Introducing the new AI-driven personal tutor

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Until now, personal tutors have been available to relatively few students. Jacaranda discusses its launch of jacTUTOR, a personal tutor for Year 7–12 students, driven by GenAI

AI HAS exploded onto the scene in virtually every industry, and the opportunities in education are endless. From more personalised learning to tailored teacher support and development, AI tools have the potential to revolutionise the learning experience. Educational publisher Jacaranda has wasted no time in getting on board. Starting early in Term 3, 2024, it is rolling out the latest development in AI-driven learning – a personal tutor available through its popular learnON platform. Shirly Griffith, senior director at Jacaranda, says the organisation is “very excited” by this latest technology, which will help bridge gaps in the type of support that students are able to access.

Jacaranda is a leading educational publisher with footprints in almost every Australian school. Our high-quality teaching and learning resources have received numerous industry awards and are an integral part of almost every lesson in Australia. As the Australian School Division of Wiley, a global learning company, Jacaranda continues to grow and seek new ways to solve educational challenges for teachers and students.

“No matter how hard teachers work, they can’t provide one-on-one tuition to everyone who needs it. We need these [AI] tools to help teachers carry that load”

Shirly Griffith, Jacaranda

“This kind of support was only available to the more privileged students previously,” Griffith tells The Educator. “No matter how hard teachers work, they can’t provide one-on-one tuition to everyone who needs it. We need these tools to help teachers carry that load, which is why we wanted to lead the way in developing the space of personalised tuition.”

When it comes to AI, much of the initial conversation among educators has been focused on issues like safety and cheating concerns. However, Griffith notes that AI has also brought exciting opportunities around the democratisation of education, and the ability to get tailored, human-like responses to questions. learnON’s new jacTUTOR will first be available for mathematics lessons and will be launched with a series of preset prompts. According to Griffith, these prompts are based on the types of questions that students most commonly ask when they get stuck on a question.

“We find that sometimes, especially in a subject like maths, students don’t actually know what to ask,” she explains. “If you ask any maths teacher for the most common question or statement students make, they’ll say ‘I don’t even know what the question is asking’. So, one of our preset prompts is ‘Can you help me understand what the question is asking?’ We’re trying to encourage students to understand that it’s perfectly OK to ask that.”

The second preset prompt is “Can you help me get started?”, which is the next most common question from students. Another is “How do I know if my answer is correct?”, which is designed to encourage students to reflect on their work and catch potential errors. Students can also ask jacTUTOR to use simpler language, to rewrite a question, or to explain terminology. Griffith says the idea is to model “best practice thinking” around questions, and by the end of the year Jacaranda will make it possible for students to type in their own questions. Ultimately, the idea is to allow students to encounter struggles, ask questions and move forward with confidence.

While the AI tutor is a new concept for Jacaranda, its learnON platform is already being used by over 6,000 schools/campuses across Australia. The platform allows students and teachers to connect in virtual classrooms and progress through bite-sized lessons that are mapped around the curriculum. learnON has already garnered positive feedback for its high level of personalisation, which allows students to access information in the way that works best for them – whether that’s descriptive language, videos or interactive exercises. Griffith explains that the key aim is to give students a level of consistency and security in what they’re learning, as external or ‘generic’ sources can often introduce confusion rather than clarity.

“Let’s say a student is studying mathematics and they need to get to a level of security in a particular method,” she says. “Teachers typically stick to the same method until students have fully understood the concept, before they introduce alternatives. Students rely on that certainty and consistency, and so schools will need to be careful that the tools they’re using make them feel that they can succeed and take next steps in their learning.” This consistency is where the learnON platform really shines. As a student moves through a course, the platform is aware of what the student is studying at that moment in time, where they are in the curriculum, and where exactly they’re stuck. This brings a new level of context awareness to its AI tools, which is beyond what an ‘out of the box’ solution can offer. All answers given through learnON are then carefully graded, and students are provided with individualised feedback. This is a bonus for teachers too, as they can clearly see points of weakness or areas they may need to re-teach. “This personalisation also ensures that the responses that students are getting are age-appropriate,” Griffith adds. “For example, a response for a Year 7 student will be written differently compared to a response for a student in Years 10 to 12.” For Jacaranda, the jacTUTOR tool is only step one. The platform will continue to build out its capabilities over the coming year; however, the introduction of a personal tutor is already a hugely exciting step forward in education. “A relatively small percentage of students can afford human tutors, so we’re very keen to use this powerful technology to correct that imbalance,” Griffith concludes. “We feel that the future use of AI in education will only be limited by people’s imagination. There’s no getting away from it – all of us now benefit from AI tools in our work and outside of it. More sophisticated AI coming into the education sphere has huge potential and has to be embraced.” To find out more about the learnON platform and jacTUTOR, click here.

Students studying in front of a computer

Encouraging students to ask questions

A new level of personalisation

Published 22 Jul 2024

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“We feel that the future use of AI in education will only be limited by people’s imagination. More sophisticated AI coming into the education sphere has huge potential and has to be embraced”

Shirly Griffith, Jacaranda

“Every student should get stuck!” Griffith says. “Learning should be a constant striving and stepping forward. When students do encounter those struggles, the instant feedback helps them to move forward and have a sense of confidence. “On top of that, students will now be able to have this human-like interaction where they can get further clarification and explanations.”

schools and campuses

6,086

teachers

250,262

students

1,828,944

learnON user numbers to date

Instant grading and feedback

Adapted to different learning styles

Teacher support

Real-time data and reports

Key features of learnON platform