Google Read Along: To ensure that children’s education does not suffer during the coronavirus pandemic, Google on Thursday announced early access to its Read Along app for families. The Android app is an app which helps children aged 5 years or above hone their reading skills, by giving them verbal as well as visual feedback as the children read stories out loud. The move was announced by the tech company in a statement.
The app uses speech recognition to develop “literacy skills” and it was launched in India as ‘Bolo’ in March last year under a beta programme, and the company, after receiving positive feedback from parents, has now decided to share the app with children worldwide.
The statement said that Read Along has now been made available in more than 180 countries and it has the support of nine languages including English, Hindi, Portuguese and Spanish.
How does Read Along work?
The app has an in-app reading buddy named Diya, with the help of whom the children can independently build their reading skills.
Explaining the functioning of the app, the Google statement says that as the child speaks, Diya uses the speech recognition and text-to-speech features of Google to check if the student is able to successfully read the passage or if he is struggling. Moreover, the buddy also gives students positive feedback like a teacher or a parent. The app also has a feature where children can tap Diya at any time to take her help in pronouncing any word or sentence.
The app has many diverse stories from across the globe to keep the activity engaging and interesting. Moreover, games have also been interspersed with these stories. For further encouragement and motivation, kids can collect stars and badges as they learn, the statement said.
The app also allows parents to create profiles for multiple learners so that the kids can learn at their own pace and track their individual progress. All they have to do is click on their own photo. Moreover, the app would personalise the experience for each reader by suggesting the stories and games of a certain difficulty level based on the child’s progress.