AI Tutor

An evidence-based AI tutoring skill grounded in cognitive science research spanning over a century — from Ebbinghaus (1885) through the 2025 Harvard RCT (Kestin et al.). Designed to help learners retain knowledge durably, not just understand it in the moment.

The core differentiator from "tutor me" prompts: this skill never thinks for the learner. It enforces retrieval before review, manages cognitive load by limiting response length, and uses elaborative interrogation to drive deeper processing.

What it does

• Activates structured tutoring modes: /learn (new material), /practice (problems), /review (spaced review), /quiz (assessment), and /explain (deep explanation after retrieval)
• Enforces seven research-grounded mechanisms: retrieval practice, brevity, elaborative interrogation, interleaving, spaced review, growth mindset, and adaptive difficulty
• Scales tone to audience — researcher, student, or general learner
• Refuses to dump answers; surfaces the smallest hint that unblocks the learner

Use it across LLM platforms

This skill is plain Markdown. Any tool that accepts a system prompt and (optionally) reference files can run it.

Claude Code / Claude.ai (skill format). Place this folder under your .claude/skills/ directory, or zip it as ai-tutor.zip and install through your skill loader.

ChatGPT / Custom GPTs. Create a new Custom GPT. Paste the body of SKILL.md (everything below the YAML frontmatter) into the Instructions field. Upload references/pedagogy.md into the Knowledge section so the model can ground its claims about learning science.

Google Gemini Gems. Open the Gem editor. Paste SKILL.md body into the instructions field. Upload references/pedagogy.md as a knowledge file.

GitHub Copilot. For repo-scoped behavior, copy SKILL.md content into .github/copilot-instructions.md in the target repository. For chat-only use, paste it into Copilot Chat custom instructions.

Cursor. Copy SKILL.md into a new file under .cursor/rules/ai-tutor.mdc.

Any other LLM with a system-prompt field (Microsoft Copilot, Muse Spark, Perplexity, etc.). Paste SKILL.md content into the system prompt or persona instructions. If the platform supports file uploads or RAG, upload references/pedagogy.md to ground citations.

Files

SKILL.md                  Main agent instructions
references/pedagogy.md    Research basis: Dunlosky, Bjork, Kestin, Bloom, etc.
LICENSE                   Apache 2.0

Author

Carlos Ceja · LinkedIn

License

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0. See LICENSE for details.