What is Cognii and how can its AI enhance teaching?

Cognii is a renowned AI system in the education sector, receiving multiple awards for its contributions to K-12 and higher education. While it might seem like a glimpse into a future where bots replace teachers, the current reality is that Cognii serves as a teaching assistant. It streamlines tasks like grading, enabling students to learn more autonomously. This technology can be utilized in classrooms or, more commonly, for remote learning, providing students with guidance akin to a virtual tutor.

What is Cognii?

Cognii is an AI-powered tool designed to assist students in answering questions by providing a set of pre-written guidance comments, rather than functioning as a fully autonomous teacher.

This platform is compatible with various devices, enabling numerous students to utilize the service. It offers activities like reading passages and answering questions, providing guidance based on responses, or offering direct assessments. The platform spans multiple subjects, such as English language arts, sciences, social studies, engineering, technology, and math, catering to grades 3-12.

Cognii operates entirely digitally, recording responses and student performance. This allows teachers to assess individual progress, group performance, or broader class trends over the entire school year. The platform provides straightforward analytic data for easy navigation and quick insights.

One standout feature of Cognii, distinguishing it from other assessment tools, is its ability to allow students to write answers in their own words while still receiving automated guidance and grading. Further details on this functionality will be discussed next.

How does Cognii work?

At its core, Cognii is a digital platform for questions and answers. However, its complexity lies in its use of AI, enabling the system to recognize and provide guidance on student answers written in their natural language.

Instead of just completing multiple-choice assessments for quick grading, Cognii allows students to respond in their own words. It identifies areas where answers lack parts, context, or depth, providing feedback for improvement. 

Students can then revise their answers until they are correct before moving forward, akin to having a teaching assistant provide guidance throughout the assessment. 

Because feedback is immediate, students can progress through the assessment without waiting for teacher input, accelerating their mastery of subjects compared to traditional question-and-answer formats.

What features make Cognii stand out?

Cognii is accessible to students anytime and anywhere they have a connected device. This availability enables students to master subjects at their own pace, providing support and guidance even when they are not in a traditional classroom setting.

By employing natural language processing, akin to voice-controlled assistants like Amazon's Alexa, Cognii's AI can interpret students' typed answers in various formats. This enables more sophisticated tutoring, where guidance is tailored to pinpoint areas of misunderstanding or errors in answers, offering adaptive responses.

The chatbot-style interaction, resembling online conversations many students and teachers are familiar with, makes the platform highly accessible. Using the app can feel like chatting with a person, creating a natural learning experience through communication.

Automated grading saves teachers significant time. Additionally, since data is stored online, teachers gain insights into areas and students that require more attention, facilitating lesson planning and ensuring comprehensive subject coverage.

How much does Cognii cost?

Cognii's pricing is based on individual sales, taking into consideration factors like school size, the number of students using the system, required feedback data, and more. As this information is not extensively publicized, the cost is likely not inexpensive.

While the tool is designed for both K-12 and higher education, it is also applicable in the business sector for training purposes. Consequently, the available packages vary widely and can be customized to meet the specific needs of each institution, priced on a case-by-case basis.