As a marketing agency deeply involved in the EdTech industry, we are always on the lookout for the latest developments in the field. This week, we turn our attention to Google for Education's announcement at ISTE, the United States’ largest educational technology exhibition.
Google for Education has always been committed to creating tools that enhance students' learning experiences and educators' teaching efficiencies. The recent ISTE event brought to light several exciting developments aimed at fostering more personal, collaborative, accessible, and secure learning environments.
Google Classroom is ushering in more personalized learning experiences with a new Read Along integration. This feature allows educators to support differentiated learning and track students’ progress. Additionally, the Practice Sets feature will enable educators to offer more relevant student interventions by adding their own resources and managing AI-suggested resources. Even YouTube videos can now be more interactive, with the ability to add questions that help students check their understanding as they watch.
More Collaborative and Accessible Learning
Collaboration and accessibility also received a significant boost with new features in Google Meet. The Tile Pairing feature allows two people to pair together so they’re both highlighted whenever one of them speaks - ideal for pairing a presenter and their sign-language interpreter. The addition of Q&A and polling to livestreams will foster engagement with larger audiences, and the number of max attendees in Meet has been increased to 1,000, facilitating broader school community connections.
Google Classroom is set to roll out analytics that provides insights into student performance and engagement. Classroom analytics will enable educators and education leaders to understand trends in assignment completion, grading, and Classroom adoption. Furthermore, education leaders and support staff can now temporarily visit a class to assist educators without needing to be assigned as co-teachers1.
Simplifying Lesson Planning and Enhancing Accessibility
To facilitate lesson planning, Google for Education is enabling curriculum leaders and verified teachers to share links to class templates and classwork. They can also import content into their classes without needing to be a co-teacher. With the help of AI, accessible built-in features are being added to the Chrome browser, like reading mode and PDF OCR technology for screen reader users to convert images to text for PDFs1.
Safer Learning Environment
In a bid to enhance digital safety, new tools are being added to the Google Workspace for Education, such as context-aware access improvements to control app access and expanded spam protections in Drive. Chromebooks will also have more data controls, enabling admins to set up rules to prevent actions like copying and pasting, screen capture, screen sharing, and printing. Additionally, new privacy toggles will empower students and teachers to disable the camera and microphone when not in use.
Google for Education continues to innovate, providing an array of tools and features designed to create more personal, collaborative, accessible, and safe learning experiences. As marketers in the EdTech space, it's vital that we stay abreast of these developments and consider how they might impact our strategies.
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