Today Microsoft announced the launch of Reading Coach, a standalone app that helps learners improve their reading fluency through personalized and engaging practice. The app, which is available for free as a Windows application and a web app, can be used in the classroom or at home with a Microsoft account.

Reading Coach was previously a feature in Microsoft Teams, where it provided learners with customized reading practice and instant feedback on their pronunciation and fluency, while also giving educators insights into their progress. Now, as a standalone app, Reading Coach also allows learners to create their own AI-generated stories by selecting characters and settings from a curated collection of options.

The AI-generated stories are moderated for content quality, safety and age appropriateness following Microsoft’s Responsible AI guidelines. Learners read the stories in the Immersive Reader, an accessible reading surface that has been shown to support struggling readers. As learners read the stories aloud, speech-to-text artificial intelligence analyzes their reading fluency, identifies words they find challenging, and records their accuracy, speed and time spent reading.

Learners can also choose what happens in each story chapter, creating their own reading journey through the story. Words they found challenging in the previous chapter are automatically included in the next chapter, making the practice adaptive to their needs. Learners also receive fluency coaching on the words they find challenging after each story chapter. To keep learners motivated and engaged, the app rewards them with effort-focused badges, and unlocks new characters and settings for the next story.

Reading Coach features:

• Personalized: Learners co-create their own stories with responsible AI, keeping even reluctant readers engaged.
• Targeted Practice: Reading Coach detects learners’ challenging words and automatically embeds opportunities for additional, independent practice.
• Inclusive by design: Emerging readers and learners with dyslexia can build confidence with built-in support from Immersive Reader.
• Responsible AI: Keep learners safe by letting the principles of fairness, reliability, safety, privacy, security, inclusiveness, accountability and transparency drive all our AI tools

Reading Coach is now available in public preview to use at home. .