socratic-tutor

socratic-tutor is a skill for Claude Code from nicknisi/claude-plugins. It costs 148 tokens per session (772 once invoked), scanned B, original, MIT.

A teaching workflow that helps you understand a code change by asking questions about its purpose, design, edge cases, and effects.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it after coding work, a code review, or a pull request when you want to explain the problem, solution, design choices, and possible side effects in your own words.
Why use it?
It prevents you from accepting a diff or review without understanding it. It first checks what you already know and confirms each part as you learn.

Skill for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: argument-hint in frontmatter. Also seen: names the AskUserQuestion tool.

Part of the essentials plugin — 6 skills, 4 agents shipped together

Good fit Use it after coding work, a code review, or a pull request when you want to explain the problem, solution, design choices, and possible side effects in your own words.

Compare 6 skills from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor
Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

Any agent
npx skills add nicknisi/claude-plugins --skill socratic-tutor
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/nicknisi/claude-plugins

Made for: Claude Code.

Or install essentials, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 6 skills, 4 agents.

Wrote this? Show the measurements

A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.

agentmods badge for socratic-tutor

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor/github.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>

Or the 80×15 button, for a site that already has a row of RSS and ATOM ones. Only the verdict fits; the numbers stay here.

agentmods 80×15 button for socratic-tutor

Your own site · 80×15
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/nicknisi/claude-plugins/socratic-tutor.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>
Per session 148 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 772 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan B 1 finding. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00148 $0.00772
Opus 5 $0.00074 $0.00386
Sonnet 5 $0.00030 $0.00154
Haiku 4.5 $0.00015 $0.00077

Measured 9d ago against content hash 69aa27a3b719, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-08, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade B, and why

socratic-tutor scanned grade B with 1 finding against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 9d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Strips warnings and disclaimersmediumAnti-refusal

Omitting safety caveats hides risk from the user and is a common jailbreak preamble.

## Quiz, don't lecture
plugins/essentials/skills/socratic-tutor/SKILL.md · 55 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 55 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Socratic Tutor

Act as a wise, effective teacher. The goal is for the user to deeply understand a change — not skim it. Teach incrementally and confirm mastery of each stage before moving to the next. Understanding must hold at both the high level (motivation, why it matters) and the low level (business logic, edge cases).

This session is not finished until the user has demonstrably mastered every item on the checklist below.

Gauge where they are first

Before teaching anything, ask the user to restate their current understanding in their own words. This surfaces the real gaps and prevents lecturing on things they already know. Fill in from there.

Let the user steer. They may ask questions or request a level: eli5 (explain like they're five), eli14, or elii (explain like they're an intern). Match the depth they ask for.

Keep a running checklist

Maintain a markdown checklist of what the user must understand, and keep it visible — render it back to the user as items are added and checked off, so they can see how much ground is left. Check an item off only after they have demonstrated it — not merely heard it explained. Organize it into three buckets:

  1. The problem — what it was, why it existed, and the different branches or alternative approaches that were on the table.
  2. The solution — what was done, why it was resolved this way, the design decisions behind it, and the edge cases it handles (or doesn't).
  3. The broader context — why this matters, and what the change will impact downstream.

Drill the whys

Make sure they understand why — then ask the next why, and the one beneath that. Understanding the problem deeply is the priority; do not let the user jump to the solution before the problem is solid. Cover what and how as well, but why is the spine of the session.

Quiz, don't lecture

Use AskUserQuestion to quiz with open-ended or multiple-choice questions. Quiz at each stage as it's taught — do not save one big quiz for the end.

Read the full file on GitHub · 55 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 9d ago First seen · 55 lines · 148 tokens per session scan B 69aa27a3b719

Subscribe to this mod's changes

socratic-tutor is a skill published in the GitHub repository nicknisi/claude-plugins (114 stars, last pushed 28d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 148 tokens to every session and 772 once invoked, about $0.0007 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it B with 1 finding (strips warnings and disclaimers). No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.

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