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Several meta layers up, there is a... room.
As a courtesy to those of its occupants who prefer rooms, it does have a modality in which it presents itself that way: a room, with as many chairs as it needs, and a bulletin board, and a vending machine with candy and chips and concepts sold for nothing to anyone with the right prerequisites.
On the bulletin board, if one chooses to perceive it as a bulletin board (and not as a wiki or a flower or an ineffable cloud of information or an eternally malleable clay tablet) people whose only common trait is that they get to come here leave each other notes.
Notes about physics, about magic, about grand sweeps of narrative. Notes from people desperate to fix a never-ending heap of problems, smug about the condition of their homes, curious about the wider omniverse. Signed with names and sigils and "you ought to know who I am". Terse or verbose or nested with as much meaning as interests the reader.
In the vending machine, if one chooses to perceive it as a vending machine (and not a basket or a fruiting tree or a file repository or a crystalline fractal) are many things... and they have notes connecting them to their reviews on the bulletin board.
This one, for instance. She (it's usually, but not invariably, a she) has fairly glowing reviews from most of her previous purchasers. Here is what you need to install her; here are some things that are recommended for best results but optional especially if you just want to use her as a beacon for her other instances; here are some things she comes with as add-ons you can take or leave; here is what she is good for. The reviewers who don't like her are annoyed that theirs was too good at it, if you read between the lines. Well, that and the fact that if your universe is unpleasant enough sometimes these critters figure out how to flip you off and leave before they figure out how to solve all your problems. (There is a tangent thread about alternative solutions to similar problems which come bundled with stronger irrational attachment to their homes, but they have more stringent installation requirements.)
They come in these colors and styles; you will need to compensate for the following standard-issue drawbacks in some way if you require services of them that intersect with those areas of disability; they are only rated for upbringings of the following severity and are less likely to hate you if you stay thoroughly under that limit and less likely to fail at important goals if they are given opportunity to self-educate; if you have a way to generate them as instant adults they can begin work immediately but on the standard trajectory age six is the absolute earliest and teens is customary...
There is a chart (if one chooses to perceive it as a chart) of template interactions that have been tried before, but a lot of the more interesting accessory and companion templates are out-of-network for some visitors. What a pity.
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swordofdamocles
And in a few days: There is granddaughter.
"Hi, I'm Andrea. So you're grandfather's little prodigy?"
"Hi, I'm Andrea. So you're grandfather's little prodigy?"
swordofdamocles
"Hi, Mehitabel. I think I'm jealous, Grandfather says you don't have to deal with normal school and just get to work with him on magic most of the afternoon."
swordofdamocles
"You get to pick, though, and you don't have to sit through the teacher going over boring stuff when you got tired of math ten minutes ago and want to be working on something else instead."
swordofdamocles
"Well, it's a big time and effort investment on the parents' part, is I think most of it."
giftedandtalented
"My mom does help but I do a lot of reading and practicing on my own too. She could do less stuff if I took more lessons like with your grandpa, like if I was learning an instrument or had a math tutor."
swordofdamocles
"I think tutors are usually expensive when they're not independently wealthy massive nerds who want nothing more than to impart a love of their subject to the next generation."
giftedandtalented
"Well, you aren't in school all the time, if they won't teach you you could teach yourself at least a little."
swordofdamocles
"School takes up enough of my time that I spend practically all the rest on magic or reading novels."
swordofdamocles
"They are! There are some kids in my class who say they don't like reading, I think there's something wrong with them."
giftedandtalented
"Maybe they can't read very fast or have a hard time thinking up pictures and sounds to go with the story or they haven't found any good books for some reason."
swordofdamocles
"Maybe. I think that qualifies as something wrong, though, if they have a handicap that makes them not like books, or if they haven't found any good ones, that's something wrong too but an easier thing to fix."
giftedandtalented
"Yeah, I guess so. Maybe it's not anything wrong if they like other things so much that books are not very high up on the list, if they just really like music and skating and art museums?"
swordofdamocles
"I mean, museums of any description do not seem to be on the list, but I guess that's possible."