Google is rolling out a bunch of new features for its Workspace for Education service, including several AI-powered tools.
As part of its keynote address at the Bett ed-tech event in London, the search engine giant debuted feature additions to the Google Classroom portal.
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Google Adds New Teaching, Studying Resource on Classroom
One of the new features introduced was the AI assistant for teachers that will help suggest timestamps on YouTube videos where questions can be inserted.
The feature will be available for all teachers using the Classroom portal, the first time it became openly accessible since Google announced the idea all the way back in June last year.
A Practice feature was also introduced, a tool educators can use to generate answers and hints for questionnaires. The Practice tool is currently available in 50 languages.
Practice sets have also become more accessible with the new Resource tab, allowing users to manage and navigate through practice sets and academic activities.
For non-AI-powered features, Google will soon allow educators and schools to form activity groups and collect signatures online via Classroom.
Lessons and discussions are expected to be easier, as well, with the introduction of speaker spotlight features in Google Slides.
This allows the instructor to appear alongside their presentation to further engage with their students even when they are online.
The features are expected to arrive later this year.
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ChromeOS, Chromebooks to Receive Upgrades
Google Classroom is not the only service that will receive enhancements from Google in relation to its promotion of quality education.
Google Meet will soon have closed-caption features for recorded meetings and conversations.
Additional accessibility features were also rolled out for ChromeOS, including the ability to get PDFs even from screen readers.
Meet has been one of the common platforms schools have used in the past during online discussions, only second to Zoom.
