One of the major problems that many online teachers and students have faced in a video conference is that they are unable to focus in the same way as in a face-to-face class. Zoom has understood this and has finally introduced a new kind of feature called Focus Mode to their platform. The new model is made especially to help the students in being attentive in the class and not get distracted easily.
The feature allows the teacher to hide videos and screens shared by other students so that the students are unable to see what others are doing. Also, the new Focus Mode allows the host to select which participant should be visible in the meeting or not. Apart from this, the teacher can also deactivate the Focus mode in between the calls so that the students can discuss a certain topic with each other. Not only online learning, but the feature can also be used in the corporate environment, where the host can control the visibility of participants in the call.
No matter who uses it, the feature is made in such a way that it increases the attentiveness of the participant. One has to update Zoom to version 5.7.3 on Windows or Mac after which they will be able to use the new feature. The feature is currently only available on the desktop application of Zoom and not on the mobile platform. However, we can soon expect the same on the mobile version in the coming months.