Microsoft has announced a boatload of exciting new updates for its suite of Learning Accelerators.
We’ve been huge advocates for the Microsoft Learning Accelerators from day one, so we’re thrilled to see even more updates and the release of a brand new Accelerator.
Keep reading to find out more about all the announcements.
What are Microsoft Learning Accelerators?
Microsoft launched the Learning Accelerators to make education more accessible by providing students with the vital tools they need to develop their learning. The tools are specifically aimed at improving essential skills to help students in further education and later in their professional lives.
Currently, the list of Learning Accelerators includes:
- Reading Coach and Progress – tools to support students in their reading by guiding them through pronunciation, syllabification, reading speed and vocabulary recall. Teachers can easily track their student’s reading progress and set tailored assignments.
- Search Coach and Progress – tools to strengthen information literacy, supporting students to develop key research skills and learn how to cite credible sources for their assignments.
- Reflect – tools to support students in identifying and expressing their feelings and building their emotional vocabulary. Teachers can add Reflect to assignments and other areas of Teams and get students to pause for a moment to think about how they’re feeling.
- Speaker Coach – a tool that supports students to evaluate key points of their public speaking performances, giving personalised feedback on pitch, use of filler words and pacing.
Spring 2024 updates for Microsoft Learning Accelerators
Search Progress and Coach updates
Aiming to build information literacy into any research assignment, Search Progress and Coach allows students to learn how to check the credibility of their sources and research more effectively.
Meanwhile, teachers get to see how students are finding information, similar to “showing your work” when answering a maths question.
New updates include:
More relevant for UK schools
The latest update makes it more relevant for schools outside of the US! Previously, the American .gov and .edu domains were set as default, but teachers can now customise this so it’s more relevant to your region.
Support for mobiles and tablets
Search Progress now works on tablets and mobiles, which makes the tool so much more accessible for a wider group of students, some of which may not have access to a laptop or desktop computer outside of the classroom.
And, it’s great news for schools who use tablets during lesson time.
Citation support
A huge part of any research project is citing your sources.
With the new update, citation is even easier for students, supporting them as they progress through their academic studies.
More customisation
Teachers can now customise Search Coach via Assignment Settings.
You can choose to include a background, enable the Fact Check Filter or highlight specific institutional domains.
Brand new Speaker Progress tool
A preview of Speaker Progress is now available!
The latest addition to the Learning Accelerator suite will sit alongside Speaker Coach and support students in developing key skills in presenting and public speaking.
Teachers will be able to create speaking assignments for students to practice presenting and monitor student speaking progress.
Students will receive real-time coaching on various elements of their public speaking skills, such as pace, pitch, filler words, pronunciation, repetitive language, use of sensitive phrases, eye contact and body language.
They will receive immediate feedback and a report of their top strengths and opportunities for improvement.
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