IntelliScribe for teachers

Five minutes to set up · works on school Chromebooks and laptops · nothing leaves the device by default

1. Install it

Open the IntelliScribe AI page on the Chrome Web Store and click Add to Chrome. A setup tab opens by itself.

2. Finish the setup tab

• Pick your look — four colour schemes, light or dark. Change it any time in Settings.
• Sign in — optional. Skip it for now; you can create an account later (step 5).
• Where should writing checks run? — choose Just the everyday writing sites (Gmail, Google Docs, Outlook, Canvas, Notion and similar) or Allow on all sites. Chrome asks once. Banking sites, school portals and password fields are always left alone.
• Pin it — click the puzzle piece at the top right of Chrome, then the pin next to IntelliScribe AI, so the icon stays visible.

3. Writing checks

Click into any text box on an allowed site. Mistakes are underlined as you type and a small pen in the bottom-left corner counts them. Click the pen to see every issue, fix one with Fix, or fix everything with Fix all. The pen can be dragged to any corner.

• Ctrl + Shift + Y turns checks on or off for the page you are on.
• Names and subject-specific words you do not want flagged: pen → Settings → Writing → Your words.
• Everything is checked on the computer itself. No text is sent anywhere.

4. Dictation

Click into a text box, press Ctrl + Shift + Space, talk, press it again. The words are typed where your cursor was and copied to your clipboard as a backup. The first time, Chrome asks for microphone permission and the extension downloads its speech model once (about 100 MB); after that it works offline.

• Choose Fast, Balanced or Accurate in Settings → Transcription.
• Everything you dictate is kept in the History tab of the side panel, grouped by the page you were on.
• Recordings, uploads and pasted text can be cleaned up, summarised or turned into key points in the side panel (click the IntelliScribe icon).

5. An account (optional)

An account does three things: it keeps your history in sync between computers, lets the extension on your other computers use the API keys you added, and lets you run a class (section 7) — or, for a student, join one. Create one from the side panel with your school email and a password. Google sign-in is also available, but many districts block third-party Google sign-in for staff accounts, so the email option is the safe choice.

6. AI features (optional)

Rewrite, change tone, shorten and summarise are switched off until an API key is added in Settings → General → API keys. The built-in guide (“How do I get an API key?”) walks through getting a free Google Gemini key. Without a key, everything above still works. For student devices, leaving the key out keeps the extension fully on-device. To give a whole class AI on one key, use a class instead (section 7).

7. Classes: AI for your students on your key

Students usually cannot each get an API key. A class lets them use yours, and shows you what it was used for. All of it works on the website with nothing to install; the same class screens are in the extension under Settings → General → EDU → Classroom Management; your API keys are managed on the website only, under Settings → School.

• Create a class. Sign in at intelliscribe-app.netlify.app/app, turn on Classroom under Settings → School, open Class, choose I’m a teacher — create a class and name it the way your students know it, like “Period 2 English”. Make one per period; they all share your API keys.
• Add your API key. Settings → School → Your API keys. Paste the key and the provider is detected. The key is kept on the IntelliScribe server, not in your browser: after you add it, it is never shown again (only its last 4 characters) and never sent to your students’ devices. Like any server-held secret, the people who run the server can reach it; you can delete it here, or revoke it on the provider’s site, at any time. Add more than one and calls are spread across them; a key the provider rejects is marked so you can see why.
• Share the invite link or this month’s code. Each class has an invite link to paste into Google Classroom or an email, and a 6-digit code to read out, which changes at the start of every month. A student who opens the link signs in, sees your name, the class, and what you will be able to see, and then chooses Join. If they have the extension installed, the link opens in the extension. Reset link makes a new one and stops the old one straight away; students already in the class stay in it.
• Paste your class list (optional). Class → your class → Students → Class list. Paste the block of email addresses Schoology, PowerSchool, Google Classroom or a spreadsheet already lets you copy — separated by semicolons, commas or new lines, up to 200 per class and 50,000 characters a paste — and IntelliScribe says how many were added, how many were already there and how many weren’t addresses. You can type a name beside any row. The list emails nobody, and it puts nobody in a class who has not asked to be there: students still join themselves with the code or the link, and still see the confirmation screen saying what you can see. (Pasting the address of a student who is already waiting is your yes, so it lets them in — IntelliScribe says how many that was.) What it changes is who joins straight away. Once a list exists, a student using the code or link with an address that is not on it is waiting for your approval: their app says so, none of your class’s settings apply to them, and nothing of theirs can use your key. You see their email address and when they asked, and nothing else, with Approve and Decline; adding their address to the list approves them too, unless the class is full or archived, in which case they keep waiting. Declining is the same as removing them — they can’t ask again until you press Allow back. A class with no list works as before: anyone with the code or link joins straight away, so taking the last address off your list opens the class again, and you can only do that once nobody is waiting.
• Choose what students can use. Four switches per class: Writing checks (on the student’s device, free, on to start), Cloud dictation (uses your key for recordings a student’s device doesn’t turn into text itself: ones longer than their on-device limit, and any recording when the on-device model isn’t loaded, is paused, is switched off or fails; on to start, and a student who turns on “Turn my speech into text only on this device” sends none), AI grammar fixing (the Fix grammar button, and an automatic fix of every dictation, even ones transcribed on the device) and AI writing tools (rewrite, shorten, change tone). Both AI switches use your key and are off until you turn them on. Students are told when you turn on a switch that uses your key; if you turn on AI grammar fixing or cloud dictation after a student joined, it starts on their device once they have seen that and pressed OK. You can also set daily AI request limits, per student and for the whole class. A class holds up to 150 students.

What you can and cannot see

You see only the requests made with your key: for each one, which student, when, what it was (fix grammar, rewrite, cloud dictation and so on), how big, and whether it worked. While AI grammar fixing is on, that includes the text of every dictation a student makes. The text itself is behind View text, and every time you open one it is recorded. Requests are kept for 30 days, or a year if you press Save. Switch off Store what students wrote and no text is kept for new requests; text already stored still expires on that schedule.

You cannot see a student’s spelling and grammar checks, dictations that stay on their device while AI grammar fixing is off, or their history and saved transcriptions. You cannot add a student to a class: students join themselves, after being shown what you will see. You can remove a student (they can’t rejoin until you press Allow back; reset the invite link too if it got out) or archive a class at any time (archiving releases everyone and stops your key being used for it), and a student can leave at any time. A student who signs out gets their own settings back there (in the extension, or on the website), writing checks included, until they sign in again. An account that teaches can’t join a class, and a student in a class can’t create one: teachers and students need separate accounts.

Devices where extensions are blocked

There is a browser version at intelliscribe-app.netlify.app/app that needs no install. Its Write tab runs the same on-device spelling and grammar checker — paste an essay in, fix it, copy it back — so a device with extensions blocked still gets the checking. Its Dictate button turns speech into text on the device too: the first time, the browser downloads the speech model once (about 100 to 120 MB). Speech is turned into text on the device unless the student has saved their own API key on the website, or is signed in to your class with cloud dictation on and has agreed to it (on the join screen, or by pressing OK on the notice about it); then a recording longer than a minute, or one the device can’t manage (for example while the speech model is still downloading the first time), goes through that key. A student who turns on “Turn my speech into text only on this device” (their class card, under Class) sends none. Each dictation’s recording is also kept for a few days (2 unless changed, at most 7), so the student can play it back or turn it into text again from Recent dictations under the editor: in that browser, in the student’s own IntelliScribe account if they choose that, or not at all if they turn it off. For a student in your class, your Keep recordings setting decides instead, and recordings go to their account only after they press OK. You can’t play or list them. Dictating straight into other websites, and the in-page pen, still need the extension.

Questions

Email onwarddigitalca@gmail.com.