ExplainBack Learning Tool

Concept Map of Understanding — subtopics color-coded as Understood, Partial, or Missed after explaining back to AI
Dynamic home screen — suggested topics update based on your study history with typewriter animation

Inspiration

Most students confuse familiarity with understanding. You watch a lecture or read book, nod along, feel like you "get it" — then blank out on the exam. The real problem isn't lack of resources. It's that passive consumption feels like learning but isn't. We wanted to build something that forces real understanding, not just exposure.

What it does

ExplainBack is built on the Feynman Technique — if you can't explain something simply, you don't truly understand it. Type any topic you just studied, explain it back to AI, and get structured feedback on exactly what you understood and what you only thought you did.

After explaining you get in response,

What you got right — on basis of what you actually explained
Gaps found — concepts you missed
Misconceptions — what you got wrong, corrected simply
Understanding score out of 10
Visual Concept Map showing subtopics as Understood / Partial / Missed
AI quiz with option to practice 5 more questions
Quick Recap before quiz
Dynamic topic suggestions based on your study history

How we built it

Built entirely with MeDo through multi-turn conversations. We described each feature in prompt and iterated on MeDo's output to refine the app — voice input, text-to-speech, dark mode, multilingual support, localStorage history, and the concept map visual were all added through iterative prompting.

Challenges we ran into

Getting the AI to evaluate only what the user actually said — not hallucinate extra points or fabricate examples the user never mentioned. Also making the Concept Map feel visually clear and meaningful rather than just a list.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

The Concept Map of Understanding — a visual tree showing exactly which subtopics were understood vs missed. This single feature transforms ExplainBack from a chatbot into a genuine learning intelligence tool. Also proud of the dynamic topic suggestions that adapt to each user's study history.

What we learned

The Feynman Technique as a product concept is deeply underutilized. Also learned how to build and iterate on a full-stack AI app purely through conversation with MeDo.