Can AI help my child learn?

What this experience shows

1. Start with the goal

   A right answer is not always learning.

   Immediate performance and later unaided mastery are different outcomes.

   Physical focus: School

2. Change the help

   Answer, hint, and coaching are different tools.

   The design determines whether AI replaces student thinking or supports it.

   Physical focus: AI model

3. Keep the human

   AI can make a tutor more capable.

   Tutor CoPilot supported human tutors and reported a percentage-point mastery gain—not a replacement of the tutor.

   Physical focus: A person

Evidence connected to this pathway

1. randomized trial / Study context

   Students can perform better while AI is available yet learn less for later unaided work when assistance gives away answers; guardrails and tutor-like design can change the outcome.

   Students can perform better while AI is available yet learn less for later unaided work when assistance gives away answers; guardrails and tutor-like design can change the outcome.

   Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: Generative AI can harm learning when it gives away answersOECD: OECD Digital Education Outlook 2026
2. observational finding / United States

   Students whose human tutors had AI assistance were about four percentage points more likely to master a topic; gains reached about nine percentage points with lower-rated tutors.

   Students whose human tutors had AI assistance were about four percentage points more likely to master a topic; gains reached about nine percentage points with lower-rated tutors.

   Stanford National Student Support Accelerator: Tutor CoPilot: a human-AI approach for scaling real-time expertiseStanford SCALE: Tutor CoPilot publication

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