Homegrown conversational AI platform SwiftChat with Google on Thursday introduced Read Along, a speech-based reading tool on their platform. SwiftChat's Read Along bot will assist early learners aged 5-11 years in learning to read independently using their voice. The tool is available as an Android app and as a website.
"By regularly using the Read Along bot on the SwiftChat app, children will be able to improve their reading skills. SwiftChat's mission is to bridge the gap between technology and people by delivering simple and meaningful solutions on a large scale. We want students to learn to love reading, and believe this partnership is a wonderful step in that direction," Shikhar Gupta, Chief Product Officer at SwiftChat said in a statement. The new tool on the SwiftChat app will support over 700 illustrated stories in English and seven Indian languages, namely Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, and Urdu, according to the company.
Moreover, the company said that the bot will allow learners to improve their reading skills at their own pace by adjusting the difficulty levels based on their reading ability. It will guide learners through a personalised reading journey while providing feedback and assistance from "Diya", Read Along's in-app reading assistant.
Read Along, which was first released in India as Bolo, uses Google's speech recognition technology to help develop reading skills.