FOUR NEW GOOGLE DOCS FEATURE TEACHERS AND STUDENTS SHOULD KNOW ABOUT

Over the last few days, Google Docs announced the release (and the expected release) of a number of key features that will be of tremendous help for us in education. These new features are part of a collection of new?updates?touching almost all of Google Workspace services including Sheets, Forms, Slides, Meet, and Google Classroom. Apparently, Google seems keen on creating an integrated and interactive work experience across all of its services so that users can easily navigate and pull in content from one service right into the other with few clicks. I will be highlighting all of the new features that concern us in education in a series of posts starting with?Google Docs?today

The main new features in Google Docs are:

1- Smart chips

Smart chips allow you to pull information from other workspace products into your document. Using the symbol @ you can add things such as files, dates, and people. "For example, if you’re a student working on a group project, you can quickly embed files from Drive or tag other students in your group right into your document by typing the ‘@’ sign. Once people are tagged, just hover over their name to quickly chat, email, or set up a meeting."

2- Interactive checklists

Similar to bulleted lists, interactive checklists allow you to organize items into an ordered structure with the added functionality that users are able to mark completed items. Table templates is another new feature that is expected to be released in the next few months. The purpose behind table templates is to help users enhance their collaboration and foster their workflow. "For example, topic-voting templates let you easily gather feedback directly in docs."?

3- New writing tips

Docs is adding more and more awesome stylistic features to its editor. Besides suggestions about grammatical errors that have been around for a year now, Docs users can now turn on/off the new feature that provides "warnings about offensive language and stylistic suggestions".

4- Present to Google Meet directly from Docs

Users of Sheets, Slides, and Docs are?now able to directly present their content to Google Meet. "You can quickly present and see both participants and your content in the Meet tab. Later this year they’ll take this a step further and allow Education Plus customers to embed live Meet video calls in Docs, Sheets, and Slides, making it even easier to see each other while collaborating."

Lastly, I want to conclude that Google Docs is a great tool for helping teachers thoughtfully incorporate digital writing into the curriculum. It can help connect the gap between writing in school and writing in the real world. Try it today!