New Features for the New Year

Punxatawney Phil saw his shadow last week which some people think means six more months of winter. But here at Kiddom, we decided that if Phil saw his shadow, we’d be releasing seven new features – and nobody has to wait until spring to use them!  

Check out what’s new in Kiddom that will help save time and consolidate tools all semester long.

Increased Timeline Specificity

Kiddom’s timeline is being updated to give teachers more specificity when planning – now, instead of having to plan by week, teachers can plan to a specific day. This increases the amount of control teachers have and ensures that all needed curriculum materials can be accessed on the exact day they’re needed.

Ease of Access to Presentation Materials

For many of the curricula available in Kiddom, there are available presentation materials (slide decks) that have been created by the authors, publishers, or flagship school users. When Kiddom has presentation materials available for a specific lesson or unit, these will now appear in a ‘Presentations’ section, alongside learning targets and other curriculum elements. This makes it easier to find and use slide decks in class.

New Interactive Question Types

A great benefit of a dynamic, digital curriculum is the material can “come to life” for students. Given the emphasis on discourse and interactivity within the curricula we support, it’s important for the technology to mirror this; students and teachers require options for question and activity types to demonstrate and reinforce learning in a variety of ways. A number of new question types are now available to use when creating questions and will start to be used in bundled digital curricula starting this spring.  

The new question types are:

Categorizing: In a Categorizing question, students can drag and drop cards to their matching statements. There can be multiple correct answers per statement but each answer can only be used once.

Matching: With Matching, students can drag and drop cards to their matching statements. Be sure to drag the cards to the correct destinations for the question to be auto-graded.

Ordering: With Ordering, students can drag and drop cards to put them in the right order. Simply add a list of items by clicking on the Blue ‘Add’ button. Then, drag the cards into the correct order for the question to be auto-graded.

Fill-In-The-Blank: With Fill-in-the-Blank, students can fill in blanks that you designate within a text. Simply click on ‘+ Response’ to add a blank and denote the right answer. You do not have to denote a correct answer, if you want students to free-write or respond to a question in their own words.

Student Bookmarks

Students can now bookmark assignments to complete them later, helping them stay organized and keep their assignments on track. Students can use the bookmark icon to create a new bookmark, which can be renamed, edited, or deleted.  Bookmarks can be accessed from the bookmark tab on the right side of the screen from within an assignment.  Students can have multiple assignments open, helping them review previous assignments while completing new ones.

Dual Roles for Admins

With widespread teacher shortages, admins have been needed to step into the teacher role now more than ever. Admin dual roles allows admins to quickly switch between acting as an admin and acting as a teacher within Kiddom. No extra configuration or setup required. One account can access all of Kiddom!

And there you have it! Seven new features and one timeline refresh to help teachers and students stay organized and engaged this semester. Enjoy!

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