This is very interesting, I've been using LLM to learn new things that way and it really worked. To some extent, learning with LLM is better than taking any course, even with a tutor, as I am getting something prepared for me, in terms of my experience, progress level, etc.
LLM is going to change schools and universities a lot, teachers, tutors will have to find themselves in the new reality, as they have a strong competitor with infinite resources and huge knowledge, patient and ready to work with every student in a distinct way, according to student's needs, level, intelligence, etc.
Instruction-based tutoring is dead from that perspective, why should I follow someone reciting a book or online tutorial, while there is a tool that can introduce me into subject in a better and more interesting way?
Sure, there are great teachers, who are inspiring people, who are able to present the topic in a great way, the point is, they are minority. Now, everyone can have a great tutor for a few dollars a month (or for free, if you don't need generating too much data quickly).
pandatigox 26 minutes ago [-]
Sounds interesting, can you share some useful prompts for learning?
r_lee 11 minutes ago [-]
(not OP but..) I personally am not very into "prompting", you just need to figure out how these models work
it's best when you ask a well known problem/thing they can reference (vs. a niche way to solve exactly what you want to solve)
then you work backwards, I e. why is it like this, what is this for, what are the alternative ways to accomplish this etc...
it's a big query engine after all.
don't try to ask like "what is the exact right way" or etc. because it will try to generate that and likely hallucinate if there is no such answer in its training corpus.
instead ask what the model does know, or doesn't.
jeffbee 10 minutes ago [-]
LLMs aren't any of these things: infinite, knowledgable, patient, or ready. They are a compressed representation of all of the misstatements and misunderstandings in the history of Reddit. If you think you've been using LLMs to "learn new things" it could be because you aren't already familiar with the domain and you can't see where it's misleading you.
fragmede 13 minutes ago [-]
To some extent. I had Claude (Sonnet 4.5) generate some homework problems for students I was teaching to code, and the problem/answers weren't actually right. They were subtlety wrong, which makes me worry about using it for other subjects.
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LLM is going to change schools and universities a lot, teachers, tutors will have to find themselves in the new reality, as they have a strong competitor with infinite resources and huge knowledge, patient and ready to work with every student in a distinct way, according to student's needs, level, intelligence, etc.
Instruction-based tutoring is dead from that perspective, why should I follow someone reciting a book or online tutorial, while there is a tool that can introduce me into subject in a better and more interesting way?
Sure, there are great teachers, who are inspiring people, who are able to present the topic in a great way, the point is, they are minority. Now, everyone can have a great tutor for a few dollars a month (or for free, if you don't need generating too much data quickly).
it's best when you ask a well known problem/thing they can reference (vs. a niche way to solve exactly what you want to solve)
then you work backwards, I e. why is it like this, what is this for, what are the alternative ways to accomplish this etc...
it's a big query engine after all.
don't try to ask like "what is the exact right way" or etc. because it will try to generate that and likely hallucinate if there is no such answer in its training corpus.
instead ask what the model does know, or doesn't.