A new AI-powered tutoring tool, Codio Coach, is making headlines with a bold claim: Improving student grades by up to 15% using a method inspired by Socrates, the 2,400-year-old Greek philosopher.
Developed using Anthropic's CLOUD language model, Codio Coach doesn't give students the answers - instead, it guides them through the questions, encouraging critical thinking in a modern twist on the classic Socratic method.
According to internal research by Codio, involving 1,800 students in 39 computer science courses between January 2023 and December 2024, learners who used the tool saw a 12% increase in average scores and a 15% increase in average grades. Completion rates also doubled in some cases, but only within Codio's integrated system.
Despite these promising numbers, experts remain skeptical. The results come from controlled settings, and it's unclear whether the same improvements would hold up in traditional classroom environments. Critics also warn that while AI can boost performance in the short term, it may not always lead to deeper learning in the long term.