How Tassomai has helped me homeschool my son
The Tassomai team recently caught up with Kenneth, a father who uses Tassomai as part of his son’s homeschooling programme. We asked him all about how they use the platform and how it has helped his son’s home education.
How did you first hear about Tassomai?
I was actively searching for a platform that could help my boy with his learning and came across Tassomai after trying a few other platforms. I’m a big fan of Tassomai because of its emphasis on cognitive load – the mental process of gaining knowledge and understanding through the senses, experience and thought and turning it into memory – and how it is able to stretch my son’s knowledge.
My son is 12 years old and homeschooled at the moment, so it is great to make use of online platforms and resources to give some additional structure and gamification to his learning.
“Tassomai raises the bar and pushes you just at the right moments so that you can keep learning.”
How has Tassomai helped with homeschooling your son?
He is studying GCSE content on the app, as he is working towards a scholarship at the moment, so it has been great to use it to stretch his knowledge as well as recapping what he has already learnt. Tassomai raises the bar and pushes you just at the right moments so that you can keep learning.
Through using Tassomai every morning, I know my son is getting a baseline of knowledge in almost all of his subjects. We use Tassomai for science (physics, chemistry, biology), maths, English, French, Latin, geography and history. It is great for him to have all of these subjects available to him and in a lightly gamified manner to keep him engaged. I also use the Parent Dashboard via the app to see how much my son uses Tassomai and look at the Tree to see where he needs to focus more time and what to revise.
Private subscriptions to Tassomai include a wide range of different subjects depending on a learner’s age range.
When he was in school, he would only be studying some of these subjects once a week, so there was a lot of room for stagnation. His school also didn’t offer Latin, and in my boy’s words: “Latin has been fun and vital to my learning and progress.” Being able to recap knowledge everyday has really helped him to make progress. In my opinion Latin is a baseline and the key to languages ranging from English to French, and it unlocks the etymology for the key terms in the STEM subjects, both at this stage and in higher education and subsequent careers, ranging from law and medicine to engineering and the sciences.
How do you approach lesson plans and what role does Tassomai play in this?
The most important thing in planning my son’s learning is to always have the specification and marking criteria in mind, as that is what is going to get him the top marks. The exams all have a formula to answer each question, so it’s all about learning the body of knowledge and then how to apply that to the question styles.
He typically starts each day using Tassomai on his iPad to complete goals in all of his subjects. Tassomai has given him a clear foundation and he can go through enough material in an hour or two on the app that would rival what he would learn in a week at school.
It’s all about cognitive load – when he comes across a topic for the first time on Tassomai, he will try his best in the quiz and then actively go to his textbook to learn more about it before returning to a quiz to see how much he can improve. Even when he is coming across new topics, it’s this action of continual familiarisation that really helps to widen his understanding.
How have you found the addition of Mai to your son’s learning on Tassomai?
Mai, Tassomai’s amazing new AI-powered tutor is built into the app and comes as standard with all private subscriptions.
Tassomai were kind enough to give us access to Mai, their new AI tutor, as part of the trial they were doing. Mai seems to be really helping when my son comes across new material or doesn’t understand a question. A lot of other products funnel you out to external resources, but what we have liked about Mai is that it is built into the app and keeps everything very cohesive.
My son’s use of Mai has also been great for helping us to discuss his learning. If he uses Mai to understand more about a question, we can then have a discussion about what he has learnt and this gives him another opportunity to cement what he has learned by describing it aloud.
Overall, I’m very, very happy with Tassomai and how much it has helped us in our homeschooling journey. My son wanted to add his feedback too…
I want to express my gratitude for you creating Tassomai. It has been a tremendous help in my exam preparation journey. The AI Tutor, 'Mai,' has been a valuable companion, guiding me through various subjects and topics. I have found 'Mai' to be efficient and informative, and it has significantly contributed to my understanding of the subjects I'm studying.
– Kepha’Yannik, Tassomai student