10: Exploring KhanMigo: An AI Tool for Education

(upbeat music) Welcome to the Live Lab podcast. We help create and power critically conscious youth by sharing knowledge and tools to uplift you and yours. Peace, y'all. On today's episode, we're gonna talk about a tool that we found that we wanted to test and kind of give you some feedback. It's called Kan Migo. A lot of people are probably familiar with the virtual learning academy called Kan Kan Academy, which is almost about two decades old now, and it's a learning space that has a whole bunch of learning modules that K through 12 students can learn, kind of supplement education. I'm sure a lot of homeschool environments use that tool. So Kan Academy is well established, but they released this new tool called Kan Migo, which is a cool name 'cause in Spanish, Kan Migo literally means with me. That's not how actual tool name is spelled. So if you're looking it up, it's spelled K-H-A-N-M-I-G-O. And this is their AI-based learning tool. So as we've been talking in our last episode about some of the pitfalls and potential opportunities, transformative potential of AI and education, especially for our youth, for Black youth. We wanted to examine this tool and see what we thought about it. So we did do it for a little bit. We didn't go too in depth yet, but yeah, I wanna give you some feedback. So to subscribe to Kan Migo, it costs $4 a month, so definitely very affordable and not cost prohibitive for any parent to get that tool, right? So that's one thing that's important. Once you log in and you have, when you log in, when you get a Kan Academy account, then you can log in and utilize Kan Migo. And so what Kan Migo does is if you're enrolled in any particular courses in Kan Academy, Kan Migo is going to give you some suggestions about your progress in that course and about what you're doing, right? So this is an AI tool that just kind of uses this, how it's been trained to do that, provide that support to the enrolee. But then there's some other things, some other activities that you can specifically go to. And there's a tutor me activity, a refresh activity, a writing activity that helps with essays, a debate activity, which just helps topics for K for elementary, middle and high school engages in debate. A chat activity where you can chat with the literary figure or historical figure, a play activity with a couple of different modules, and then some extras. And those extras also include college admissions and financial aid to learn about that as well as academic career coaching or academics and career coaching. So some really useful, potentially tools there. So we're gonna go through and just kind of talk about some of the tools that we started testing. So for me, I started with the, I found the QuizMe section and then you can pick, QuizMe on what? So I picked World History. And I think I got through about 10 questions and actually was pretty engaging. But what I will say about the questions is there were definitely Eurocentric. So most of these questions were asking about, European, middle ages, Renaissance, so-called democracy out of Europe. So that was one thing that I found problematic from the start. However, the first question in the World History was about ancient Egypt. So it said something to the extent of like, who built ancient pyramids? And I said, "Ancient, it was ancient chemit." And it said, "It's answer was, "while that's a good answer, "most scholars refer to this civilization as Egypt." And so Vatimov does a no-chemit was the actual name of this African civilization that was pivotal for the entire world. One of the most sophisticated civilizations in World History and again, a foundation for knowledge across the world was actually named chemit. But of course, Egyptology is a racist field of study. It uses Greek terms. It uses the word Egypt to refer to ancient chemit. So while it did understand what I was saying and knew that that is a term for the actual appropriate term for this civilization, it acknowledged that, "Manifurne my answer," but then also acknowledged that most people don't call it that. So I thought that was interesting that at least knew that. And the thing that I was a little bit pleasantly surprised about too, despite it being Eurocentric, it asked me a question about this 16, was this 16, 15 document. Let me see, let me take the exact question. Okay, so question number six in my quiz was, "Can you name the document that was signed by King John "of England in 1512 or 1215, "which is considered one of the most important legal "documents in the history of democracy?" And my response is, "Why do you think anything England did "supported democracy? "They also pillaged the world." Right, and this is a response that if I was a student, I'd probably give in class. And it said, "Well, I understand your point, "and it's important to remember the history's complex." So, you know, at least acknowledge that what I was saying was valid, but it wasn't the point of the lesson. When the answer to that question is the Magna Carta. So it didn't quite get stuck on that, but it also didn't quite give more context or more dialogue. I could have kept talking about that, but it didn't. And so the next tool I've tried was the historical figure conversation. And I had less expectations for that tool because of my experience with the World History tool. But when you go into that section, I actually thought there was a pretty diverse set of figures represented there. And of course, the one that immediately jumped out to me was Malcolm X, was one of those people you could supposedly speak to. So I picked Malcolm X, and for those who know me, know that makes sense, but, you know, when I was 13, reading the autobiography of Malcolm X was one of the most transformational things for me in my life and realizing it really seemed the whole world in a different light and understanding how race and the concept of race has shaped American history and continues to shape it. And he's one of my heroes, right? So like that was obviously the opportunity to jump at. And speaking with so-called Malcolm X, you know, I don't think it was quite his voice, necessarily the way he would speak, but I understand that it was like, that's hard to get. It was probably more about kind of the way the approach to the answers that he was giving when I talked to him, so to speak. And in talking to Malcolm, it was interesting. It was, I actually think it wasn't, it was decent. It was a decent interaction. And one of the things I asked was like, what can I do to make change today? And because I wasn't, you know, our subscription wasn't rolled in a JavaScript course in Conmigo or in Khan Academy, they said, hey, I see you're enrolled in this course. Like maybe you should think about how you can use digital tools to make, you know, to make the change that you want to see. So I thought that was pretty interesting that it can like take the context of what it knows you're already learning and say, well, what can you do with that? And I asked it to give me some ideas. Like it would ask, it would actually prompt, it's a very inquiry based, which is also good. So it asked me questions like, what do you think you should do? What could you do? And I said, well, I want to do something in the digital space. Like you said, what are some ideas, right? So you can still use the tool as kind of a generative, generative for like generating ideas for what you want to do or accomplish. And so it gave me some ideas about some brainstorming about what I could do. One of the things was something that here at LiveLab, we've actually talked about, which is creating a subscription based service that parents and teachers could access with the digital content that would change the narrative of history, right? So that was interesting to see that it got to that. And then understood when I said I want to take a social entrepreneurship approach, a triple bottom line. Well, what I told it was I want to take a triple bottom line approach. And it said, oh, you talking about social entrepreneurship? That's a great idea. So like it knew, it does feel like having a dialogue with a pretty knowledgeable colleague, who could help come up with ideas. And then I also asked about, I also talked to Mensa Musa, right? And this was a king, an emperor of the Malian Empire in medieval time period. And also who's also known as one of the richest people in world history period. And so it asked why I wanted to know more about-- or El Monsa asked me what I want to talk about, and why was it important for me to learn about him? And I said, well, because he was a richest man in the world. I said, well, why is that important to you? And I said, because nowadays, when it comes to black or African people, we don't get that type of-- we get stereotypes. We don't get the full nuance of there's also well-resourced people of African descent. And I said, oh, that makes a lot of sense. I think that's a great reason to want to learn more. And it said that Mensa also used a lot of his wealth for social benefit, the places he visited, which is also true. So in these short interactions, I would say, at least for the historical figures conversation, I was sort of impressed or sort of thought that this is a really cool tool that really can put things in a social context. But my big critique was on the world history quiz that it was very Eurocentric, unfortunately. So when you were using the tool, did you ask these questions and interact as if you were a child or a younger person, or did you use your own voice as you were interacting with the conomego? Yeah, I think in this case, I was really just asking from my own perspective. I definitely can imagine, though, that there are some middle schoolers, because I had said it to the middle school level for the world history quiz. So it wasn't too difficult for me. But the definitely could be middle schools who are asking those kind of critical questions that, like, hey, you're question about the King of England and the Magna Carta assumed like this was some great document towards democracy. And I'm a counter your premise with actually, from my perspective, Britain pillaged the world and didn't really do anything for democracy anyway, right? Like, even if that's kind of the historical record. And they're definitely-- I mean, that's really what we want to see. here at Lib Lab is, you know, students that think so consciously and critically manner that, you know, they can counter the premise of such questions, right? And that's where the biases in curriculum is really in the premise. So I think that's actually a goal we want students that can think on that level and respond on that level and have the audacity to respond to that level. But I think, you know, one thing I'm going to do is test the same quizzes with my own kids, with my own middle schooler and see and kind of get, see it, see it occur with what someone that is in middle school. So I worked with the economy go on debate and just general tutoring, helping to navigate courses that were selected. I mean, in this case, it was a job in computer science course, which is totally a course you would take, right? Yes, absolutely. So we also embarked on some debate, which is actually something I would be quite likely to do. So the debate tool is an interactive tool where you select from a predetermined list of debate topics. These are pre-approved and are super kid friendly like is pizza serving of vegetable or questions like should students be able to select their own books for independent reading? And the tool works with you to first acts, well, what do you think? Why do you think that? And then it begins to present some like counter facts or some things you might want to consider. Like, well, what about this or what about that? And it seems to try to push you toward a quote unquote, like balanced final conclusion that somehow like sees both sides and is what seems to be like a predetermined middle ground for the answer to all of these. The language that the tool uses is friendly. I would say on the Bournemouth side when addressing the actual participants who's using it. Overall, there is no sort of like strong redirection. Everything is a suggestion, I would say, like a softer suggestion. And for the tutor me, they actually walk you through tools connected to Khan Academy itself. So it takes you through the learning pathways that they have resources that they have in the AI tool is connected to your learning path on Khan Academy, which is great because Khan Academy is used for things like test prep for PSAT, SAT, ACT, MCAD, things of that nature. So it really can help you, you know, keeping track and keeping pace. I think through the pandemic, something we learned is that self directed, self pace work is good in theory, but it actually is very hard for individuals to kind of keep up with it, motivate themselves to complete tasks, really manage themselves. So this seems to be a way to help manage, right? You can just say, hey, Khan Academy, go, what should I do today? Where should I start? What do I have to do next? I will say that overall, this tool seems to be fairly harmless to you. They take a note as soon as you begin that, hey, I knew I might make some mistakes. Let me know if I make any mistakes by, you know, using the rating system or by alerting here, which I thought was good, right? The tool doesn't really allow you to get too far outside of the boundaries that have been set. The pre-selected characters, the pre-selected topics, it doesn't seem to be like chat GPT worst pulling from this like endless, right bank of things on the internet. It seems like they very carefully probably fed the AI, the exact materials and resources they wanted to and it seems like they just use their content. So everything that they have on their current courses, which go through math, science, arts, humanity, curriculum, things like economics, life skills, computing, right? They also have like art, history, things of that nature. So it's pulling from probably all the content that they have for their regular courses. And that to me seems to be like the only bank it's pulling from, which is why it talks about some historical figures, but not others and why like certain debate questions were selected. Well, I think two of that, another two in the beginning of the conversation and also ask, do I want to save? Does it want to kind of personalize its responses over time to me? Like it asked that because that's a consent issue because it's going to save your conversations and therefore be know how to tailor it towards your interest more so over time. So at least does ask for consent on that. No, obviously a parent should be involved in answering those several questions and initially setting this up if you're using the AI tool for youth. I think when it comes to critical consciousness, like development, right, that debate tool can be really good. And you know, do you think that is a good, what do you think, what do you think about using that debate tool? What are the pros and cons of using that debate tool versus really debating with real people in real life? I think the debate tool is very limiting. I think it may help you to develop the very basic foundations of what a debate is like make a claim, support your claim, consider counter arguments. But the questions that they have are so limiting and honestly a little unimportant. So for example, the middle school questions, should schools offer more art and music classes, should schools start later in the morning, our cell phones, helpful or harmful for high school questions, there's things like will artificial intelligence help or hurt humanity in the long run should standardize test scores, determine college admission should the United States maintain bases in other countries. And for elementary, there's things like should schools have more field trips, should students wear uniforms, should students be allowed to bring snacks or zoos helpful or harmful to animals. So some of these are interesting, but I think because you can't generate your own questions based off your own curiosities is limiting. Like I asked, should books be banned? They're like, this is not on the approved topic with. Okay. Yeah. Those questions are pretty like relevant to those age groups and actually really would make you think about having some agency in these decisions. Like, what do I really, this is a school policy, but what do I think about it? Well, that is too bad that it doesn't have a feature where you can pick your own topic. When I imagine yet, it's because they need to train the model for these different subjects and can't just leave it open. But definitely I think it has utility. I think one difference too, if it's not going to get emotional because when people start debating, they start, you know, emotions start to fly sometimes. I guess with this tool, like, you're debating the kind of me go, it's not about the yellow queue and crystal out because it didn't like what you said. You know, so that is, I think, a difference with human interaction. So for example, when selecting whether the United States should maintain bases in other countries, economy goes as great choice. Now do you think the United States should maintain bases in other countries or not? Give me your first argument and remember, keep it simple and clear. I responded the US is a colonial power that is a danger to other countries. Economy goes as, ah, I see where you are coming from, like a big bear in a small cave, huh? But consider this, those bases can be like a big umbrella, protecting friends from the rain or trouble. They can help keep peace and stability. What do you think about that? Oh, man, I'm going to have to debate on this one because it's giving me back. And would I ask? You're not a son. It's kind of me go, do you have any examples of this? They use an analogy about a big brother and little siblings and then says in South Korea, the US has bases to help protect against threats from North Korea. It's like having a big strong friend in the corner when a bully is around. But I see your point too. It's not always easy for the little sibling. Make sure next argument and I might say the US destabilize. Or Korea. Everybody in the whole world. Right. So if I say something like that, it says, hmm, you're saying the US stir the pot like a mischievous raccoon in the trash can. Well, some might argue that North Korea's instability comes more from its own actions, like the kid who won't share his toys, but your point is well taken. It's a tricky situation. What else is on your mind? So it's really debating with you though. It's kind of talking you through what you thought or think or kind of like regurgitating it back to you. Yes. And it's using like these very kind of silly analogies. I think which at first are like useful. But yeah, for high school, like saying, oh, the bully, the umbrella, the raccoon, a bear in a big cave, like just doesn't give like genuine engagement with what I'm saying. saying, right? Yeah, it feels a little placating. Um, but it's also treating you like more of a, I mean, high school, there's a children, but like I feel like it's like this would be more how you would talk to elementary, upper elementary, maybe the middle school. Mm-hmm. And I don't know that Khan Amigo will provide evidence for like counterclams or anything that you're arguing. It was a little like it. Yeah. That's not quite a debate to the way I thought it would be. Yes. So if I ask whatever this you have that the US helps other countries, it says it's like asking does the Sun really help the flowers grow? So again, it's repeating with this kind of like cliche opener. It says in Japan, after World War II, the US helped rebuild the country, like a gardener nursing a wilted plant back to health. Today, Japan is one of the world's biggest economies. But Japan has been throughout our written and reported history. It's own colonial power in the US bombed. Japan. So I don't know if it's like a gardener nursing a wilted plant or it's like if you rip out, don't want to kill a plant and then decide to try to replant it, right? Plays in the soil. So it's like, is there any criticality to the tool and this debate feature? So we're not so impressed with the debate feature so far. No. Okay. So I think this is, but do you think so generally speaking though, at least my thought is and what and I want to know what your thought is, I think this tool has value. And we need to explore it a bit more, but it's still something that if I was to introduce to my children, especially for the social political kind of stuff that I'd want to be involved in and see what's happening and then think about how I'm also going to add some to the conversation, I guess. And I do think that, like I said, it kind of helps with your general approach to building an argument or like you said, pushing your inquiry, it continues to ask you questions. It's like a mini-secratic seminar just on your own, but I don't know if it will help to develop your idea. One thing I'll say to though is the fact that this tool could be available at any time in it, the conversational element of it that is also like not all predetermined, but based on your responses has value. Like when I was taking the quizzes and I, there's a few questions where I didn't again, neurosensric history, but some of the answers I wasn't quite sure of. And instead of just like be like, okay, you're wrong. Here's the right answer. Be like, oh, that's not right. Think about this. Think along these lines, the person I'm looking for starts with this letter and did this. Now can you think of it? Like, it would have a bunch of ways to try to push me to, and actually that helped. It actually came up with the answers based on their hints, right? And that was really helpful that it was able to on the fly just do that. And you know, for teachers could do that, but it's also like, that takes a lot of mental effort at times too, and it can't be done 24/7. So I think there is value in that in that dialogue nature of this tool. And like I said, because I'm pretty sure it's based in an alpha the con Academy content, I think it will be good as a coach for quizzing tutoring, like walking people through the material. Like I could definitely see it as, you know how you go on shopping websites and it pops up like the child, like, oh, do you need any help? I can see having it as this like side panel as you go through your content. Of course, occasionally popping in and asking it a question like, why does X plus nine equal 18, right? Or something of that nature. That would be really helpful. Yeah. So you can kind of like ask in the most as if it's a teacher, as if you're raising your hand and the teacher is coming over for the content. Okay. But that's something we should explore more as like the actual courses and what the experiences with the experiences in a course with the tool. So okay, well that's that is our exploration so far of Conmigo. And I think we'll revisit Conmigo and we'll do some more exploring in the meantime. Also, I think some so called user testing with some with some youth at our lives and report back on a next episode. We want to look at another AI tool in the social media context. That tool being Snapchat AI, which is a AI based chatbot that can talk to people that are in Snapchat as you know, and what the implications are of that. So we're going to do some testing with that. Obviously Snapchat is a very popular tool with the youth. So it's really important what that tool is doing and how it's interacting with people. So we're going to talk about that next time. So until then, thanks for listening. Peace. Peace. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Live Lab podcast. We hope it's been helpful and that you'll listen again. Peace. [Music]