My first exposure was in the 6th grade, around 1969 or so, we took a field trip to a local university with a computer. They set up a terminal to run the fox-chicken-corn puzzle, so each student got to try to solve it once. I kept wondering how a machine understood things about animals and vegatables. I retired in 2021 after 40 years as a programmer. Never underestimate a good introduction to a subject for a kid.