FP TrendingFeb 18, 2021 18:44:32 IST
Google has announced the new Google Workspace for Education – a rebranded G-Suite for Education – along with stricter security tools and new capabilities for both Google Classroom and Google Meet. The company has also introduced more than 50 new features across various verticals in its education products to enable better learning and teaching experience. Google has also announced that the Teach from Anywhere hub that it launched last year is now available in eight Indian languages.
Furthermore, the Teach from Anywhere hub has helped over 9 lakh people to get started with remote teaching, while more than 5 lakh teachers have been able to attend webinars for digital pedagogy and skills development.
Speaking about the development Bani Dhawan, Head of Education, South Asia, Google stated that the past year, the education community has inspired them with their creativity and resilience, adding that every day more than a billion people come to Google in search of answers.
“Our Learning & Education team works to fuel that curiosity and help people build knowledge by connecting them to great learning experiences through our products,” Dhawan added.
The company has also revealed that Google’s free edition G Suite for Education will be renamed to Google Workspace for Education Fundamentals. Google is also introducing three new paid editions – Google Workspace for Education Standard, The Teaching and Learning Upgrade, and Google Workspace for Education Plus for institutions that require more powerful security tools.
Google Workspace for Education
Some of the new features include:
Google Classroom
Offline mode: The latest Google Classroom feature includes a dedicated offline mode, where the app could be worked offline or with intermittent connections where students could review their assignments, write assignments in Google Docs, and open Drive attachments, all without an internet connection.
Improved mobile grading: Google has seen many teachers around the world using mobile devices for giving feedback on the go, and these improvements will make it easy for instructors to grade work while viewing an assignment, switching between student submissions, and sharing feedbacks.
Classroom add-ons: Classroom add-ons will allow educators to integrate their favorite third-party EdTech tools to connect directly into the Classroom interface, without any extra log-ins.
Roster sync: Starting later this year, admins using Education Plus will be able to create classes, and populate and sync rosters directly to Classroom from their Student Information System.
Better pictures of homework: Students will now be able to combine photos into a single document, crop or rotate images, and adjust lighting.
Student engagement tracking: Google will launch student engagement tracking inside Classroom where educator will be able to see relevant statistics to help them understand how students are interacting with Classroom each day.
Google Meet
Multiple moderators: Google Meet will support multiple hosts, later this year. All hosts will have access to moderation controls to manage who can join, control who can use the chat or present their screen, and more.
End meeting for all: Teachers will have an option to “End meeting for all”, which can prevent students from staying on a call after the teacher has left.
Mute all: To make it easy for educators to teach without interruption, teachers will be able to mute all participants at once, and decide if students could unmute themselves or not.
