App turns smartphones into magic study lens

Volley turns smartphone cameras into a lens for students to see tips, facts and quizzes from homework and textbook pages.

Classrooms are becoming smarter. Digital technology is standard in modern schools, but now children could have a new way to learn faster, with a quick way to check facts and learning tips using a new app.

Volley, a San Francisco-based app backed by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg’s education venture, enables students to point their phone’s camera at a textbook or piece of homework and instantly see key facts and links to online classes or study guides. The app uses machine learning to process the information automatically. It can also automatically generate revision quizzes, tests from textbook pages, or create customized study guides for a more dynamic learning experience.

With USD 2.3 million recently announced in seed funding from Zuckerberg Education Ventures and leading Chinese education provider TAL Education Group, the app is aiming to disrupt the way children learn and revise.

The app developers say Volley will give each child a personalized teaching assistant in their pocket, and could be developed to help schools identify what children are having problems with, or help textbook developers create better learning strategies.

With technologies like VR and mobile learning changing the way schools teach, what will be next for improving the classroom?