experienced in the context of story plots, the complex emotions of characters, ethical dilemmas, and diverse settings, these children make connections with their imaginations that help them to overcome these hurdles.
2. The Future Belongs to Confident Communicators and Public Speakers
In a world where everyone has access to AI-generated content, the ability to present ideas with confidence, charisma, and authenticity will be key differentiators. Indeed, people look to people they can look up to and learn from.
At DKL, we have worked with many students whose parents come to us because their child is shrinking in the shadows when confronted with boisterous, outgoing peers. This is why we include public speaking in our curriculum. We help our students gain the confidence to not only speak English fluently, but to command attention, tell compelling stories, and persuade audiences—even if they do so in their own quiet style.
Time after time, we have seen that students who master a language develop confident self-expression that is the foundation of personal agency.
3. Elite Educational Opportunities Require Human-Level English Mastery
Prestigious private schools and competitive academic programs aren’t lowering their standards because of AI. In fact, they are raising them. When reading application essays, admissions officers consistently tell me that what they are looking for is an authentic voice, personal insights, and sophisticated thinking that only come from genuine language mastery.
Academic achievement and GPA improvement still depend on critical thinking, analysis, and the ability to synthesize complex ideas. These are skills that children develop through intensive reading and writing practice. Even in STEM fields, the ability to organize thoughts and communicate clearly determines success.
It’s essential that we prepare our children not to be passive consumers of AI, but empowered directors who will command these tools rather than be dictated by them.
4. Creative Thinking Is the New Premium Skill
As AI floods the world with generic content, the ability to compose original works and express unique perspectives will become increasingly valuable. AI can write an essay or a formulaic story. However, it can’t dream up an imaginative tale based on a child’s first-hand adventures or capture the authentic voice that emerges from lived experiences and cultural navigation.
Kids can achieve remarkable creative breakthroughs when they tap into their own experiences, especially as global citizens growing up between cultures. We’ve seen students blend their Asian heritage with their international school experiences in deeply personal and culturally specific ways, creating short stories, poems, and essays that reflect their unique personalities and perspectives.
5. Critical Thinking Skills Have Never Been More Important
In addition to creative thinking, critical thinking skills will become increasingly important as children navigate a tech-dominated world.
AI can follow patterns and aggregate and synthesize information at lightning speed. However, it lacks genuine critical thought: the ability to evaluate source credibility, construct original nuanced arguments, identify subtle bias, or draw deep and insightful conclusions that come from lived human experience.
This is why in our English language training, we go beyond traditional language learning to helping students analyze literature, societal events, and the human psychology behind them.
When students dissect the motivations behind a character’s actions in a novel, debate the reliability of different historical accounts, or examine the cultural assumptions embedded in texts, they develop the discernment that will be paramount in the AI era.
6. A New Generation of Global Citizens Will Require Cross-Cultural Navigation and Deep Language Understanding
Many of today’s children are global citizens who will benefit from the cultural fluency that comes from deep language study.
Through my own journey mastering Chinese, English, French, and Japanese, I’ve learned that each language opens unique ways of thinking about society, psychology, history, law, science, and other topics.
Our students come from diverse cultural backgrounds. However, they all have a common drive to understand people who are different and to become a bridge between communities.
As I often tell families, “Language learning is a cultural expedition.” When students develop multilingual and multicultural thinking through rigorous language study, they learn to become comfortable in different worlds, carrying the cultural intelligence that will define leadership in our interconnected future.
7. Verbal Intelligence Is a Cornerstone to Leading an Interesting Life
Perhaps most importantly, we want our children to lead interesting and enriching lives. In an age where AI can generate predictive, standardized responses to any query, individuals who can think originally, communicate persuasively, and connect authentically with others will stand apart as the leaders, innovators, and inspiring voices of tomorrow.
The students who grow through deep language programs become the kind of people others want to listen to, learn from, and follow. They will thrive in an AI-powered world not because they know how to use the latest tools, but because they know who they are, what they believe, and how to express their authentic selves with power and grace.
The Path Forward for Parents
The AI revolution will make it easier to translate words, research topics, and even generate ideas. However, rather than diminish the importance of deep English language skills, it will make them more essential than ever.
While machines can process language efficiently, only humans can truly live it, feel it, and use it to create rich and meaningful experiences.
Once your child experiences language learning through the lens of personal and cultural study instead of grammar lessons and vocabulary quizzes, they’ll move beyond the tedious homework assignment and enter a portal to a more fascinating world.
Cathy (Lei) Wu is the founder and director of Dragon Knight League Reading and Writing Studio (DKL).