Frequently Asked Questions

1. 1. How do I get my kids set up on Heliomath?

   Start by creating a family account with your email address. Once completed, you can add a profile for every learner. That way your family will be on a single account that you can manage, and you'll be able to log your kids onto Heliomath individually, using their own unique passwords.

2. 2. How will Heliomath know what to teach my kids? Do I need to select what my kids should learn on Heliomath?

   Heliomath actually takes care of this for you. It quickly assesses what your child has already mastered, what skills they are currently learning, and what should come next. It does this by tracking the consistency and speed of every answer, building a complex model of how well every child has mastered the web of skills and concepts required for higher level math. And because it maps out conceptual dependencies (i.e. what the building blocks are for a given type of question), it knows in what order to teach new concepts.

3. 3. What kind of work will my kids do? Is there a weekly schedule or specific curriculum kids need to get through?

   Heliomath moves learners along at an optimal pace for them, rather than trying to race them through the curriculum or to hold them back. When you set up learning profiles for your kids on Heliomath, you set a target number of math-sessions per week for them (we recommend at least 4 sessions per week, and no more than 10). How much time you want your kids to spend (and how quickly you want them to progress) is entirely up to you and your family. But you can rest assured that the program will always keep them moving forward, learning what they need to in order to succeed at higher level math in the future.

4. 4. What kind of reading level do kids need in order to answer questions on Heliomath?

   Reading isn't required to answer questions on Heliomath ➔ only an ability to follow objects on a screen.
   
   All questions on Heliomath are supported by a voice feature that is synchronized with light animations signaling which part of the question appearing on the screen is being read out loud. (This has the added benefit of helping learners associate hearing a math-symbol spoken out loud with its visual representation on the screen, and several parents have told us they believe Heliomath is helping their kids get better at reading math-questions.)

5. 5. Is Heliomath suitable for learners with significant learning differences?

   Yes. Numerous learners with learning differences such as dyslexia, dyscalculia, ADHD, and even cognitive impairments are using Heliomath to significantly accelerate their math learning, and we've even seen it work for children dealing with multiple concurrent difficulties. Almost ¾ of all learners on Heliomath report having at least one learning-difference, and almost ½ of all learners report a combination of 2 or more learning-differences. Depending on the severity of these challenges, parents may find it beneficial to offer a bit more support to their child while using Heliomath, especially if assistance with focus is needed. In most cases however, this level of involvement is not necessary. Learn more about how Heliomath can be particularly beneficial for kids facing significant challenges learning math.

6. 6. What is required of a parent? Will I still need to teach my kids on the side?

   Heliomath knows how to troubleshoot a learner's challenges, and knows what topic a learner is ready for, so the vast majority of learners can work with Heliomath by themselves.
   
   Heliomath also provides session recaps, as either a summary (that lets you know their achievements and where they've been challenged), or a detailed recap of all questions asked and answers given. Thus everything is available for a parent or teacher to quickly review a learner's progress. As such, a parent or teacher can be involved as much or as little as they want to be.
   
   That said, there are a few main things parents or teachers can do:

   • Help your kids get started on Heliomath and continue encouraging and supporting them as they learn
   • Avoid giving them the answers to questions they get wrong (light hints are fine, but remember they are the ones that need to do the learning - and discovering the answer for themselves is key to building confidence and forming lasting memories)
   • And maybe most importantly, make time for Heliomath in your child's busy week. As an automated tutor, it doesn't matter when that time is, or how often it changes at the last minute. But just like any endeavor, it is important to do it regularly.

7. 7. How many questions does Heliomath have?

   The number of unique math-questions is too high to count. More importantly, it's well beyond the limits of what any person would ever answer (they'd be masters long before they ran out of questions). Math-questions are generated spontaneously from the "question blue-prints" (or "question factories") of our learning-objectives, rather than pulled from a static list. For example, "adding single-digit whole numbers" can generate the question 2 + 4 and 6 + 6 and 5 + 3 and so on, generating 81 unique questions. This jumps to 8100 for "adding double-digit whole numbers", and 808,201 for "adding positive rational numbers to 3 decimals".
   
   So it may be more useful to think in terms of learning-objectives covered by Heliomath. At present, we have 235 learning-objectives spanning K-5.

8. 8. How do you keep kids engaged? Is this another math game?

   Heliomath doesn't rely on heavy, sensory-stimulating gamification or any other extrinsic motivator to coax kids into doing math ➔ here's why:

   • While the science isn't fully in yet, we're concerned about near-ubiquitous gamification in education-apps overloading kids with high-dopamine experiences (and what this might be doing to kids' resiliency, perseverance, and general ability to push through challenging situations).
   • We want kids to understand and remember their math - not that they got to defeat the evil rabbit at the end of the multiplication tunnel.
   • Long term learning-recall and scholastic performance are not significantly improved by heavily gamified learning apps.
   • There's a risk of confusing edutainment with real learning when thinking about where kids are spending time. (Nothing wrong with video games so long as they are played in moderation, and heavily gamified learning apps should really count towards your kid's video game time as well.)

   Luckily, math itself can be experienced as a kind of game if kids encounter just the right amount of challenge and recognize their own legitimate progress.
   
   Great game designers will tell you this is the most important aspect of the games people love to play. Despite a simple interface with no flashing lights or gimmicks, we've had kids as young as 7 answer over 300 questions in a single day.
   
   We believe this is thanks to our:

   • Wide variety of visual question formats
     (draws the attention of learners + helps them form strong connections between the abstract math-symbols appearing in questions, and the concrete objects they can represent in the real world)
   • Frequent variation-training
     (keeps things interesting, where learners never quite know what's coming next + helps them commit what they're learning to long-term memory)
   • Speeding up & slowing down wherever needed
     (fast-forwards learners through the skills they've clearly mastered, while helping them figure out why they got a question wrong and how to get it right the next time, so that they always experience just the right amount of challenge and never become blocked)
   • Text-to-voice on all questions
     (synchronized with light animations of the elements appearing on the screen - particularly helpful for young learners & those experiencing learning-challenges such as dyslexia, dyscalculia, and ADHD)
   • Rich progress feedback
     (such as displaying the total number of correct answers a learner has accumulated in their learning-session)
   • A simple, one-question-at-a-time interface
     (reduces cognitive fatigue, and ensures learners never get discouraged by long worksheets featuring the same kind of question being repeated over and over)

9. 9. How is Heliomath able to do all this?

   Heliomath is powered by our proprietary AI system, and does NOT use generative AI (such as Midjourney or ChatGPT) for any of it's math instruction. As such, it isn't prone to "hallucinations", and it doesn't do all the thinking for the learner. Instead, Heliomath continually assesses the most pedagogically relevant next question or learning activity for each learner given the entirety of their answer-history, emphasizing a "receptive" approach over a "generative" one.

10. 10. What learning science and teaching approaches is Heliomath based on?

    Heliomath is built on what actually helps kids learn—especially those who struggle with math. We combine proven learning science, special-education best practices, and the kind of step-by-step teaching great tutors use every day. It isn't based on one theory. Instead, it's built from many well-supported ideas that we've tested and refined with real learners.
    
    Some of the key influences:

    • Cognitive load theory & worked examples
      Keeping screens clean, steps small, and thinking demands focused—so working memory isn't overwhelmed—while modeling how to solve new types of problems.
    • Using visuals to make ideas click
      Using blocks, number lines, fraction strips, arrays, and other visuals (including digital manipulatives) before and alongside symbols.
    • Scaffolding & gradual release
      Giving just-in-time support (visual cues, worked steps) when a learner is stuck, and then fading that support as they gain independence.
    • Spaced practice & retrieval
      Bringing skills back just before they're forgotten so learning sticks, instead of doing a topic once and never revisiting it.
    • Error analysis & misconception diagnosis
      Looking for patterns in wrong answers to infer what a learner is thinking, and then targeting the likely misconception.
    • Building up understanding step-by-step
      Breaking math into very small, ordered skills and not moving on until prerequisites are solid.
    • Giving instant, helpful feedback
      Treating every response as information: Heliomath checks understanding continuously and gives instant, specific feedback rather than saving everything for a quiz later.
    • Supporting focus, persistence, and confidence
      Gently flagging when learners are guessing, rushing, or disengaging and reinforcing helpful behaviors (focus, persistence) with behavior-specific praise.

    
    We also try to ensure learners build a coherent mental model of math, with every new idea connecting cleanly to what they already know, so that their understanding remains a unified, internally consistent foundation (see more on why we think this is so important).
    
    But most importantly... We watch closely how real children respond to every lesson. If something isn't working well for a broad range of learners—including those with dyscalculia, ADHD, autism, or foundational gaps—we adjust it until it does.
    
    Educational theory matters, but what matters most to us is simple:

    • Does this help your child truly understand math and feel successful? If not, we improve it until it does.

11. 11. Is Heliomath a full math curriculum?

    For K-2, yes. For Grades 3-5, almost, but not quite. Heliomath is currently focused on core arithmetic and foundational math concepts ➔ the areas where most learning gaps tend to emerge and persist, especially in the early grades. Our system emphasizes number sense, operations, place value, and early fractions, all of which are critical for long-term math success. Heliomath also covers geometry for K-2, but not for Grades 3-5. And it does not yet cover other topics like measurement units, or data/graphing. We plan to expand into these areas in the future, but our current priority is ensuring every learner builds a strong, durable foundation in pure math first.
12. Still have questions? Contact us here