AI Math Tutor Review: Vice Principal Neil Almond’s Independent Assessment
Neil Almond is a respected principal and elementary school expert working with the STEP ahead teaching school hub. He’s also an experienced math teacher who is now championing the strategic use of AI in schools.
We asked Neil to independently trial Skye, our spoken AI math tutor, and share his thoughts on the pedagogy, usefulness, and real-world application.
Neil tested Skye’s Standardized test prep for upper elementary students Review Program , over several two weeks in March 2025. Since then, not only have we implemented some of his recommendations, but we’ve also added standard elementary math programs for 3rd, 4th and 5th Grade , and our series of high school math programs.
Here’s Neil’s independent assessment of the AI tutor Skye:
Over the past two weeks, I’ve had the opportunity to test out Skye, Third Space Learning’s new AI math tutor, designed to support elementary math learners – and high school students from September. I was placed on a Standardized Test Review Program — a timely addition for my 5th Grade teacher toolkit. Having spent time exploring the platform, here are my reflections on the usability, pedagogy, and potential of this early iteration.
Why we built Skye:
Traditional tutoring only reaches a few students due to cost and capacity constraints. Moving from traditional to AI tutoring models helps schools scale one-to-one tutoring. Our spoken AI math
tutoring uses more than 10 years of tutoring experience to help schools provide one-to-one support for every student who needs it, not just those the budget allows. Every lesson has been designed and tested by qualified teachers and math experts, and we’ve included some of their responses to Neil’s review below.
Interface and usability
Skye’s interface is clean and uncluttered, a refreshing contrast to the often overstimulating design of other edtech tools.
Cognitive load has been clearly considered: color, cursor movement, and dynamic input fields direct attention purposefully. The answer box appears only when relevant, encouraging students to attend to each step rather than race ahead.
Human expertise in the AI loop is important to effective tutoring with Skye. Every AI tutoring lesson slide is created specifically to manage cognitive load. The pictorial elements are designed to match the instructions from Skye. Then the blur functions and visual scaffolding are used to focus attention on just the relevant information for that stage of the lesson.
The AI math tutoring onboarding experience lasts around 7–8 minutes and is deliberately paced. Students are introduced to the voice input system — which works surprisingly well — and guided through how to interact with the platform. It builds rapport with return questions and conversational responses. Importantly, it avoids the trap of mimicking a human teacher — a wise decision.
I was asked to complete an initial assessment, although being placed directly on the Standardized Test Review Course meant I wasn’t best positioned to judge its accuracy or impact on what the system offered.
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Throughout my period of testing, an unusual design choice was made that, despite being entirely AI-driven, Skye sessions must still be booked in advance. This could only be done Monday–Friday and only between set hours.
However, since my testing period has come to an end, students are now able to launch a Skye session on demand on any day of the week they choose.
This is a win-win. Teachers can set sessions for homework, or parents can encourage its use at home.
How schools use this: As Neil says, we’ve since amended the online platform so you can launch an AI tutoring session on demand. This flexibility has led to varied applications by schools. The most common AI tutoring use cases include:
- Additional math intervention
- Flexible tutoring to help learners close knowledge gaps
- Standardized test and high school review and studying
- Ad-hoc cover sessions for staff absences
- Setting online homework
Pedagogy and student experience
Skye follows a structured instructional sequence: one worked example, one guided “we do,” followed by two independent “you do” tasks. This mirrors effective classroom practice and will feel familiar to students.
However, if this remains the sole structure, some learners may find it monotonous. Including more open-ended tasks or classic mathematical problems could broaden the experience and support both motivation and mathematical thinking.
Our thinking: This structured I do, we do, you do sequence reflects established best practice in mathematics instruction. The consistent format reduces cognitive load by allowing students to focus on content rather than predicting lesson flow.
The platform includes motivational elements such as badges and positive reinforcement, but these are used sparingly and support rather than distract from learning.
At present, Skye’s adaptivity appears to be rule-based. While it responds to correct and incorrect answers, it doesn’t yet adjust scaffolding or progression dynamically based on student performance. Future iterations could benefit from more nuanced adaptivity to maximize learning impact.
I am told that such behavior is coming, but I have not seen it in practice. However, the rate of improvements from Third Space since I first gained access to Skye leads me to believe that they will make good on these improvements.
How this works: Students begin each lesson with a diagnostic question. If they demonstrate the prerequisite knowledge, they skip straight to independent practice rather than working through the teaching slides.
Feedback and misconceptions
If a student answers incorrectly two or three times, Skye reveals the correct answer. In many cases, this is useful. However, it sometimes moves on too quickly without addressing the underlying misconception. A moment to pause or revisit the error could make these sessions more instructionally effective.
There were also instances where feedback didn’t fully align with the learning objective, for example, referencing column addition when the focus was on adjusting. Tighter coupling of feedback to task intent would strengthen the learning experience.
How we built this: Like the best AI for math, our AI is trained to identify and address misconceptions through open-ended questions. When learners need extra guidance, it provides scaffolded hints to help them reach the correct answer independently.
Safeguarding and support
Skye incorporates sensible safeguarding protocols. If a student expresses concerning language, such as “I feel like I want to hurt myself,” the system issues a stock response advising the student to speak to a trusted adult and flags the concern with school staff.
All sessions are recorded, and any alerts are followed up appropriately. It’s a thoughtful integration that reflects a strong commitment to student wellbeing.
Our approach: When integrating any AI in the classroom, privacy and safety must be a priority. All sessions are recorded, and any concerns are automatically flagged to school staff. The system provides appropriate responses while ensuring proper safeguarding protocols are followed so schools can use AI in their school with peace of mind.
Final reflections
Skye is still in its early stages, but there’s already much to commend. The interface is intuitive, the instructional design is grounded in sound pedagogy, and the development team has been impressively responsive to feedback.
For schools seeking a flexible, low-effort way to extend support, particularly where teacher capacity is stretched, I’d recommend exploring Skye’s AI tutoring. It is a platform worth watching and, increasingly, using.
You can also read EdTech Ninja Jodie Lopez’s AI tutoring review on how Skye provides tutoring to students who need it where tight budgets mean support might be lacking.
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