NE BUSINESS BUREAU
NEW DELHI, JUNE 19
Microsoft India on Tuesday launched ‘Teams for Education’ feature in order to support online education to engage and help students and teachers in learning preparation from home. This new feature can now accommodate a maximum of 49 participants with its grid view expanded to 7×7. ‘Teams for Education’ feature also includes class insights, custom backgrounds, and virtual breakout rooms to meet and collaborate in small groups, a company release said.
Over 150 million students, institutional leaders, faculty, and teachers have been actively using Microsoft Education products to engage students in remote learning. The new ‘Teams for Education’ Microsoft features are aimed to give educators’ new methods to keep students digitally engaged and increase student’s participation. It also includes OneNote Class and Staff Notebooks.
Students can now digitally Raise Their Hands during class meetings. Educators can also see Attendance Reports with view Class Insights feature. This feature is an intelligent data analytics breakdown on activity metrics and grades, student engagement in class, rate of assignments turned in with a new trend view.
“Many teachers and faculty have been incorporating new tools into their lessons, often for the first time and students are experiencing new methods of learning, which will have an important, lasting impact on their future. With this transition, it has become clear that with the required physical distance between teachers and students, it’s more important than ever to help educators find ways to connect with students and keep them engaged, motivated, and safe in a digital world. It is inspiring to see how technology is helping educators and students maintain learning continuity,” said Manish Prakash, Country General Manager-Public Sector, Health and Education, Microsoft India.
Partner integrations: ‘Teams for Education’ now also includes integrations with Kahoot, Prezi, GO1, Nearpod, Piazza, Gaggle, Moodle, Canvas, and others. Microsoft will continue to add partner integrations making it easier for schools and universities to use Teams.
Providing accessible and inclusive education for students
Microsoft has also built-in Learning Tools like Immersive Reader into Microsoft Word, Microsoft Edge, Teams, OneNote, Flipgrid, and Minecraft: Education Edition to enable parents to support students across all reading levels or those who have difficulty reading or writing due to dyslexia or dysgraphia. Today, Immersive Reader is empowering over 23 million people with dyslexia and learning disabilities globally every month.
Creating accessible education is a key priority and core value to Microsoft’s approach for Education. New experiences like Microsoft Translator for Education, will empower educators to engage with students and their family members in their native languages as well as provide reading and literacy support via text and audio.
Public-private partnerships are critical to the future success of educational institutions
Microsoft will also continue working with a number of global non-governmental and non-profit organizations like UNESCO and UNICEF to harness technical expertise to support communities around the world with the highest need.
At the same time, educators, administrators, and institutional leaders will also be able to share their stories and tips or ask questions on the Remote Learning Community. With over 6,000 members, educators from around the world are providing professional development resources and coaching to complement what they receive from their individual administrators and districts.
