# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
For those of you out there who need a little refresher, and for those of you just starting out (Welcome, by the way), we've put together a quick overview of navigating the platform that will be available here on the blog and in our Help Center.

Navigate Schoology Like a Pro

If you look up at the top of your screen, you'll see three main areas - Courses, Groups, and Resources-and some icons and your name on the upper right. This top navigation is always available, no matter where you are on the site. Make sure to familiarize yourself with it, because you'll be using it a ton. (If you are a system admin or have Advisor access, you might see an additional area called Tools).

And keep in mind that Schoology streamlines navigation. There are multiple ways to get basically anywhere you want to go, so don't hesitate to try something new and see what happens.

Home Page

Your Home Page is where you will start every time you log into Schoology. There are two main tabs on your Home Page: Recent Activity and Course Dashboard. Depending on your preference, the Recent Activity tab is perfect for sending mass messages, posting updates, making calendar events, and the Course Dashboard is perfect for jumping directly into your courses.

There are two main components to your Recent Activity area:

Nearly everything on this page is clickable for quick and efficient navigation, so click away.

Central Column -This column shows a condensed feed of posts that relate to you, your courses, and your groups. It also enables you to post updates, announcements, and polls with files and links attached. (Pro tip! Posting an update or an assignment on the Recent Activity feed is a quick way to post to multiple places at once.)

Upcoming Feed -All your assignments, due dates, and calendar events are organized in chronological order.

For more information on your Home Page, see this help guide article.

Course Dashboard

The other tab on the home page (which might be your default) is the Course Dashboard. This is where you can navigate to your active courses, which for most teachers and students, is automatically populated based on your courses in the Student Information System (or SIS).

Your courses are your digital learning environments. This is where you will put learning content, grade materials, and communicate with your students. Your courses contain all your instructional items (e.g., files, assignments, and assessments) along with communication and organizational tools strictly associated with the course.

You can set up and organize your courses in many different ways. Your course materials can be set up by week, section, topic, whatever. You can even set up in what order your students must complete each item using the Student Completion feature for a self-paced approach to learning. However you decide to do it, consider one word of advice: Organize everything with folders. This makes it easier for both you and your students.

You can learn more about courses from our Help Center.

Groups

The Groups area can be used in many different ways -- from professional development to book clubs -- so the best way to learn about their potential is simply by exploring some of our Public Groups, like Schoology Educators. Basically, Groups are collaborative spaces where you can share ideas and resources, organize events, and connect with others.

Groups are a great way to build or expand your personal learning communities (PLCs) on a global scale.

You'll notice that your Groups look very similar to Courses. Groups are more about communication, collaboration, and resource sharing. They can be set up for students, parents, and educators -- basically for any group that needs to connect, collaborate, and communicate with others, enabling all members to work together for a variety of purposes.

You can find out more about Groups from our Help Center.

Resources

The Resources area is a centralized place where all of your instructional and shared Group materials are kept. It is a place where you can manage all your files, assignments, assessments, learning outcomes, and badges. Best of all, it has unlimited storage.

You can import files, create new resources, and copy or move them into any or all of your courses quickly. You can also share resources with your groups and download them from our Public Resources area. Course items, folders, and even entire courses can be copied in your resources for use on a later date.

If you use folders to organize everything in your courses, they will stay just as organized when you move them to your resources. If you don't, everything will be loose and much harder to find and repurpose.

The Resources area has three main sections:

Left Side Navigation -This enables you to switch between your Personal, Public, and Group Resources. This is also where you can connect Resource Apps, like Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive.

My Resources -These are your personal and shared resource collections (collections are kind of like different filing cabinets). You can switch between collections here

Main Window -This is where you can create, view, edit, and manage all your resources.

You can learn all about Resources in our Help Center.

Personal Profile

In the top right corner, you'll see your name with a downward-facing arrow. By clicking on the arrow, you can modify your personal and account settings such as profile picture, privacy, notification settings (email, text, and push notifications), and more. This is also where you can see any received badges and your Portfolio(s).

You can learn more about managing your Account and Profile in our Help Center articles.

That's pretty much all you need to know to start navigating Schoology like a pro. There is always more to learn, so make sure to check out our Help Center with step by step info on using the platform.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
For those of you out there who need a little refresher, and for those of you just starting out (Welcome, by the way), we've put together a quick overview of navigating the platform that will be available here on the blog and in our Help Center.

# data[].attributes.headline
New to Schoology? Learn the Basics for Online Learning

# data[].attributes.subject
New to Schoology? Learn the Basics for Online Learning

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
New to Schoology? Learn the Basics for Online Learning

# data[].attributes.body
Watch the following:

How to Use Schoology

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqc1xE2H9Wg

Schoology Assignments - Part 1

https://youtu.be/RwhfkySMQn8

Schoology Assignments - Part 2

https://youtu.be/wAymJXZrlKU

Schoology Discussions - Part 1

https://youtu.be/aSsAi4_9dE8

Schoology Discussions - Part 2

https://youtu.be/GznldzRuoJE

# data[].attributes.headline
Your New Superpower: Manage Multiple Course Sections at Once

# data[].attributes.subject
Your New Superpower: Manage Multiple Course Sections at Once

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
If you were a superhero, what special powers would you have? I always default to Dr. Manhattan from the graphic novel, Watchmen by Alan Moore. Aside from the fact that he can do pretty much anything, one of my favorite powers is his ability to be in many places doing many things at once.

Just imagine the dovetailing you could do with a power like that! Believe it or not, Schoology Enterprise users have it. Our latest feature enables you to teach and manage multiple course sections at once. It's called Course Section Linking, and it'll make you the Dr. Manhattan for education.

One important note before we dive in-Course Section Linking is a big feature that spans your entire course. This blog only covers the highlights, so make sure you take a look at our Help Center article. It has all the details.

What is Course Section Linking?

If you use Schoology Enterprise, then you have the option to link sections of the same course together. Course section linking is a great way to manage all sections of a course more efficiently.

When sections are linked, they all share the same set of materials. They also have toggles enabling you to switch between each section instantly.

To briefly put this in context, imagine creating a 30 question quiz and it being instantly available in all your course sections at once, even with different due dates, locking times, and more. Then imagine adding in the grades for one section in your Schoology Gradebook and switching to another section's gradebook in two clicks.

Pretty sweet.

Needless to say, course section linking will save you tons of time. And as for your students, they'll have the same experience they've been having. This is really designed to improve the instructor's experience.

Want to do this on Schoology Basic? Try using Grading Groups as the different sections of your course.

Linking the sections of your course is easy, and there are a couple of different ways to do it. The first way is by creating new courses.How to Link Sections Together

​

Second is by editing an existing section and adding new linked sections to it. That will appear similar to the form above. Lastly, you can also link existing sections together.

​

But not all sections can be linked. When you want to link sections together, it is required that they:

are categorized under the same course

have different students

have the same administrators

have the same grading periods

An Important Best Practice for Section Linking

We recommend that you ONLY link sections at the beginning of a school year or semester. The reason being when you link, say, three sections together, one becomes the master section (referred to as "original") and the others mimic the master.

In other words, linked sections all share the master section's materials and grade setup. Any materials, grade settings, grades, etc. contained within the other sections (i.e., the non-master sections) will be removed at the time of linking.

​

"Unlinking" Course Sections

One of the nice things about Schoology is you always have options; once you've linked sections, you can also unlink them. Just keep in mind that if you separate two linked sections, the materials, grades, and data will remain only in the master section.

​

When you unlink sections, you have two options. Make sure you are aware of the effects.

Restore course to its original materials will restore that section to the way it was before it was linked. If it was an existing section with data, all that data will be restored.

Unlink and move enrollments into a new section will remove everything and start you over with a fresh course-i.e., no materials, no data, nada. This cannot be undone.

As mentioned before, linked sections really only share the same materials and grade setup. Otherwise, they are all completely separate.

Toggling Between Sections

That means an update to Section 1 will only be seen by students of Section 1. This goes for all other areas of the course as well, including the Gradebook, Mastery, Badges, Attendance, Members, Analytics, and Workload Planning areas.

There is, however, a better way to jump into your other sections in a couple clicks using toggles. The rule of thumb: section toggles always appear near the top left of the page.

​

Toggle in the gradebook area

These toggles will make jumping back and forth between sections quick and easy. If you're in the gradebook in one section, you can toggle to the gradebook in another section. I like to think of it like a wormhole-i.e., the quickest way between two points.

You'll even have toggles to switch between assignment comments, media album submissions, BigBlueButton sessions, etc.

There is one difference here, however, and that is Course Updates. This area does not have a toggle. Why? Because it's an aggregated feed of all the updates and comments happening in all your sections.

​

Notice how each update is tagged with its respective section. The same goes for all materials too, because you can give each section a different assignment, which leads us to the last feature highlight.

Creating and Managing Course Materials

And now the moment you've all been waiting for! Course section linking lets you create course materials from within your course and have them instantly go live in all your sections! This will be a huge time saver for those of you teaching multiple sections.

The beauty of this feature is that you get all of the benefit without much change. Just take a look at the assignment creation form below. Notice the ability to adjust how the material acts in each section.

​

Being able to control how materials are delivered to each section like this opens up a number of possibilities. You can easily create one material with separate availability, due dates and times, and locking date and times for each section.

* * *

That's it for the major highlights of this feature. You'll see pretty quickly how far-reaching this feature really is.

But before you dive in, please see our Help Center article. It will guide you through some of the most important things to remember when linking and unlinking sections.

We also have a great LEAP webinar on course section linking that will provide you with some best practices.

Share with us what you think right here on the blog or via Twitter (@Schoology). We always love the feedback.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Your New Superpower: Manage Multiple Course Sections at Once

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
If you were a superhero, what special powers would you have? I always default to Dr. Manhattan from the graphic novel, Watchmen by Alan Moore. Aside from the fact that he can do pretty much anything, one of my favorite powers is his ability to be in many places doing many things at once.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Your homepage is the first place you'll land every time you log in to Schoology. Every aspect of the platform can be accessed directly from this location. Your homepage is where you'll be briefed on all events and activity. It also keeps you organized by highlighting important events. The Recent Activity feed on the right displays aggregated activity across your courses, groups and organizations, along with a running list of Reminders and Upcoming events. You can also view the Course Dashboard for a tiled list of courses in which you're enrolled. You can always return to the homepage from anywhere in Schoology by clicking the Schoology logo, or your school logo, in the top left corner.

Use the links below to jump to a specific section of the guide:

Recent Activity

Your homepage is the first page you'll see after logging into Schoology. Here you can find the Recent Activity feed. This feed shows all the comments, updates, and events pertaining to your connections, courses, and groups.

Use the menu in the top-center of the page to post Updates, Polls, Assignments, Events, or Blog Posts directly from your Recent Activity page. You can also choose where in Schoology the post is visible, and who is able to view the post.

Finally, you can filter the Recent Activity feed by clicking the Most Recent drop-down menu on the right side of the center column.

Note: You can post assignments, updates, and events to any or all courses and groups at once using the Post: function.

Course Dashboard

The Course Dashboard view of the Schoology Homepage enables you to view all of your courses as a tiled list. Drag and drop course tiles to reorder courses. From the Course Dashboard, click into any one of your courses and go directly to its main landing page.

If you would prefer to view the Course Dashboard as your default home page, you can adjust this in your Account Settings. Visit our Course Dashboard article for full details.

Search

Use the search tool to find people, courses, and groups that you are associated with in Schoology.

Apps & The App Center

View any apps installed at the account-level and access the App Center.

Calendar

The Schoology Calendar is an important organizational element for your connections, school, courses, and groups. It keeps events and due dates organized and easily accessible from the right column. You can view events and due dates by the Month, Week, or Day.

Each item is color-coded by default depending on the affiliation to which it pertains (Courses, Groups, School, or Personal). Click the arrow to the right of each calendar to change the color of its events.

Messages

You can send personal messages to members of your school and outside connections using the Messages area.

Notifications & Requests

Notifications display course events in chronological order to keep you abreast of academic activity.

Requests display connection requests and also allows you to RSVP calendar events.

Reminders

The Reminders area appears in the right column of your homepage when students in a course submit an assignment, test/quiz, or discussion post that needs to be graded.

Note: Assessment and managed assessment submissions are not included in Reminders.

Upcoming

In the right column of your home page, you'll see a running list of upcoming events, assignments, test/quizzes, etc. This list will update as you refresh the page, and it displays up to ten items.

Account menu

Click the down-facing arrow in the top right corner to:

At the bottom of every Schoology page, the new footer includes the following:

Language Selector - Use this menu to set the language of your Schoology experience.

Support Center - Access the Support Center to view your Support Contacts and/or support options, as well as links to the Schoology Help Center and Community forums.

Schoology Blog - Navigate to our blog, the Schoology Exchange.

Privacy Policy - View our Privacy Policy.

Terms of Use -View our Terms of Use.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Your homepage is the first place you'll land every time you log in to Schoology. Every aspect of the platform can be accessed directly from this location. Your homepage is where you'll be briefed on all events and activity. It also keeps you organized by highlighting important events.

# data[].attributes.headline
INSTRUCTOR TOP 5 ISSUES FOR BACK TO SCHOOL

# data[].attributes.subject
INSTRUCTOR TOP 5 ISSUES FOR BACK TO SCHOOL

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Here are the top five issues that teachers and their students may encounter when jumping back into Schoology at the start of a new school year:

I'm unable to log in.

Ensure you're logging in through your school's custom domain (if applicable).

Ensure you're using the proper Single-Sign-On credentials (if applicable).

Use the Forgot your Password link to retrieve a temporary password. Learn more in this article.

I cannot view course and/or materials.

Ensure the student is enrolled in the course.

Ensure assignments and other materials are published to students.

Ensure the student is using the same account as the one in the course's Members area.

Due to permissions at your school, students may not be able to view upcoming courses. Click Support at the bottom of any page in Schoology to contact your school's Support Contact.

I receive an unexpected error and/or page does not load.

Ensure the issue occurs using another computer and browser, or after refreshing current page.

Ensure it occurs on other WiFi networks (outside of school/home).

Submit a ticket to Support with this information listed in this article.

My grades/courses/materials have disappeared.

Grades: Go to Bulk Edit in the Gradebook and confirm all assignments have a Category and Grading Period. If needed, assign them to the current category/grading period and Save Changes.

Courses: Check if courses were Archived by going to Courses > My Courses > Archived. Edit the course and assign it to a current grading period to make it current.

Materials: Go to Course Options > Recycle Bin to ensure materials have not been deleted. Restore the item to the course if needed.

How do I change schools?

Enterprise users: Contact your school's System Admin/Support Contact for assistance.

Basic users: Create a new Instructor account at the new school using a different email address. Save your courses to Resources and export them to your computer. Re-import the resources into your new account.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Instructor Top 5 Issues for Back to School

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Here are the top five issues that teachers and their students may encounter when jumping back into Schoology at the start of a new school year: Ensure you're logging in through your school's custom domain (if applicable). Ensure you're using the proper Single-Sign-On credentials (if applicable).

# data[].attributes.headline
3 Smart Ways to Use Schoology and Google Drive in a Perfect Mashup

# data[].attributes.subject
3 Smart Ways to Use Schoology and Google Drive in a Perfect Mashup

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
As educators, we are always searching for ways to streamline and simplify our day to day tasks. When it comes to making our workflows more efficient, there are two tools that are simply great together-Schoology and Google Drive.

If you use these tools already and have not explored how seamlessly they work together, then you are missing out on a great mashup. Google Drive is an excellent tool for creating different types of content easily. Schoology helps me put that content into a pedagogically structured environment. Together, they complete my digital learning workflow from content creation to instruction to coaching to grading.

Below, I'll take you through how to get started using Schoology and Google Drive together. After that, I'll show you three smart ways to use the two that even the veteran users may not have considered.

How to Install Schoology's Google Drive App

First things first-you'll need to install Schoology's Google Drive app, which you can do in just a couple of clicks. In your Resources drop down menu, select Apps, click on Install Apps, and select Google Drive from the list. First time users will need to authorize and sign-in to their appropriate Google Drive account.

How to Embed Google Drive Content into Schoology Materials

Before I started using Schoology, I had already created folders and folders of Google Docs, Presentations, Drawings, and other Google materials for my classes. Instead of reinventing the wheel, I realized that I could easily integrate these existing materials into my Schoology Pages, Assignments, Discussions, Quizzes, and Tests.

I found that the key to meshing these tools together is the "insert content" tool in your Rich Text Editor. Using it, you can open a window into your Google Drive.

Then, just as you would embed a YouTube, Vimeo, or other third-party resource, you can select your Google content and embed it into the body of your page.

You'll notice that the inserted content will appear as a yellow placeholder before you click Save; however, you can select the placeholder, click the image icon that appears, and see a preview of the content. Once you save, the Google Drive content will appear perfectly superimposed inside of your page.

3 Smart Ways to Use Schoology and Google Drive

1) Live Feedback and Peer Review in Discussions

Depending on the type of assignment, you may want to consider how students will submit their Google materials. For a quick submission, students can use Schoology's Google Drive App to directly import a file. They would do this in the same way they submit any assingment.

Now, If you are interested in providing feedback or revisions on a Google material, I have found that the best option is for the student to copy and paste the "shareable link" in the create tab. This allows for you to see the "live" version of the student's work where you can make helpful comments and even see the student's revision history.

What's cool is that you can also use this live linking to conduct peer review sessions using Schoology's discussion feature. Whether students created a Google Doc, Drawing, or Presentation, they can share the link in a discussion post for their peers to see and review. This is a great venue for working on critical thinking, collaboration, and digital citizenship all at once.

2) Use Google Slides (Presentations) and Schoology Pages for Lesson Review

Instead of the traditional PowerPoint presentation lessons, many educators are now jumping on the Google Slides bandwagon. This tool is great for building engaging lessons, and it's even better when used with Schoology because of the pedagogical flexibility it provides.

One of my favorite uses of Google Slides and Schoology is embedding the day's lesson (a presentation) in an Schoology page. This way the students who were absent can catch up and those who just need a refresher have it.

This can also serve as a great tool for educators who have adopted a flipped or blended learning model. You can embed the presentation directly into an assignment, test/quiz, or discussion and then provide questions for the students to demonstrate their comprehension of the material from the lesson.

3) Use a Google Drawing as a Magnetic White Board

After attending a local Google Apps for Education Summit, I walked away with a great new use for Google Drawings. Kasey Bell (@ShakeUpLearning) explains in one of her awesome blogs that she uses both Google Drawings and Google Slides to create a "magnetic" board where students can manipulate words (magnets) to create their own unique poems.

In a recent experiment, I created my own Google Drawing with eight scrambled sentences.

After making their own copy of the template, my Spanish 1 students had to collaborate with a partner to unscramble each sentence and put the words in their correct order to create a coherent (and grammatically correct) sentence. My students really enjoyed the hands-on activity and raced to be the first group to unscramble all of their sentences.

This lesson made me think of all of the other great applications for hands-on activities with Google Drawings. For example in Social Studies, you could create a timeline for students to move historical events (represented with words or images) to match the appropriate year. In a Geography lesson, you could upload a map as the background of your Google Drawing for students to label specific cities, landmarks, etc.

The possibilities are truly endless.

How do you mash Schoology and Google Drive together?

About the Author

Shauna Polson is a Spanish Teacher and Schoology Trainer at Boulder High School in Boulder, CO. After having taught Spanish at the elementary, high school, and undergraduate levels, Shauna now resides in the Rocky Mountains, teaching Spanish at Boulder High School. As a blended learning enthusiast, she is constantly trying to incorporate new practices and techniques into her teaching through the exploration of technology. Shauna currently serves as the district's Technology Contact for Boulder H.S. and leader of the school Technology Committee. She is also a Contract Trainer for Schoology, leading onsite and web trainings for schools and districts across the United States.

Connect with Shauna via Twitter (@ProfePolson).

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
3 Smart Ways to Use Schoology and Google Drive in a Perfect Mashup

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
As educators, we are always searching for ways to streamline and simplify our day to day tasks. When it comes to making our workflows more efficient, there are two tools that are simply great together-Schoology and Google Drive. If you use these tools already and have not explored how seamlessly they work together, then you are missing out on a great mashup.

# data[].attributes.headline
Designing Your LMS to Make Distance Learning Better

# data[].attributes.subject
Designing Your LMS to Make Distance Learning Better

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Intentionally setting up a learning management system where everything students need is easy to access can help them all be successful.

When remote learning hit, I was ready. My daughter had been in online school for three years. I teach technology integration. But during this time, our family struggled. I found that my son, a straight-A student in a traditional school setting, got distracted, lost track of assignments, and struggled academically.

So what happened? And what would help students like him? It seems to me that we teachers can use our learning management system (LMS)-Canvas, Schoology, Google Classroom, etc.-to build a digital home base for our learners. Grounding design in a delicate combination of empathy and simplicity, we can use our LMS to build community, increase usability, and keep everyone on track and on task.

Start With Empathy

Empathy in design is crucial. Put yourself in the shoes of your learners and you will put them first in your design. They are the end users. They are the ones for whom we should be designing learning experiences.

When I've asked teachers why they made the choices they did, such as tool selection or ways to submit assignments, many have said, "Because it is easiest for me." No matter what we prefer, we must consider empathic, student-centered choices that we can make. In the end, student-centered design will make it easier for the teacher, too.

First, create a place that houses everything learners and families need. A checklist with links or a week at a glance on your home page or via email is a solid start but shouldn't be all you offer. This spring, many learners and families had to visit multiple learning platforms, emails, websites, and tools to find, complete, and submit online activities. This proved exceedingly difficult for most, and a lack of consistency from week to week and class to class challenged everyone.

Look at the online learning experiences you offer from the perspective of your learners. Are they simple, and do they make navigation easy? Do they support learning and build community? If you ask these key questions as you design, the experiences will be better for everyone.

Build Community

A common concern is feeling disconnected in online learning. We don't want learners to feel like they are engaging with a computer. They are engaging with each other. With you. With content.

Use empathy in design to choose tools that build connection and integrate seamlessly into your LMS. For example, Edpuzzle, Pear Deck, and Seesaw allow you to link to or embed your voice and interactive content into your LMS. Flipgrid goes a step further and allows learners to reflect together and hear each other's voices asynchronously. Use discussion boards to field questions, allow peer review, and convert class discussion strategies to an asynchronous platform to deepen reflection.

Create an entry point in your online course that shows your personality and organizes resources for learners. Rosemary Jane, technology coordinator for Cincinnati Public Schools, encourages teachers to use a Bitmoji classroom, clickable PDF, or interactive week-at-a-glance at the entry point for an online course to direct learners to what is important and organize necessary links and resources. "We need to think of where we live," said Jane. "Our neighborhood. Our homes. They should be safe and comfortable. So should your online home base. Learners should go there expecting support and familiarity that will lead them to success."

If your district or building offers a template for your landing page, use it and personalize it for you and your learners. Add in regular communication about how to be successful and celebrate student wins here. And most important, be empathetic in your communication. Understand that this is new for most, and flexibility is needed.

Practice Good Design

Keeping your home base simple decreases cognitive load and increases working memory. Learners shouldn't have to use extra mental energy searching for what they need to be successful. Design your online classroom to provide a single place for daily or weekly updates, learning materials, assignments, activities, meeting links, grades, feedback, and everything else they need.

Use bullets and lists; avoid paragraphs.

Pay attention to font legibility; avoid fun or fancy fonts (many are not readable).

Limit the number of fonts; avoid using more than one font for headings and one for paragraphs.

Use color for emphasis, but avoid having more than two text colors.

Use contrasting colors; avoid light on light or dark on dark text.

Use clean, simple page layouts consistently; avoid mixing up your structure day-to-day.

Use images that reinforce key concepts; avoid images that aren't meaningful.

Use icons to reinforce key tasks; avoid clip art and patterns or backgrounds that distract.

Limit navigation to a couple of clicks; avoid folders inside folders.

Organize everything in clean, simple chunks with limited clicks so that everyone can quickly and easily see what's expected. Apply these design best practices to avoid distraction and barriers to learning:

Commit to Consistency

In a traditional face-to-face classroom, everything is centralized and consistent. Bins and areas of the room are clearly labeled. Routines are created. Key information is prominently posted. Classrooms don't change location, and learners don't have to guess where they're going or where to find things. The same should be true online, and your digital home base helps learners work more independently face-to-face or online.

If your school offers templates for your LMS, embrace them. Talk with colleagues to build consistency across your team, building, or district. Fewer questions and better demonstrations of learning will be the result, improving everyone's experience. Here are some guidelines for consistency: Repeat icons for learners to quickly see what they should do, create naming conventions for online folders (e.g., topic and date), and employ a small set of effective digital tools that are familiar to everyone.

Support Learners

Science and parenting journalist Melinda Wenner Moyer points out, "The more certain kids are that someone's got their back, the more confident and autonomous they can be." We can encourage confidence and autonomy by designing our home base assuming that learners and parents or caregivers need support and guidance. If everything they need is in one place, they will be able to find the help and support they need. This will also improve effort and help them stick with and complete tasks in the online and blended environment.

Include school and district resources for families and students.

Include supports benefiting all students, especially learners on IEPs and English language learners.

Prominently display goals and objectives.

Provide alternatives to support individual differences.

Assume the best of your learners.

In order to provide your students with more support, do the following:

Being tech support for your learners-empower them to seek help and find resources;

Making students ask for supports that can be easily preloaded to your online home base;

Adding assignments or materials that don't align with objectives;

Using one-size-fits-all instruction, assessment, or communication; and

Being inflexible.

There are also things you can do that will make this process more difficult. You'll want to avoid the following:
Special thanks to Kathryn Hicks (University of Cincinnati), Rosemary Jane (Cincinnati Public Schools), and Krista Heidenreich (Lakota Local Schools) for sharing their brilliance.
Going into an uncertain fall, we can alleviate a lot of stress for parents, caregivers, and students if we prioritize student-centered design. Leveraging your LMS as a home base is a simple first step to making sure that all learners can be successful and that learning and community take front and center in our classrooms, no matter the learning environment.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Designing Your LMS to Make Distance Learning Better

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Intentionally setting up a learning management system where everything students need is easy to access can help them all be successful.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
You can use Course Updates to create announcements in your course. Post updates in your course to quickly communicate brief messages for your students. When updates are posted, they appear in the Updates section and on each individual homepage of all members in your course.

Add a Course Update

1. Select your course from the Courses menu and then click Updates.

2. Add your update to the Rich Text Editor at the top of the screen and click Post.

Update Options

There are several options available for editing, formatting and sharing your updates:

To edit or delete an update after posting:

Hover your cursor over the update and click the gear icon that appears next to the post.

To delete a student's comment on an update:

1. Click the gear icon to the far right of the comment.

2. Click Delete.

Set the Updates area as the default landing page for your course

1. Click Course Options in the left menu

2. Select Edit Privacy/Course Settings.

3. In the Default Landing Page menu, select Updates.

4. Click Save Changes to update your settings.

Change an update into an announcement

To change a course Update into an Announcement, check the bell icon next to the Post button.

This promotes the update to the top of the Updates page and to the top of the Course page until you remove the announcement from the top.

Create Course Polls

You can create anonymous polls in your course to receive live feedback as members vote. To create a poll:

1. Type an update in the text box.

2. Click Poll under the text box.

3. Two fields display by default. To add more options, click the Add Option link below the fields.

4. Click the Post button to complete.

Note: You can also create course updates from the Home page by clicking on the Update link the top of the page, and following the steps above.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
You can use Course Updates to create announcements in your course. Post updates in your course to quickly communicate brief messages for your students. When updates are posted, they appear in the Updates section and on each individual homepage of all members in your course.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
We have attached the following resources here to help you download and distribute Parent Access Codes for your students and their families:

Instructions for your teachers on how they can download Parent Access Codes for the students enrolled in their courses.

Instructions for your Parents on how to set up their Parent accounts once you have distributed each students's unique Parent Access Code to their family.

A template of letter for you to send out to your Parents notifying them that you will be using Schoology as your LMS. There is a PDF version and a .docx version attached to this article.

A printable article walking parents through the layout and functionality of a Schoology parent account.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
We have attached the following resources here to help you download and distribute Parent Access Codes for your students and their families: Instructions for your teachers on how they can download Parent Access Codes for the students enrolled in their courses.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Create assessments in your Schoology course to assess your students' grasp of the material or evaluate their preparedness for class. Each assessment is automatically graded (unless you've included a subjective question, such as a short answer/essay), providing you with instant and powerful feedback that can help guide your upcoming lesson plans.

You can also manually override grades, grade with rubrics, and customize a wide array of settings for each assessment.

Important Notes:

Assessments must be created, edited, and graded from the web version of Schoology. Students can use mobile devices to submit an assessment.

Assessments are available in Schoology Enterprise and Basic. Only standard question types are available in Schoology Basic. Find out more about question types here.

Click these links to jump to a specific area of the guide:

Create an Assessment

To create an assessment:

1. Click Add Materials.

2. Select Add Assessment from the list.

This opens the Create Assessment window.

3. Name the assessment.

4. Set a Due Date to place the assessment in the Course Calendar and Upcoming area.

5. Submissions - Specify if students are able to take the assessment, and when they have access to it. Enabling Submissions is a separate process than the publishing feature in the Options row.

1. Password - If desired, set a password that students must enter to begin the test. Learn more: Password Protection for Assessments.

2. Set the number of points the assessment is worth in the Course Gradebook.

3. Select a grading category from the drop-down menu.

4. Click Grading Options to display additional settings:

Select a grading period.

Enable the checkbox to set the assessment as a midterm or final.

Set a factor.

Select a grading scale.

Click Create to complete.

Advanced options

Use Advanced Options to enable/disable the following features:

Use Individually Assign to only display the assessment to one or more members of the course or a grading group.

Use Published to Students to display or hide the assessment from student view. The assessment is published by default and immediately available to students.

After creating the assessment, click the gear icon from the course materials page or from the upper-right of the assessment page and select from the following options:

Edit - Open the edit popup to make changes to any of the above grade settings.

Publish/Unpublish - The assessment is automatically published by default. Click Unpublish to hide the assessment from student view, and click Publish to make available to students after unpublishing.

Move - Move the assessment to a different course.

Copy to Course - Create a copy of the assessment in a different course.

Delete - Delete the assessment.

Save to Resources - Save the assessment to your Personal or Group Resources area.

Back to top
Assessment Setup

Add additional information about the assessment and control settings from the Setup tab. Click Save at the bottom of the page to save your changes.

Instructions

Add instructions for students taking the assessment, which displays before they start.

Use the rich text editor to format the instructions, add additional components such as tables, images, and LaTex symbols, and many other options.

Assessment Settings

Assessment has a time limit: Set a time limit for the assessment. Students who have not finished before the time limit is expired have their assessments automatically submitted with the answers they have completed.

Assessment questions are randomly ordered: Enable Randomize Order to ensure that each student sees the questions on the assessment in a different and randomly selected order.

Show possible points for each question during the attempt: Hide or display how many points each question is worth for students taking the assessment.

Note: If the number of points you designated in the Create Assessment screen is different than the total number of combined points for all the questions in the assessment, the possible points for each question displayed to a student during an attempt will update to reflect this difference. For example, if you make the assessment worth 100 points in the Create Assessment screen, and have 9 questions on the assessment worth 10 points each, the number displayed during an attempt is 11.11: (100/90) x 10.

Important Note: Changes to the Assessment Settings are reflected in all future attempts, as well as any attempts currently in progress. For example, students begin an assessment and you realize you set the time limit to 3 minutes instead of 30 minutes. You change the time limit to 30 minutes and save. You can now instruct students to exit the assessment and resume it-they will see the new time limit. However, changing these settings does not affect assessment attempts that students have already submitted.

If your organization uses Respondus LockDown Browser, you can require students to take an assessment using LockDown Browser. See more information on this here.
Back to top
Assessment Toolbar Settings

Additionally, you can enable one or more of a set of Advanced Assessment Tools for students from this area.

Students can flag questions for review - Helps students remember which questions they want to go back to while taking a test.

Students can eliminate answer choices - Students use the eliminator tool to rule out incorrect answers on the way to finding the correct one.

Students can use a calculator during attempt - Students can use a built-in basic or scientific calculator while taking an assessment.

Students can use a ruler during attempt - Students can use a built-in ruler (6 inches or 15 centimeters) while taking an assessment.

Students can use a protractor during attempt - Students can use a built-in protractor while taking an assessment.

Text to Speech function and Line Reader/Screen Masking. This feature is only visible if your organization is using AMP. Students can use text to speech toolbar with screen masking during attempt - Students can use Learn more about text to speech toolbar.

Students can highlight text - Students can select text within the assessment and highlight in multiple colors. Learn more about text highlighting in assessments.

Students can use a notepad - Students use the notepad tool to take notes during an attempt. Learn more about notepad in assessments.

To enable a calculator, ruler, or protractor for a specific question, rather than the entire assessment, see Question-level Assessment Tools.

Student Settings

Allow students to view results after an attempt is submitted: Choose an option from the dropdown menu:

No: Students may not view the results of their assessment after completion.

Yes: Students may view their assessment results after completion, including the answer they selected.

Yes with correct answers: Students may view their assessment results after completion, including the answer they selected and the correct answers.

Number of attempts a student can submit: Select from the dropdown how many times students may attempt the assessment.

Final grade is determined by: When students can submit to the assessment more than once, select whether their highest grade or last grade should be used to calculate gradebook points.

Note: You can make changes to these settings at any time and they will apply to all assessment attempts-past, in progress, and future. For example, you want students to see the correct answers for an assessment, but only after all students in all your sections have completed the assessment. You set Allow students to view results after an attempt is submitted to No while students are submitting attempts. Then, after all students have submitted and you've graded everyone, you change the setting to Yes with correct answers. Students are now able to view the results of their assessment attempt with correct answers visible.

Click Save at the bottom of the page to save your Assessment Setup settings.

Assessment Questions

Add questions to your assessment from the Questions tab. In the left column, click a question type to add it to your assessment. Add content and control settings for each question in the assessment question builder screens.

Note: There is a limit of 200 questions per assessment.

Visit the Assessment Question Type section in the Schoology Help Center for detailed information about each question type.

Once you have added questions to your assessment, you'll see them listed in the Questions tab. In the Points field in the upper-right corner of each question, set the number of points the question is worth. A tally of the total number of questions and points in the assessment displays in the upper-right corner of the assessment.

Note: If the number of points you designated in the Create Assessment screen is different than the total number of combined points for all the questions in the assessment, the possible points for each question displayed to a student during an attempt will update to reflect this difference. For example, if you make the assessment worth 100 points in the Create Assessment screen, and have 9 questions on the assessment worth 10 points each, the number displayed during an attempt is 11.11: (100/90) x 10.

Alternatively, if you've enabled students to view their submissions, they will see the point value for each question as you've set it, not updated to its gradebook equivalent. In the above example, students would see each question as worth 10 points, not 11.11, when reviewing their submission.

Hover over the More Options menu along the right border of each question and select from two options:

Copy - Adds a copy of the question to the bottom of the assessment. The name of the copied question is the same as the original, with COPY added in front. For example, a copy of Test Question is called COPY - Test Question.

Delete - Removes the question from the assessment. You cannot restore a deleted question.

Click Add Text at the top of the list of questions on the left to add additional instructions between questions anywhere in the assessment. For example, if you want to break the assessment into sections, you can add additional instructions for each section. Each question and text block displays to students on its own page in the assessment.
Back to top
Student View

Students can access the assessment from anywhere they can access other graded materials:

Note: The student experience for Assessments is now supported on the native Schoology mobile apps. Specific documentation is available for students using and the Android app.

If you've allowed for multiple attempts, the number of submitted and remaining attempts displays to the student. For example, if you've allowed three attempts, students who have already completed one attempt see You have made 1 of 3 attempts. You have 2 remaining. The points possible for the question and elapsed time of the attempt also display.

Any previously submitted assessments display in the table with the following information:

Gradebook Points: The number of points earned over points available, displayed as a fraction. If you've enabled multiple attempts, Gradebook Points displays the points for the option you selected for Final grade is determined by in the Student Settings area: Highest Score or Last Score.
This is also the score that displays in the student assessment view and the course gradebook.

Note: If the number of points you designated in the Create Assessment screen is different than the total number of combined points for all the questions in the assessment, the total displayed in Gradebook Points will reflect this difference. For example, if you make the assessment worth 100 points in the Create Assessment screen, and the combined total of all the questions is 90, the number in Gradebook Points will update to a 100 point scale. A score of 75/90 on the attempt, for example, will display as 83.3 in Gradebook Points, as 75/90 = 83.3 on a 100 point scale.

Attempt: The number of the attempt, with the one most recently started at the top.

Status: In Progress or Submitted. Students do not see the Needs Grading status.

Time Spent: Length of time the student spent on the attempt.

Last Modified: The timestamp for the most recent time the student made changes to the attempt, including month and day, year, and time. This can be helpful when an attempt is resumable and you want to see the last time a student worked on it.

Action: If you've enabled student permission to view submissions, they can click the View link in the right margin to open a completed attempt, or Resume to open and continue taking an assessment in progress. Currently, all In Progress assessment attempts are resumable.

Students click Start Attempt to begin the assessment.

Taking the Assessment

Students can navigate the assessment by clicking the question numbers along the bottom of the screen, or by using their keyboard tab and arrow keys.

Depending on the types of question, different actions are available to students when answering them:

Drag and drop: Ordering, matching, and label image, for example.

Rich text editor: Short answer and essay questions, for example.

Math keyboards: Math short answer.

Button selector: Multiple choice and true/false, for example.

Drawing tool: Highlight image, for example.

Each of these functions may also be completed using the keyboard's Tab, Arrow, and Enter keys, as well.

As students answer questions, their work saves automatically. Completed attempts are submitted from the review screen, which students can open at any time by:

Clicking the Review Screen icon in the right margin menu.

Clicking Review Screen in the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen from the last question in the assessment.

Students can also enable additional accessibility features from the Accessibility icon including changing the color contrast or font size of the assessment. Additionally, they can click the Full Screen icon to view the assessment in full-screen mode.

Students can flag any questions for review using the Flag tool. Click the Flag icon within any question to add it to the flagged list. Click the flag icon again to remove a flag from a question. You can view all flagged questions from the Review Screen with the Flagged box checked:

Students can use the Eliminate Choices tool to rule out incorrect answers to help determine the correct one. Click the Eliminate Choices icon and click on any answer choice to eliminate:

Students can use the Protractor tool to populate on the screen while attempting the assessment:

Students can use the Notepad tool to takes notes during an assessment. Learn more about Notepad here.

Click the Full Screen icon to view the assessment in full-screen mode.

For subjective questions aligned with a rubric, an icon and link display in the right margin that students can click to view the rubric.
Back to top
Grading Assessments

After students complete the assessment, you can grade their submissions from the Grading tab.

You can grade the assessment By Question or By Student. To grade by student, follow the instructions below. To grade by question, please see Grade by Question for Assessments.
To grade student attempts:

1. Open the assessment and click By Student from the Grading tab.

2. Click the student submission you want to grade in the table.

Alternatively, open the student's assessment by clicking the puzzle piece icon in the gradebook cell corresponding to the student row and assessment column.

By Student Table

The By Student area displays information about students and assessment attempts.

1. From the Filter dropdown menu, choose to display all students, or only students who haven't yet submitted an attempt.

2. The total number of students assigned the assessment displays in parentheses next to the Students column label. Click the down-arrow menu to the right and choose to display students by first or last name, and in alphabetical or reverse-alphabetical order.

3. The Gradebook Points column displays the students' points earned for the assessment over the total number of points possible. A dash displays for unsubmitted or ungraded assessments.
If you've enabled multiple attempts, Gradebook Points displays the points for the version you set in Final grade is determined by in the Student Settings area: Highest Score or Last Score.
This is also the score that displays in the student assessment view and the course gradebook.

Note: If the number of points you designated in the Create Assessment screen is different than the total number of combined points for all the questions in the assessment, the total displayed in Gradebook Points will reflect this difference. For example, if you make the assessment worth 100 points in the Create Assessment screen, and the combined total of all the questions is 90, the number in Gradebook Points will update to a 100 point scale. A score of 75/90 on the attempt, for example, will display as 83.3 in Gradebook Points, as 75/90 = 83.3 on a 100 point scale.

Change the assessment score manually by clicking the score for the assessment in the Gradebook Points field and adding a new score. In this example, the instructor has entered a score of 75 for the assessment. Click clear override to remove the manually entered score.

4. The Attempts column indicates the attempt number for each assessment, with the most recent attempt at the top. For example, if a student has submitted three attempts for the assessment, the third displays at the top of the student's row with 03 in the Attempts column.

5. Student submissions may be in one of four statuses:

Scores Pending - Once the student submits an attempt, the assessment enters Scores Pending status for a brief period while questions are automatically graded.

Note: Schoology generally expects score processing times to be within 2 seconds. If you notice score processing times exceeding 2 minutes please contact Schoology Support.

In Progress - The student has started an attempt but has not made a submission yet.

Needs Grading - If the assessment contains subjective questions, it updates to Needs Grading status and the course admin must grade the subjective questions.

Completed - After all questions have been graded, the status changes to Completed, and the score updates in the course gradebook and in student views.

1. The Last Modified column shows the timestamp for the most recent time the student made changes to the assessment, including month and day, year, and time.

2. The Elapsed Time column shows how long the student has spent on the attempt.

3. Tap or hover over the More Options menu and select from two options:

Submit/Unsubmit: For submitted assessments, select Unsubmit to place the attempt back into In Progress so that the student can resume it. Any work the student had previously completed is saved for them to come back to.
For example, if a student accidentally submitted an assessment before completing, select Unsubmit to allow the student to finish and resubmit.
For unsubmitted assessments, click and select Submit to move the assessment attempt into a Completed state. The student will not be able to resume this attempt once you submit it.

Delete: Delete the student's submitted attempt. For example, if you want to allow the student to retake the assessment without enabling additional attempts for all students.

Note: Deleting a student's submission cannot be undone.

Back to top
Grading a Student Attempt from the Assessment

Click anywhere on a student's submitted attempt to open it for grading. Add scores in the box next to student responses:

Grade any subjective questions that require manual scoring.

Overwrite any auto-scored questions.

Click clear override to remove the score you entered. If the question already had an automatically calculated score, remove the override to revert back to this score.

The Attempt Score field in the upper-right corner updates automatically as you add or change question scores.

Important Notes:

Attempt score is a tally of the number of points achieved over points possible for each student attempt - you cannot edit it directly.

To change a student's attempt score, manually increase or decrease the points awarded on individual questions. To change a student's overall assessment grade, change the gradebook points from the By Student tab or from the Course Gradebook.

Any changes to the correct answer setup (for example, changing the correct answer) made after students have submitted the assessment will not automatically adjust the students' scores. Instructors must manually override the grade.

Back to top
Grading a Student Attempt from the Course Gradebook

From the gradebook cell for the assessment attempt in the course gradebook, you can complete a number of grading functions:

Click the score and add a new one to overwrite the overall grade for the attempt. If you change this grade, the override is indicated by an orange pencil in the lower-left corner.
Click the pencil to clear the override.

Click the puzzle piece icon to view the student assessment submission.

Click the flag icon to add an exception to the submission.

Neither Excused nor Incomplete exceptions factor into the student's overall grade in Schoology. From a calculation perspective, marking a gradebook cell as Excused or Incomplete is the same as leaving it blank. Applying either does not penalize students or affect their overall grade.
The Excused and Incomplete exceptions act as a visual reminder to the course admin that the student has either been excused or their submission is incomplete, to help avoid later confusion as to why that cell for that student is blank or unscored.

Marking a cell as Missing, however, does penalize the student's grade. Giving a student a Missing is the calculation equivalent to giving the student a zero. Selecting the Missing exceptions also adds a zero score in the cell.

Click the Comment icon to add a comment to the submission.
Your comment saves automatically; click the x in the upper-right of the pop-up window to close the comment. You can also check the box to Display to Student (optional). The comment icon persists for any cell to which you've added a comment.
Comments and exceptions appear in the student grade report, which you can open from the Graph icon to the right of the student's name. Comments for grading periods and the overall column also appear on student report cards unless you have selected the Hide overall grade from student reports and/or hide grading period grade from student reports checkboxes in the course Grade Setup area.

Back to top
Assessment Reporting

Assessment Reporting provides immediate feedback based on student responses to assessment questions. The Reporting area provides quick insights into how individual students are performing on an assessment as well as the average for the class, and more. See the article Assessment Reporting within Courses for full details.
Back to top

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Create assessments in your Schoology course to assess your students' grasp of the material or evaluate their preparedness for class. Each assessment is automatically graded (unless you've included a subjective question, such as a short answer/essay), providing you with instant and powerful feedback that can help guide your upcoming lesson plans.