Just in time for my upcoming lecture at the Newhouse School – – Google has introduced several new features for its aimed at enhancing classroom management, accessibility, and the integration of AI in educational tools. It is impossible to overstate the need for teachers and students to align on AI's role in education, so kudos to Google for doing its best to make these services widely available.
For YouTube (where teachers could already add questions to videos), AI will now suggest questions at specific timestamps. The "Practice Sets" feature (which uses AI to generate answers and hints) has been expanded to support more than 50 languages. Google is also launching a Resources tab to streamline the management of practice sets and interactive video questions.
For class management, Google plans to introduce functionality allowing teachers to create distinct groups within Classroom, facilitating the assignment of tailored tasks to each group. Enhancements to Google Slides will include a speaker spotlight feature, enabling the integration of narrated lessons with slide presentations. Additionally, Google Workspace will now offer an eSignature facility for the straightforward collection of approvals or contracts. Classroom analytics are also set to be updated to provide insights into assignment completion rates and grading trends.
Accessibility improvements will include the introduction of text extraction from PDFs for ChromeOS screen readers and text-to-speech functionality in the Chrome browser. Google Meet will be enhanced with closed captioning support in 30 languages and the option to pin multiple hosts, furthering the platform's inclusivity and accessibility.
This sounds like a laundry list of features. It is – and it is much needed and greatly appreciated. Sadly, educators everywhere are overworked and underpaid; these productivity tools will help teachers save time, but they will also help us innovate (and that's the best part). Thanks, Google! -s
ABOUT SHELLY PALMER
Shelly Palmer is the Professor of Advanced Media in Residence at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and CEO of The Palmer Group, a consulting practice that helps Fortune 500 companies with technology, media and marketing. Named he covers tech and business for , is a regular commentator on CNN and writes a popular . He's a , and the creator of the popular, free online course, . Follow or visit .
