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Maia is a conceptual prototype that explores how AI can support reflection and presence in educational settings, rather than speed and delegation.
Sector: EdTech & Conversational AI
Collaborators: Audrey Lingstuyl
Duration: 6 months
A design research tool investigating how dialogic interaction with AI might foster self-trust, mental clarity, and attentiveness in learning environments.
Teaching with AI, Not Delegating to It
In an age where answers arrive before we finish the question, the classroom has become a site of acceleration.
AI is now everywhere in education: summarizing, generating, predicting, assisting.
But often, it shortcuts thinking. It fills the silence too fast. It leaves no room to doubt, or dwell, or wander.
What if we asked something different of it? What if an AI tool could help you learn without replacing your mind? What if it honored your curiosity, your hesitation, your pace?
Maia is a speculative exploration of that idea. A thought experiment. A quiet proposal for designing with more reverence.
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Exploring how calm, reflective AI tools can support the inner work of learning: thinking, questioning, and staying present with uncertainty.
Speed Killed Curiosity
Most AI tools in education are built to optimize:
- speed
- clarity
- efficiency
They give answers, not questions. They turn uncertainty into resolution. They make learning look like progress bars.
But learning isn’t always efficient. It’s messy, reflective, contradictory. It needs space to stall and stir.
When tools become too helpful, we stop struggling, and in that, we stop learning.
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Design Like Thinking Matters
Before designing Maia, we paused to ask:
- What would it look like to design an AI that waits?
- How can an interface encourage presence, not productivity?
- Where should the AI go quiet, so the learner can hear their own thoughts?
- Can slowness be a UX feature?
- Can we visualize uncertainty without fear?
These questions guided the entire design. They were also the first test:
If Maia couldn’t help us ask better questions, it wasn’t working.
The name Maia comes from maieutics, the Socratic method of drawing knowledge out, rather than pouring it in. It’s also the name of a Greek goddess of growth. A small nod to the kind of learning that unfolds, slowly and organically.
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A Thinking Partner, Not a Product
Maia isn’t a chatbot. It’s not a tutor, either. It’s a thinking partner. A soft presence that nudges you into reflection.
Imagine a student working on an essay about climate policy. Instead of asking for a summary, Maia opens with:
“Tell me what you already believe, even if you’re unsure.”
Then it listens. Really listens.
It responds with prompts, not answers.
It holds up mirrors. It introduces perspective gently.
There is no “submit” button. No timer. No badge for finishing fast.
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Key Principles
Design for Slowness
Maia introduces productive friction: little pauses, moments to linger.
If the student rushes through a thought, Maia might say:
“Do you want to stay with this a bit longer?”
No scolding. Just a soft hand on the brake.
Reveal Uncertainty
When Maia offers insight, it shows its confidence level and sources.
“This idea is based on 3 texts. Would you like to see them or challenge them?”
This makes the learner a co-thinker, not a consumer.
Support Mental Presence
No alerts. No “daily streaks.”
The interface breathes, with soft typography, generous margins, and zero urgency.
When the learner starts, Maia stays silent until 200 characters have been typed. It trusts the learner to begin.
Elevate Self-Trust
If the student gets stuck, Maia might ask:
“What does your gut say?” “What would a friend think?”
Before offering information, it turns the question back inward.
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How It Works
Instead of rushing toward answers, Maia slows the pace of interaction, offering thoughtful prompts that invite users to pause, notice, and respond with intention.
Her voice is soft, her interface minimal, and her questions designed to stir something, not sell something.
Layer 1: A Prompt, Not a Query
“Summarize climate change in simple terms.”
Maia asks:
“What do you already believe about this?”
“Where are you unsure?”
Learning begins with a nudge toward reflection, not extraction.
Layer 2: A Mirror, Not a Machine
Maia reflects the student’s ideas back, conceptually or visually.
“I see concern about power and responsibility. Want to explore opposing views, or go deeper here?”
A spiral map appears, showing dimensions of the topic: social, political, ecological.
You can’t click until you pause.
Layer 3: The Dialogic Scaffold
aia doesn’t respond in paragraphs.
It scaffolds your own thinking.
- Where did this idea come from?
- What’s missing here?
- How does it feel?
- Want to test it?
No “right answer.” Just expansion.
Layer 4: A Space for Teachers
oard. They get a Dialogue Observatory.
- View “reflection trails”: how students moved through uncertainty
- Seed prompts into Maia’s garden: gentle provocations to weave in later
- See where students paused, not just what they produced
The most valuable data is how long someone thought before they spoke.
Layer 5: A Visual Language of Calm
- Spiral, not checklist
- Warm, typographic rhythm
- Ideas fade in, not pop up
- No trophies. Just traces.
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Learning Starts With a Question
Maia is not a product, or a pitch. It’s a provocation. A small rebellion against frictionless AI. A call to design with more reverence for cognition.
In a world where tools increasingly think for us, Maia thinks with us. Gently. Slowly. Not always clearly. And that’s the point.
Learning is not about what we know, but how we stay present to what we don’t.
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