In the past few days, ChatGPT has unveiled its “Study Mode,” which is supposed to guide students to learning instead of just giving them the answers, and Google has announced its “Guided Learning,” which is supposed to do the same thing.

I was actually impressed with how ChatGPT could help English Language Learners (a screenshot of part of the “conversation” is at the top of this post. It immediately began to use the home language of Spanish to help teach, and I was able to use audio and my microphone for the session.

I’m not entirely sure, though, if I actually needed to go into Study Mode to get it to do this – I suspect the regular ChatGPT might do just the same.

Google’s Guided Learning, on the other hand, was pretty useless. It’s use of Spanish to help teach English was extremely minimal, and it has no audio capabilities.

That’s a bit disappointing, especially since they had an AI hit earlier this week (see Google Has Often Failed At AI, But They Have Hit It Out Of The Park – For ELLs, At Least – With New “Storybook”).

For most other English-proficient students, and for many ELLs who are given writing assignments to complete at home, however, it seems to me these modes are meaningless.  How many are really going to choose to use them when they can just use the regular mode to get he answers? I think these AI tools can work particularly well for ELLs who are highly motivated to develop speaking and listening skills (see Does Advanced Tech Mean That Secondary ELL Classes Should Be Radically Restructured?