Ensuring Greater Ease of Use for Both Teachers and Students
New workflow guidance and streamlining features make using the LMS a cinch
BOSTON — Sept. 5, 2017 — Award-winning learning management system (LMS) developer itslearning is updating its user interface and onboarding processes to ensure that K-12 teachers and students will find using the system easier than ever. Teachers will be better able to manage their content and resources regardless of whether the material is stored within or outside of the LMS. New features provide “to-do” guidance for students so that they feel supported in their learning. Teachers also have onscreen guidance as they first navigate through the different sections of the LMS. Schools will have the option of piloting these new features.
User Interface
The itslearning planner now serves as a hub that connects files, resources, and activities stored inside and outside of the LMS. The planner makes the right content available for students at the right time, in the right context.
“This type of planner is unique to the itslearning LMS,” said Arne Bergby, CEO of itslearning. “We can readily describe it as the collector, the hub or even the presentation layer for content.”
As part of that “presentation layer,” the planner now contains a new plan viewer that allows students to see the learning goals, resources, and activities in a plan as a “step-through” sequence and that allows them to easily navigate through the resources and activities that their teacher has set. The itslearning LMS has also brought the planner’s resources and activities columns together to facilitate teachers’ mixing resources and activities in the best sequence. “Play Plan will allow students to manage their tasks in the right context of resources,” said Bergby, “and of course, on every device.”
The LMS has also integrated homework tags into its task lists; assignment tool and test tool so that students can easily see which tasks or activities are designated as homework. Also, when students log in, they will now see a “This Week” module that outlines what they should be doing for that particular week and that also features homework tags.
On the teacher side, a new Quick Add feature makes adding tasks, assignments, tests, files and plans even easier. This new task took can be used to create homework and quickly assign it to the whole class, small groups, or any individual student.
Onboarding
New onscreen support will guide teachers new to the LMS through core tasks. For example, when those teachers are setting up a course, the system provides a checklist of all the essential tasks involved. And, when they click on a list item, an arrow automatically points to the tool or resource that they should click on next, so they immediately understand where to go and how to fulfill each task.
“Different areas of the system, such as the library or the mobile app, have their own onboarding support, but this checklist provides the essential steps to use the platform from day one,” said Bergby. “At itslearning, our customers’ experience with our system is what we think about 24/7/365,” concluded Bergby.
About itslearning
With a passion for improving teaching and learning through technology, itslearning lives at the heart of education. In fact, the itslearning platform is the first LMS in the K-12 marketplace to offer educators content accessible from the cloud, including 2 million free and open resources, searchable, tagged with rich metadata, and ready to use. Established in 1999, itslearning is headquartered in Boston, MA and Bergen, Norway and serves more than 7 million users worldwide. For more information, visit itslearning.com.
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