With the rollout of Chrome OS 72, the Google Assistant has made its way onto most Chromebooks. I have already written about why I think smart speakers should be in every classroom and with the addition of the Google Assistant to Chromebooks, now every student can have this functionality on their own device!
I did notice that the Assistant didn’t just appear on all my Chromebooks. When the Tx1 tablet by CTL got the update it was automatically enabled and I was then given the option about how I wanted to interact with it. However, on my Samsung Chromebook Plus, I actually had to enable it by going through the flags settings menu. I followed this very helpful tutorial to do this.
What’s great about this is that now the Chromebook acts as a smart speaker built into every device in the classroom! All of the amazing things you can do with a smart speaker can now be done with your Chromebook!
I thoroughly tested the application of the Google Assistant on my two Chromebooks to see how I could access the assistant and how well it responded. First, of all, since none of my Chromebooks have a dedicated Assistant key like the Pixelbook and some of the newer models, I mainly accessed the Assistant using my voice, much like one would if talking to their phone or smart speaker. However, you can long hold the app drawer button on the touchscreen to bring up the Assistant without having to speak.
This makes it possible to ask questions quietly without bothering everyone else in the room. Keep in mind that if you access the Assistant by long touching the app drawer/search button on the left it assumes you want to type your question. You can also type your question by touching the keyboard icon after using hot words “Hey Google or Ok Google” to waken the Assistant up.
The Assistant responded quickly on both the Samsung Chromebook Plus and the CTL Tx1. Below is a video of the testing process. I asked the types of questions a student or a teacher might ask in the classroom and a few other questions to see how it responded.
As I expected, the Google Assistant worked like a charm answering my questions and responding to my requests. There were a few things that it couldn’t do. For example, I could get it to open Google Play Music to listen to music but I had to physically start and stop the music as it lacked the ability to control music playback. Another thing I noticed, it doesn’t handle recipes like the Google Home. It cannot lead you through a recipe. I did like the visual aspect of things. When I asked a question, it not only answered, it also showed me my answers. This, in my opinion, makes it a bit better for the classroom than a traditional smart speaker.
Another thing the Google Assistant allows you to do is search for things on your screen using the built in stylus. See below.
I am sure that as time progresses the implementation of Google Assistant will improve. I am excited by these prospects as the addition of the Google Assistant to Chrome OS is making this Chrome OS even closer to its competition. This addition has made the Chromebook even more capable. Remember Chrome Can!
Thanks for reading.
Dr. Shannon H. Doak