It's one click to set up a Debian environment on a Chromebook. Same on an Android phone. You can learn plenty from that. Once you've learned the limits of what you can learn within that environment, it's not difficult to then unlock the bootloader and learn even more.
To be honest, anytime I see someone recommending how easy it is to install Debian I always feel like they’re some relic from the nineties. Kids likely won’t follow any advice starting with “install Debian”.