Asking about a lesson

It sits closed at the very bottom of the lesson, past all the work. It knows which lesson you are on, so you do not have to explain the topic. It knows that lesson and nothing else: not your child, not their work, not the rest of the course.

Before you type, it offers a few questions to tap. Good ones to ask:

1. “My child keeps getting this wrong the same way — what am I not explaining well?”
2. “Why does this method work?” — when you can do the sum but cannot say why.
3. “What should they know before this lesson?” — when a lesson seems to be landing on nothing.
4. “Another way to explain this?” — when the lesson’s way is not the way your child thinks.

You do not need to be able to do the math yourself to ask any of those. That is rather the point of it.

1. Sign in, and open any lesson.
2. Scroll to the bottom and tap Stuck? Ask about this lesson to open the box.
3. Type your question, or tap one of the suggestions. Up to 600 characters — a short paragraph. A counter shows how many are left.
4. Tap Ask. The answer appears underneath, with two follow-up questions you can tap under Ask next.

Inside a lesson, a child sees a tab at the right edge of the page with a face on it, marked How can I help you? It opens Stuck? Ask for a hint. They type where they are stuck, or tap a suggestion, and tap Get a hint.

1. It never gives the answer. It asks a guiding question back, using the lesson’s own words, from a copy of the lesson with the answers taken out.
2. It is on for every child unless you turn it off. The first time you sign in with hints on, a notice asks you once to Keep on or Turn off.
3. The switch is per child. Tap your name at the top right, then Your account, and find Hints for kids. Each child has an On / Off button.

If a child’s hints are off, there is no tab on their lessons, and the grown-ups’ box at the foot says where the switch is.

The home page has the same tab, How can I help you? It answers questions about Cogito itself: how to start, where a setting is, which lesson teaches something. It works signed in or signed out.

1. It does not remember. Each question stands on its own. You cannot ask “and what about the next one?” and have it know what you meant — say the whole question each time.
2. It cannot see your child’s work. It is given the question, the text of that one lesson, and which question on the page was tried last. Not your name, not your child’s name, and nothing else they have done in the app.
3. It is not a person. It is written by AI and can be confidently wrong. If an answer does not match the lesson in front of you, trust the lesson.

What is typed is sent, with the lesson, to Anthropic, the company whose model writes the reply. Cogito does not store the questions or the answers. It keeps a note that a question was asked: when, on which lesson, by which learner, and whether it was answered. You can see that on the family page.

If something typed sounds like a child may not be safe, the helper does not answer. It shows a message a person wrote, about telling a grown-up and where to find help, and the family page tells you it happened.

Around 25 questions a day for the whole family, and around 15 hints a day for each child. That is generous for its purpose — it is for the moments when someone is stuck, not something to work through a chapter with.

If you reach the limit it says so, and it resets the next day. Nothing else stops working.

Until December 31, 2026, everyone who is signed in gets the lesson helper and the hints, in full. Signed out, the box at the foot of the lesson does not appear.

The membership chapter covers the rest.