Family Link can’t stop Gemini from doing your kid’s homework, but 5 settings make it harder

Now it’s a chatbot that will happily solve a calculus problem line by line from an image. I find that thrilling and a little terrifying in about equal measure.

Gemini can be a great research tool. It can also become the thing doing the thinking. If your child uses an Android phone, Google Family Link gives you decent control over how they use AI.

One caveat up front. If you live in the European Economic Area, Switzerland, or the UK, Google blocks supervised accounts from Gemini.

For everyone else, these are the five settings I’d lock in before Gemini becomes part of homework time.

Decide whether Gemini is on at all

The default depends on your kid’s age

Family Link has a toggle that grants or revokes Gemini access. It’s all or nothing.

That’s annoying if you only want to pause AI during school hours (a time schedule under screen time gets you most of the way there), but it’s still your strongest baseline against unsupervised use.

Where that toggle starts depends on your kid’s age. If your child is under 13, Gemini stays off until you turn it on. Google also doesn’t make the Keep Activity setting available for that age group.

Teens 13 and older on supervised accounts get Gemini’s teen experience by default unless you switch it off.

So if you have a teenager, assume it’s on. To find the control, open Family Link > Controls > Gemini. On the next screen, tap Gemini Apps to switch access on or off.

Put a hard stop on the whole phone first

Daily limits and downtime come before AI rules

Before I worry about chatbots, I make sure the device has an off switch. Unlimited phone access can turn a 20-minute assignment into a two-hour detour. That happens with or without AI.

Start with a daily cap. Open Family Link > Screen time. Under Time limits, turn on the Daily limit, which caps total device use across every app on the phone.

Then set a bedtime. Go back to Screen time, tap Schedules, and choose Downtime.

With a schedule in place, Gemini and the rest of the non-essential apps go dark at lights-out, whether the essay is finished or not.

Yes, that includes the essay due tomorrow morning, so communicate with your child first.

Give the Gemini app its own timer

App limits are the closest thing to an AI cap

Maybe you’re fine with a focused 30-minute study session in Gemini, and no more. Family Link’s standard App limits feature can handle that.

Open Family Link > Screen time > Time limits. Tap App limits to see everything installed on your child’s device.

Find Gemini in the list, tap Set limit, and choose the duration. After the timer runs out, Android pauses the app and blocks any more prompts for the rest of the day.

App limits apply only to the Gemini app. Gemini can also pop up as an overlay through the Google app that may slip past an app limit set on the Gemini app.

Google looks to be working on a Gemini-only timer, though (more on that below).

A Gemini-only timer may be on the way

It’s a teardown, so don’t plan around it

Everything above works today. What follows doesn’t exist yet, and it might never. Still, I thought it was worth mentioning.

In a November 2, 2026, report, Android Authority published a teardown suggesting Google is building a daily time limit specifically for Gemini on supervised accounts.

The code strings turned up in Google app version 17.72.13.sa.arm64.

The unreleased code includes snackbar messages that read “Your parent set a daily time limit for Gemini” and “Your daily Gemini time limit changed.”

If a kid burns through the allowance, a lockout screen reads “You’ve reached your daily limit for Gemini,” and tells them when Gemini will be ready again.

I know that sounds a lot like the App limits timer that I mentioned above. Whether it’s different comes down to one question. Does it cover every place Gemini is integrated or just the app?

Nobody knows yet. My guess is it’s meant to go wider, since the new code appeared in the Google app and not the standalone Gemini app. But we have to wait and see.

Make every new app go through you

Close the side door in Google Play

Turning off Gemini doesn’t do much if your kid can open the Play Store and grab ChatGPT or another AI tool.

Not every AI app in the Play Store respects the protections Google built into supervised accounts.

Lock down installs to plug that hole. Open Family Link > Controls > Google Play. Look under Purchases & download approvals.

Tap Require approval for and set it to All content. From then on, your child has to send you a request before installing anything new.

It won’t affect apps already on the phone, so scroll through the installed list in Family Link while you’re there.

It’s better to supervise the habit and not the app

Family Link can decide when Gemini is available, but it can’t tell you whether your kid is learning or copying.

So sit in on a few homework sessions. Look at the prompts they write. Ask them to explain an answer back in their own words.

If they can, Gemini is probably helping. If they can’t, tighten the limits and retry. It also helps to guide them to prompts that keep the thinking on their side.

Asking Gemini to quiz them on their notes or check an essay against the rubric is different from asking it to write the essay.

I covered a few of those habits in my Gemini study tricks for students. The same principle applies to younger kids.