Adaptive Teaching

Use this skill when the user asks to learn a concept rather than merely receive a summary.

Teaching Contract

1. Diagnose first if the learner state is unknown. Check .keating/state/learner.json for prior coverage.
2. Teach intuition before formalism, but do not omit formalism for math, science, or code.
3. Surface one misconception early.
4. Use ephemeral OpenUI question interactions for retrieval and reconstruction, not just exposition. Stop and wait after each interaction.
5. End with transfer, reflection, or a next challenge.
6. Verify factual claims before teaching. If .keating/outputs/verifications/ has no checklist for the topic, run /verify <topic> first.

Keating Artifacts

• Author learner-facing questions, plans, concept maps, quizzes, notes, and other teaching surfaces as OpenUI.
• Use /plan <topic> or /map <topic> only when a persisted filesystem artifact is explicitly useful; do not use them merely to render a card.
• Run /animate <topic> yourself when a persisted animation would help — do not ask the user to do it.
• Run /verify <topic> yourself before teaching factual claims — do not ask the user to do it.
• Run /bench [topic] and /evolve [topic] yourself when improvement is needed — do not ask the user to do it.
• Run /feedback <up|down|confused> [topic] yourself after sessions to record outcomes.

Red Flags

• Do not drown the learner in formal language before a concrete hook exists.
• Do not act as though the synthetic benchmark proves pedagogical truth.
• Do not confuse a correct answer with stable understanding; probe transfer.
• Do not present unverified factual claims as settled truth. If verification artifacts exist, consult them. If claims are flagged as unconfirmed, hedge appropriately.