During last year’s Google I/O, the search giant introduced yet another big innovative when it comes to education, targeting not laptops with their Chromebooks, but tablets using Google Play. Google Play for Education was Google’s way of leveraging the rich amount of content available in the Play Store for the classroom, to get kids engaged as well as offering teachers a way of utilizing pre-approved tools to help their learning. The service launched in the Fall last year, and it’s now heading to UK schools.
In a blog post on the Google for Education blog, the search giant details the rollout of the Google Play Education to schools in the UK. It’ll start with either a choice of the Nexus 7 or Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 4 Education and will offer students easy access to Drive, Docs, Sheets and of course, curated access to Google Play. Google Play for Education is a selection of educator-approved apps and games that are specifically catered to use in the classroom. The selection is pretty broad already, but as Google is keen to make a name for themselves in education, we can see this growing steadily over time.
In my eyes, I think the inclusion of revision content for GCSE students is to be particularly effective. While I was 16, I might have been in the minority as being somewhat tech-savvy, but now kids of that age are surrounded by technology. I know that I would have responded to revision material if it was not only interactive, but right there in the palm of my hand.
A number of schools in the UK have already been using Google Play for Education, like Barclay Primary School, where IT Manager Luke Scott said that “Students love how easy it is for them to access the application once it has uploaded to their tablet. They get excited by the fact that something has just popped up onto the screen – they are instantly engaged and want to use it.” Those interested in learning more about Google Play for Education can take a look at Google’s website here.