AI Homework Help Tools: A Teacher's Honest Review of What Students Are Actually Using

Let me be upfront about something: I have seen the tools my students are using, and I've spent considerable time actually using them myself. This review isn't based on press releases or vendor demonstrations. It's based on watching what happens in my classroom and what students tell me when they trust me enough to be honest.

The short version: some of these tools are genuinely useful. Some are genuinely harmful. Most sit somewhere uncomfortable in between, and the difference almost entirely comes down to how a student chooses to use them.

What students are actually using

In my S4 and S5 computing and science classes, I conducted an informal survey at the start of this school year. I asked students to list every tool they used for homework help in the past month. The results weren't surprising to me, but they might be to some parents.

ChatGPT (or similar large language models) topped the list, used by roughly 75% of students for at least some homework tasks. Photomath or similar equation-solving apps came second, used by around 60% for maths. Khan Academy and YouTube tutorials came third — and these are the ones I'm least concerned about. A smaller but growing group were using Notion AI, Grammarly, and translation tools for English writing assignments.

Here's what nobody tells you: most students aren't using these tools to cheat outright. Many are using them because they're genuinely stuck at 10pm and there's nobody available to explain a concept. The tools are filling a gap. That doesn't make all uses appropriate, but it does change how I think about the problem.

The tools worth knowing

Khan Academy / Khanmigo: I'll say it plainly — this is the best AI-assisted learning tool available for school-age students right now. Khan Academy's content is curriculum-aligned, pedagogically sound, and the newer Khanmigo feature guides students towards answers rather than just providing them. The limitation for HK students is that it's US curriculum-focused. It works well for maths and basic sciences, less well for HKDSE-specific content.

Photomath: My assessment here has changed over time. When it just gave answers, I disliked it. Now that it shows step-by-step working with explanations, I've softened. The risk is still there — a student can screenshot the steps without understanding them. But for a student who genuinely wants to understand how to factorise a quadratic and has nobody to explain it at 11pm, the step-by-step feature has real value. The key test: can your child explain the steps in their own words the next day? If yes, the tool worked. If not, it was a shortcut.

ChatGPT (and similar LLMs): This is where I need to be careful. ChatGPT is a remarkably capable tool that is also remarkably capable of generating plausible-sounding wrong answers. I've seen it produce incorrect science explanations that a student then submitted verbatim. For factual recall, for essay planning, for explaining a concept multiple ways — it can be excellent. For relying on as a source of truth in a technical subject — genuinely dangerous. Teach your child: ChatGPT is a thinking partner, not a textbook.

Grammarly: For English writing, I'm more positive than many of my colleagues. The key is whether students read the suggestions and understand why a change is suggested, or just click "accept all." Used thoughtfully, it's close to having a patient editor. Used lazily, it teaches nothing.

The tools I'm genuinely concerned about

There are apps specifically marketed to students that will complete homework assignments directly — not explain the method, but produce the finished answer. Some of these are deliberately designed to produce output that looks like student work. I won't name them, but they're not hard to find. If your child's homework suddenly becomes uniformly excellent while their in-class performance doesn't change, that's worth a conversation.

I'm also concerned about translation tools being used to write Chinese essays. Not because translation is wrong, but because a student who writes in English and translates to Chinese is not learning to think in Chinese — they're learning to use a tool that thinks in English for them. That's a different and larger problem.

What I tell my own students

My rule in class is this: you may use any tool during the learning phase. You may not use any tool during the assessment phase without explicit permission. If you use a tool to understand something, you must still be able to demonstrate that understanding independently. The tool doesn't learn for you.

I also ask my students to declare when they've used AI assistance. Not to punish them, but to start a conversation about how they used it. Did it help them understand? Did it give them something to react against? Did it save time on a mechanical task so they could focus on the harder thinking? All of those are legitimate uses. Did it just produce the finished product while they watched? That one isn't.

For parents at home

You don't need to ban these tools. Banning them is both practically impossible and somewhat beside the point — the world your child is growing up in will use them routinely. What you can do is ask two questions whenever your child uses an AI tool for homework:

First: "Can you explain this to me in your own words?" If they can, the tool helped them learn. If they can't, it did the learning for them.

Second: "What would you do if you didn't have this tool?" This isn't about removing the tool. It's about ensuring they know there's a path without it.

The goal isn't to keep students away from AI. It's to ensure they're the ones doing the thinking, with AI as a support rather than a substitute.