Google Play Books adds new practice feature to help kids learn how to read

Google Play Book is getting a new feature that is designed to help new readers independently improve their vocabulary and comprehension skills. Google announced today that the new feature, called “Reading Practice,” is available in the United States on the on the Google Play Books Android app and in Google Kids Space. The tools are intended for children between the ages of 0-8.

With Reading Practice, early readers can track their reading position, as text is highlighted as they read out loud. If the reader is stuck on a how to pronounce a word, they can tap it to hear what it sounds like. If you need more help and want to sound out the word, you can hear the word broken down by syllable.

The feature lets you listen to an entire sentence and get a child-friendly definition of a word so you can give your child more context about the story you’re reading. Readers can also tap any word to update their position in the book and start tracking from there. At the end of the page, readers have the option to practice any words they skipped or mispronounced.

“To get started with Reading practice, check out our hand-picked collection of kid-friendly reads on Google Play Books, including some no-charge options,” said Vitaliy Dikker, a product manager at Google Play Books, in a blog post. “Or you can browse thousands of English language books designated for younger readers. The majority of these titles have Reading practice enabled, indicated by a “Practice” badge on the book detail page.”

In addition, you can use the “Reading practice” filter in Google Play Books to narrow down your store or library searches to ebooks that specifically offer Reading practice.