The leading messaging app, Rakuten Viber, has recently introduced a number of enhancements that will support teachers, parents and students during the new school year.

The new enhancements, Viber said, follow the company’s commitment to facilitate the educational process.

The Japanese-owned communications platform has launched a quiz mode for both group chats and communities, empowering teachers to easily check the level of understanding of classes about their subjects in their respective communities.

After the quiz streams live in both communities and group chats, other users can see the distribution of answers by the other participants who voted. But only after each individual has taken part will they be able to see the correct answer, together with a short explanation of the answer.

Individual answers of participants in a quiz in communities will be kept private, even for the creator of the quiz. They will only see the distribution of answers per question, while for the group chats, the creator of the quiz will have the opportunity to track the vote of each respondent.

This functionality is useful for anyone interested in checking the knowledge, understanding or opinions of the community members, or creating fun quizzes on various topics.

“At the end of the last school year, the digitisation of learning went from a gradual process to something that literally happened overnight as countries across the globe went into lockdown. In just a few days the entire educational process was moved from classrooms to students’ and teachers’ homes.

"Many Viber communities between students, teachers, and parents were created to support the overall education process. Going through the numbers today and comparing the same period last year globally, the number of users who chatted in communities has doubled, which proves Viber is a valuable ally in the quest of finding the new balance in these challenging times,” said Anna Znamenskaya, Chief Growth Officer at Rakuten Viber.

Following its commitment to support education, through the last couple of months Viber has introduced additional functionalities that will come in handy and fun for both teachers, students and parents.

On top of the list comes enhanced media gallery and the soon to be released feature Reminders in My Notes, which will assist users not to forget important deadlines for assignments, projects and meetings.

For those who want to bring some fun to their class or parent’s communities, GIF and sticker creators together with reactions will come in handy. And instant voice and video messages are always a good idea when seeking a quick and personal way to deliver short messages while being on the go. — VNS