Invasion of the Main Model Tutors

Like many fields, Artificial Intelligence is marked by companies aggressively copycatting each other. For market monopolization, each company aims to position itself as the answer to everything for consumers in business, education, and personal life. These companies also recognize the engineering overlap in many products and work to roll out front-facing features. This is seen with Apple copying the most popular apps/features, Google copying iOS, and $1 ChatGPT for the government, et al. Now it's tutoring's turn.

AI Generated.

Google has long sought to distribute tech to children and teens with the benefit of locking them as they become adult consumers. Their release of Gemini to Google Classroom is a great example of this. ChatGPT and Anthropic (Claude) have likewise distributed their model in partnerships with institutions and nations. Critics rightly point out that distributing a model is distributing a plagiarism machine that has the chance to tutor. Well, this week OpenAI unveiled its tutor module and yesterday Google unveiled its own version. (I wonder how Sal Khan feels about this scooping?)

OpenAI's ChatGPT now offers "Study Mode" - toggled from the dropdown menu. Modelled on Socratic questioning, Study Mode also offers quick checks for understanding and is focused on a quick dialogue. In my experience it does a fine job for quick dialogue. The biggest problem remains that access to ChatGPT isn't access to tutoring, but access to generative AI with the option to select tutoring.

From ChatGPT's Study Mode.

Google's model is actually not Gemini directly but a differently created model called "Guided Learning" which is built as a Socratic tutor with the added ability to draw from Google Images, YouTube, and AI Generators to add multimedia to build understanding of complex topics. Guided Learning is part of a student offer* for one-year of the "AI Pro Plan" - which offers this and more (Deep Research, NotebookLM, Veo3, and Jules access).

I have not had access but Dan Fitzpatrick says: "In a similar way, Google’s Guided Learning will help you understand, if you want to understand. Guided Learning starts a conversation, guiding the student through a process of discovery. It’s a direct response to the deepest fear educators have about AI. Outsourcing thinking. Google is making a bet that by focusing on the process rather than the product, it can position itself as a genuine partner in learning."

ChatGPT generated.

Approaching this from a principal perspective - I'm curious to see how Guided Learning is expanded to the high, middle, and elementary school markets and its integration with future Google Classroom. Done right, with proper data protections and cross-curricular protections, we might see a true Diamond Age Primer. The ultimate questions remain cost, proper guidelines and rails, and interaction with teachers, parents, and students.

*Interesting terms - 18 and older, Brazil, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, or US, school email, subject to automatic renewal at a price of $20/month.