Ask AI for the think-aloud script, not the explanation
Any model can explain a topic. The rarer prep artefact is the expert's running commentary, doubts and checks included.
Sep 17, 2026 · 1 min read
A think-aloud (see "Think aloud at the board") is easy to endorse and hard to improvise, because expert steps are automatic precisely where novices need them spelled out (Collins, Brown & Newman, 1989). AI is good at de-automating: ask for the internal monologue of an expert solving your exact problem, and you get a rehearsal script you can edit into your own voice. (Manning's think-aloud-script-generator skill exists for exactly this.)
In practice
prompt.txt
Write the internal monologue of an expert solving this problem,
for me to perform as a think-aloud for Grade 9. Include: why
each method gets chosen, one plausible wrong turn considered
and rejected aloud, and two self-checks mid-solution. Mark the
moments where I should pause and ask the class to predict.- Edit before performing: cut anything you wouldn't genuinely think, or the class hears a script instead of a mind.
- The predict-pauses are where it becomes teaching: stop, collect guesses on whiteboards, then resume the monologue.
Quick takeaway: ask for the thinking performance, not the explanation. You supply the performance.