how to assign assignments in unique learning system

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April 25, 2022 ·

How to Plan for Unique Learning System Monthly Lessons

Curriculum · Back to School · Functional Life Skills · Helpful Tips · Remote Learning · Teacher Tips

I have been using Unique Learning System for 8 years now, here are a few ways that I prepare the monthly lessons to fit the unique needs of my students!

What is Unique Learning System (N2Y)?

From the Unique Learning Systems website, “The N2Y story began in 1997 when speech language pathologist Jacquie Clark wanted to help her students in special education increase their communication, comprehension, and socialization skills.

Jacquie created News2you™, a weekly newspaper designed to cultivate literacy development using current events and relevant news. As the way students learn evolved, so did n2y—transforming from print to digital to help individuals with special needs experience meaningful access to the world around them.

Changing how special education is taught, n2y is proud to help educators and families inspire those moments of discovery and wonder, celebrating two decades of being at the heart of learning, working side-by-side with you, the educator, to change the way students grow. “

Step 1: Review the Monthly Topic

The first thing I do when the Monthly Unit comes out, typically around the 15th of the month prior, is check it out! You also have a teacher material of the yearly topics if you want to get ahead!

On the hamburger menu at the top left corner, you will get a dropdown and see Monthly Lessons. This is where you’ll find the month before and the current month or the current month and the month after depending on the time of the month! This is your goldmine!

I typically like to start planning about the 15th or 20th of the month prior so I can make sure to get all the copies and set up any homework or logins for the next month!

If you have any materials for the monthly topic, this is also a good time to pull any of those materials.

Step 2: Download and Print any Stories and Questions

At the top left side, you can see the months, pick the current month or month you are planning for. On the right hand side, you will see all the leveled books and comprehension questions.

I start with those materials and print the correct level for my learners or all levels if you need those. My students do better with the printed book in front of them, but we have also used the digital books as well.

Step 3: Download and Print any N2Y Library Stories

N2Y Library also is a great resource for you to find any supplemental materials. These materials are great to start the unit and give the definition and foundation for many of the monthly topics. These stories do not come with comprehension questions, so keep that in mind.

On the hamburger menu at the top left corner, you will get a dropdown and see N2Y Library. This is where you’ll find many topics and stories in a variety of levels.

You can search the monthly topic or any subtopics related to the month you are teaching. You can also specify the level of reader that you want by using the levels dropdown menu. I typically use these stories to go more in depth for the topic.

Step 4: Life Skills Applications

I’m going to be honest, sometimes I don’t use the Life Skills Applications from Unique Learning System. I always give them a glance over, but sometimes they just don’t work for my students. Often times, the life skills application is unrelated to the unit, which confuses my students. I have also seen these activities be too difficult for my students to use even when modified or done together as a group.

I always look at these ahead of time and use them as filler activities if we finish quickly or I have 10 extra minutes in class. These activities are typically quick and do not take up our 45 minute class period.

If these work for your learners, make sure to print them off and make copies as well. Many are cut and paste tasks or hands on experiences. These are going to be put into your calendar in the next section.

Step 5: Put it in a Calendar

Finally, with all the copies in front of me, I put it down on paper. If you are a digital person, use your online planner or calendar. I am definitely a paper pencil person, so the printable calendar works for me and makes it easy to erase and move a lesson if we need.

If you want to make a yearly Unique Learning System plan, check out this post!

I spend 2 days on each story, here is what it looks like:

• Day 1: Look through the pictures in the story on each page and talk about what my students “See”. They make predictions on what the story may be about. After, we go through and read the story all together as a group and I ask 1-2 questions on each page to help my students relate it to their own life. We may also watch a Youtube video or BrainPop video to explain the topic a bit more!
• Day 2: Watch a video to remind us on the topic. Read the story, asking 1-2 questions on every other page to check for understanding. Finally, my students work individually to answer comprehension questions at their level.

I start with Lesson 1 for Unique Learning System on the first day of the month or the first Monday of the month, whatever makes the most sense. Every other day, we change Chapters that we read and I make sure to sprinkle in the Life Skills Applications when applicable.

Don’t forget to plug in any Teacher Training Days or No School days when you won’t be teaching. You can also see on the image above, I put when I was going to be absent where a sub may not be able to teach like I do.

For any extra days, I may do the Life Skills Application, a craft or writing activities about the unit to help tie it all together!

If you are more of a visual person, I have a highlight on my Instagram page that walks through all of my N2Y planning!

Want more explanations on teaching and lesson planning? Join the Private FB Group!

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Life Skills Idea List

Thinking about life skills for special ed students is one of the most important parts of our job as special education teachers.

Functional life skills activities are especially important at this age because our students are getting older and we want them to be valuable and independent members of society when they are finished with school.

Want a life skills idea guide done for you for free? Put in your info below and I’ll send it to you!

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Free resources, organizing materials for the unique learning system.

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I have written several posts earlier on the Unique Learning System .  The first post was an overview of the curriculum and the second contained additional resources.  This post will focus on how to organize the materials that you create from the ULS.

• Read more about: Organizing & Setting Up Classrooms

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Designing Assignments for Learning

The rapid shift to remote teaching and learning meant that many instructors reimagined their assessment practices. Whether adapting existing assignments or creatively designing new opportunities for their students to learn, instructors focused on helping students make meaning and demonstrate their learning outside of the traditional, face-to-face classroom setting. This resource distills the elements of assignment design that are important to carry forward as we continue to seek better ways of assessing learning and build on our innovative assignment designs.

On this page:

Rethinking traditional tests, quizzes, and exams.

• Examples from the Columbia University Classroom
• Tips for Designing Assignments for Learning

Reflect On Your Assignment Design

Connect with the ctl.

• Resources and References

Cite this resource: Columbia Center for Teaching and Learning (2021). Designing Assignments for Learning. Columbia University. Retrieved [today’s date] from https://ctl.columbia.edu/resources-and-technology/teaching-with-technology/teaching-online/designing-assignments/

Traditional assessments tend to reveal whether students can recognize, recall, or replicate what was learned out of context, and tend to focus on students providing correct responses (Wiggins, 1990). In contrast, authentic assignments, which are course assessments, engage students in higher order thinking, as they grapple with real or simulated challenges that help them prepare for their professional lives, and draw on the course knowledge learned and the skills acquired to create justifiable answers, performances or products (Wiggins, 1990). An authentic assessment provides opportunities for students to practice, consult resources, learn from feedback, and refine their performances and products accordingly (Wiggins 1990, 1998, 2014). 

Authentic assignments ask students to “do” the subject with an audience in mind and apply their learning in a new situation. Examples of authentic assignments include asking students to: 

• Write for a real audience (e.g., a memo, a policy brief, letter to the editor, a grant proposal, reports, building a website) and/or publication;
• Solve problem sets that have real world application; 
• Design projects that address a real world problem; 
• Engage in a community-partnered research project;
• Create an exhibit, performance, or conference presentation ;
• Compile and reflect on their work through a portfolio/e-portfolio.

Noteworthy elements of authentic designs are that instructors scaffold the assignment, and play an active role in preparing students for the tasks assigned, while students are intentionally asked to reflect on the process and product of their work thus building their metacognitive skills (Herrington and Oliver, 2000; Ashford-Rowe, Herrington and Brown, 2013; Frey, Schmitt, and Allen, 2012). 

It’s worth noting here that authentic assessments can initially be time consuming to design, implement, and grade. They are critiqued for being challenging to use across course contexts and for grading reliability issues (Maclellan, 2004). Despite these challenges, authentic assessments are recognized as beneficial to student learning (Svinicki, 2004) as they are learner-centered (Weimer, 2013), promote academic integrity (McLaughlin, L. and Ricevuto, 2021; Sotiriadou et al., 2019; Schroeder, 2021) and motivate students to learn (Ambrose et al., 2010). The Columbia Center for Teaching and Learning is always available to consult with faculty who are considering authentic assessment designs and to discuss challenges and affordances.   

Examples from the Columbia University Classroom 

Columbia instructors have experimented with alternative ways of assessing student learning from oral exams to technology-enhanced assignments. Below are a few examples of authentic assignments in various teaching contexts across Columbia University. 

• E-portfolios: Statia Cook shares her experiences with an ePorfolio assignment in her co-taught Frontiers of Science course (a submission to the Voices of Hybrid and Online Teaching and Learning initiative); CUIMC use of ePortfolios ;
• Case studies: Columbia instructors have engaged their students in authentic ways through case studies drawing on the Case Consortium at Columbia University. Read and watch a faculty spotlight to learn how Professor Mary Ann Price uses the case method to place pre-med students in real-life scenarios;
• Simulations: students at CUIMC engage in simulations to develop their professional skills in The Mary & Michael Jaharis Simulation Center in the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Helene Fuld Health Trust Simulation Center in the Columbia School of Nursing; 
• Experiential learning: instructors have drawn on New York City as a learning laboratory such as Barnard’s NYC as Lab webpage which highlights courses that engage students in NYC;
• Design projects that address real world problems: Yevgeniy Yesilevskiy on the Engineering design projects completed using lab kits during remote learning. Watch Dr. Yesilevskiy talk about his teaching and read the Columbia News article . 
• Writing assignments: Lia Marshall and her teaching associate Aparna Balasundaram reflect on their “non-disposable or renewable assignments” to prepare social work students for their professional lives as they write for a real audience; and Hannah Weaver spoke about a sandbox assignment used in her Core Literature Humanities course at the 2021 Celebration of Teaching and Learning Symposium . Watch Dr. Weaver share her experiences.  

​Tips for Designing Assignments for Learning

While designing an effective authentic assignment may seem like a daunting task, the following tips can be used as a starting point. See the Resources section for frameworks and tools that may be useful in this effort.  

Align the assignment with your course learning objectives 

Identify the kind of thinking that is important in your course, the knowledge students will apply, and the skills they will practice using through the assignment. What kind of thinking will students be asked to do for the assignment? What will students learn by completing this assignment? How will the assignment help students achieve the desired course learning outcomes? For more information on course learning objectives, see the CTL’s Course Design Essentials self-paced course and watch the video on Articulating Learning Objectives .  

Identify an authentic meaning-making task

For meaning-making to occur, students need to understand the relevance of the assignment to the course and beyond (Ambrose et al., 2010). To Bean (2011) a “meaning-making” or “meaning-constructing” task has two dimensions: 1) it presents students with an authentic disciplinary problem or asks students to formulate their own problems, both of which engage them in active critical thinking, and 2) the problem is placed in “a context that gives students a role or purpose, a targeted audience, and a genre.” (Bean, 2011: 97-98). 

An authentic task gives students a realistic challenge to grapple with, a role to take on that allows them to “rehearse for the complex ambiguities” of life, provides resources and supports to draw on, and requires students to justify their work and the process they used to inform their solution (Wiggins, 1990). Note that if students find an assignment interesting or relevant, they will see value in completing it. 

Consider the kind of activities in the real world that use the knowledge and skills that are the focus of your course. How is this knowledge and these skills applied to answer real-world questions to solve real-world problems? (Herrington et al., 2010: 22). What do professionals or academics in your discipline do on a regular basis? What does it mean to think like a biologist, statistician, historian, social scientist? How might your assignment ask students to draw on current events, issues, or problems that relate to the course and are of interest to them? How might your assignment tap into student motivation and engage them in the kinds of thinking they can apply to better understand the world around them? (Ambrose et al., 2010). 

Determine the evaluation criteria and create a rubric

To ensure equitable and consistent grading of assignments across students, make transparent the criteria you will use to evaluate student work. The criteria should focus on the knowledge and skills that are central to the assignment. Build on the criteria identified, create a rubric that makes explicit the expectations of deliverables and share this rubric with your students so they can use it as they work on the assignment. For more information on rubrics, see the CTL’s resource Incorporating Rubrics into Your Grading and Feedback Practices , and explore the Association of American Colleges & Universities VALUE Rubrics (Valid Assessment of Learning in Undergraduate Education). 

Build in metacognition

Ask students to reflect on what and how they learned from the assignment. Help students uncover personal relevance of the assignment, find intrinsic value in their work, and deepen their motivation by asking them to reflect on their process and their assignment deliverable. Sample prompts might include: what did you learn from this assignment? How might you draw on the knowledge and skills you used on this assignment in the future? See Ambrose et al., 2010 for more strategies that support motivation and the CTL’s resource on Metacognition ). 

Provide students with opportunities to practice

Design your assignment to be a learning experience and prepare students for success on the assignment. If students can reasonably expect to be successful on an assignment when they put in the required effort ,with the support and guidance of the instructor, they are more likely to engage in the behaviors necessary for learning (Ambrose et al., 2010). Ensure student success by actively teaching the knowledge and skills of the course (e.g., how to problem solve, how to write for a particular audience), modeling the desired thinking, and creating learning activities that build up to a graded assignment. Provide opportunities for students to practice using the knowledge and skills they will need for the assignment, whether through low-stakes in-class activities or homework activities that include opportunities to receive and incorporate formative feedback. For more information on providing feedback, see the CTL resource Feedback for Learning . 

Communicate about the assignment 

Share the purpose, task, audience, expectations, and criteria for the assignment. Students may have expectations about assessments and how they will be graded that is informed by their prior experiences completing high-stakes assessments, so be transparent. Tell your students why you are asking them to do this assignment, what skills they will be using, how it aligns with the course learning outcomes, and why it is relevant to their learning and their professional lives (i.e., how practitioners / professionals use the knowledge and skills in your course in real world contexts and for what purposes). Finally, verify that students understand what they need to do to complete the assignment. This can be done by asking students to respond to poll questions about different parts of the assignment, a “scavenger hunt” of the assignment instructions–giving students questions to answer about the assignment and having them work in small groups to answer the questions, or by having students share back what they think is expected of them.

Plan to iterate and to keep the focus on learning 

Draw on multiple sources of data to help make decisions about what changes are needed to the assignment, the assignment instructions, and/or rubric to ensure that it contributes to student learning. Explore assignment performance data. As Deandra Little reminds us: “a really good assignment, which is a really good assessment, also teaches you something or tells the instructor something. As much as it tells you what students are learning, it’s also telling you what they aren’t learning.” ( Teaching in Higher Ed podcast episode 337 ). Assignment bottlenecks–where students get stuck or struggle–can be good indicators that students need further support or opportunities to practice prior to completing an assignment. This awareness can inform teaching decisions. 

Triangulate the performance data by collecting student feedback, and noting your own reflections about what worked well and what did not. Revise the assignment instructions, rubric, and teaching practices accordingly. Consider how you might better align your assignment with your course objectives and/or provide more opportunities for students to practice using the knowledge and skills that they will rely on for the assignment. Additionally, keep in mind societal, disciplinary, and technological changes as you tweak your assignments for future use. 

Now is a great time to reflect on your practices and experiences with assignment design and think critically about your approach. Take a closer look at an existing assignment. Questions to consider include: What is this assignment meant to do? What purpose does it serve? Why do you ask students to do this assignment? How are they prepared to complete the assignment? Does the assignment assess the kind of learning that you really want? What would help students learn from this assignment? 

Using the tips in the previous section: How can the assignment be tweaked to be more authentic and meaningful to students? 

As you plan forward for post-pandemic teaching and reflect on your practices and reimagine your course design, you may find the following CTL resources helpful: Reflecting On Your Experiences with Remote Teaching , Transition to In-Person Teaching , and Course Design Support .

The Columbia Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) is here to help!

For assistance with assignment design, rubric design, or any other teaching and learning need, please request a consultation by emailing [email protected] . 

Transparency in Learning and Teaching (TILT) framework for assignments. The TILT Examples and Resources page ( https://tilthighered.com/tiltexamplesandresources ) includes example assignments from across disciplines, as well as a transparent assignment template and a checklist for designing transparent assignments . Each emphasizes the importance of articulating to students the purpose of the assignment or activity, the what and how of the task, and specifying the criteria that will be used to assess students. 

Association of American Colleges & Universities (AAC&U) offers VALUE ADD (Assignment Design and Diagnostic) tools ( https://www.aacu.org/value-add-tools ) to help with the creation of clear and effective assignments that align with the desired learning outcomes and associated VALUE rubrics (Valid Assessment of Learning in Undergraduate Education). VALUE ADD encourages instructors to explicitly state assignment information such as the purpose of the assignment, what skills students will be using, how it aligns with course learning outcomes, the assignment type, the audience and context for the assignment, clear evaluation criteria, desired formatting, and expectations for completion whether individual or in a group.

Villarroel et al. (2017) propose a blueprint for building authentic assessments which includes four steps: 1) consider the workplace context, 2) design the authentic assessment; 3) learn and apply standards for judgement; and 4) give feedback. 

References 

Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., & DiPietro, M. (2010). Chapter 3: What Factors Motivate Students to Learn? In How Learning Works: Seven Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching . Jossey-Bass. 

Ashford-Rowe, K., Herrington, J., and Brown, C. (2013). Establishing the critical elements that determine authentic assessment. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education. 39(2), 205-222, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2013.819566 .  

Bean, J.C. (2011). Engaging Ideas: The Professor’s Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom . Second Edition. Jossey-Bass. 

Frey, B. B, Schmitt, V. L., and Allen, J. P. (2012). Defining Authentic Classroom Assessment. Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation. 17(2). DOI: https://doi.org/10.7275/sxbs-0829  

Herrington, J., Reeves, T. C., and Oliver, R. (2010). A Guide to Authentic e-Learning . Routledge. 

Herrington, J. and Oliver, R. (2000). An instructional design framework for authentic learning environments. Educational Technology Research and Development, 48(3), 23-48. 

Litchfield, B. C. and Dempsey, J. V. (2015). Authentic Assessment of Knowledge, Skills, and Attitudes. New Directions for Teaching and Learning. 142 (Summer 2015), 65-80. 

Maclellan, E. (2004). How convincing is alternative assessment for use in higher education. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education. 29(3), June 2004. DOI: 10.1080/0260293042000188267

McLaughlin, L. and Ricevuto, J. (2021). Assessments in a Virtual Environment: You Won’t Need that Lockdown Browser! Faculty Focus. June 2, 2021. 

Mueller, J. (2005). The Authentic Assessment Toolbox: Enhancing Student Learning through Online Faculty Development . MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching. 1(1). July 2005. Mueller’s Authentic Assessment Toolbox is available online. 

Schroeder, R. (2021). Vaccinate Against Cheating With Authentic Assessment . Inside Higher Ed. (February 26, 2021).  

Sotiriadou, P., Logan, D., Daly, A., and Guest, R. (2019). The role of authentic assessment to preserve academic integrity and promote skills development and employability. Studies in Higher Education. 45(111), 2132-2148. https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2019.1582015    

Stachowiak, B. (Host). (November 25, 2020). Authentic Assignments with Deandra Little. (Episode 337). In Teaching in Higher Ed . https://teachinginhighered.com/podcast/authentic-assignments/  

Svinicki, M. D. (2004). Authentic Assessment: Testing in Reality. New Directions for Teaching and Learning. 100 (Winter 2004): 23-29. 

Villarroel, V., Bloxham, S, Bruna, D., Bruna, C., and Herrera-Seda, C. (2017). Authentic assessment: creating a blueprint for course design. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education. 43(5), 840-854. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2017.1412396    

Weimer, M. (2013). Learner-Centered Teaching: Five Key Changes to Practice . Second Edition. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. 

Wiggins, G. (2014). Authenticity in assessment, (re-)defined and explained. Retrieved from https://grantwiggins.wordpress.com/2014/01/26/authenticity-in-assessment-re-defined-and-explained/

Wiggins, G. (1998). Teaching to the (Authentic) Test. Educational Leadership . April 1989. 41-47. 

Wiggins, Grant (1990). The Case for Authentic Assessment . Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation , 2(2). 

Wondering how AI tools might play a role in your course assignments?

See the CTL’s resource “Considerations for AI Tools in the Classroom.”

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Teaching, Learning, & Professional Development Center

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How Do I Create Meaningful and Effective Assignments?

Prepared by allison boye, ph.d. teaching, learning, and professional development center.

Assessment is a necessary part of the teaching and learning process, helping us measure whether our students have really learned what we want them to learn. While exams and quizzes are certainly favorite and useful methods of assessment, out of class assignments (written or otherwise) can offer similar insights into our students' learning.  And just as creating a reliable test takes thoughtfulness and skill, so does creating meaningful and effective assignments. Undoubtedly, many instructors have been on the receiving end of disappointing student work, left wondering what went wrong… and often, those problems can be remedied in the future by some simple fine-tuning of the original assignment.  This paper will take a look at some important elements to consider when developing assignments, and offer some easy approaches to creating a valuable assessment experience for all involved.

First Things First…

Before assigning any major tasks to students, it is imperative that you first define a few things for yourself as the instructor:

• Your goals for the assignment . Why are you assigning this project, and what do you hope your students will gain from completing it? What knowledge, skills, and abilities do you aim to measure with this assignment?  Creating assignments is a major part of overall course design, and every project you assign should clearly align with your goals for the course in general.  For instance, if you want your students to demonstrate critical thinking, perhaps asking them to simply summarize an article is not the best match for that goal; a more appropriate option might be to ask for an analysis of a controversial issue in the discipline. Ultimately, the connection between the assignment and its purpose should be clear to both you and your students to ensure that it is fulfilling the desired goals and doesn't seem like “busy work.” For some ideas about what kinds of assignments match certain learning goals, take a look at this page from DePaul University's Teaching Commons.
• Have they experienced “socialization” in the culture of your discipline (Flaxman, 2005)? Are they familiar with any conventions you might want them to know? In other words, do they know the “language” of your discipline, generally accepted style guidelines, or research protocols?
• Do they know how to conduct research?  Do they know the proper style format, documentation style, acceptable resources, etc.? Do they know how to use the library (Fitzpatrick, 1989) or evaluate resources?
• What kinds of writing or work have they previously engaged in?  For instance, have they completed long, formal writing assignments or research projects before? Have they ever engaged in analysis, reflection, or argumentation? Have they completed group assignments before?  Do they know how to write a literature review or scientific report?

In his book Engaging Ideas (1996), John Bean provides a great list of questions to help instructors focus on their main teaching goals when creating an assignment (p.78):

1. What are the main units/modules in my course?

2. What are my main learning objectives for each module and for the course?

3. What thinking skills am I trying to develop within each unit and throughout the course?

4. What are the most difficult aspects of my course for students?

5. If I could change my students' study habits, what would I most like to change?

6. What difference do I want my course to make in my students' lives?

What your students need to know

Once you have determined your own goals for the assignment and the levels of your students, you can begin creating your assignment.  However, when introducing your assignment to your students, there are several things you will need to clearly outline for them in order to ensure the most successful assignments possible.

• First, you will need to articulate the purpose of the assignment . Even though you know why the assignment is important and what it is meant to accomplish, you cannot assume that your students will intuit that purpose. Your students will appreciate an understanding of how the assignment fits into the larger goals of the course and what they will learn from the process (Hass & Osborn, 2007). Being transparent with your students and explaining why you are asking them to complete a given assignment can ultimately help motivate them to complete the assignment more thoughtfully.
• If you are asking your students to complete a writing assignment, you should define for them the “rhetorical or cognitive mode/s” you want them to employ in their writing (Flaxman, 2005). In other words, use precise verbs that communicate whether you are asking them to analyze, argue, describe, inform, etc.  (Verbs like “explore” or “comment on” can be too vague and cause confusion.) Provide them with a specific task to complete, such as a problem to solve, a question to answer, or an argument to support.  For those who want assignments to lead to top-down, thesis-driven writing, John Bean (1996) suggests presenting a proposition that students must defend or refute, or a problem that demands a thesis answer.
• It is also a good idea to define the audience you want your students to address with their assignment, if possible – especially with writing assignments.  Otherwise, students will address only the instructor, often assuming little requires explanation or development (Hedengren, 2004; MIT, 1999). Further, asking students to address the instructor, who typically knows more about the topic than the student, places the student in an unnatural rhetorical position.  Instead, you might consider asking your students to prepare their assignments for alternative audiences such as other students who missed last week's classes, a group that opposes their position, or people reading a popular magazine or newspaper.  In fact, a study by Bean (1996) indicated the students often appreciate and enjoy assignments that vary elements such as audience or rhetorical context, so don't be afraid to get creative!
• Obviously, you will also need to articulate clearly the logistics or “business aspects” of the assignment . In other words, be explicit with your students about required elements such as the format, length, documentation style, writing style (formal or informal?), and deadlines.  One caveat, however: do not allow the logistics of the paper take precedence over the content in your assignment description; if you spend all of your time describing these things, students might suspect that is all you care about in their execution of the assignment.
• Finally, you should clarify your evaluation criteria for the assignment. What elements of content are most important? Will you grade holistically or weight features separately? How much weight will be given to individual elements, etc?  Another precaution to take when defining requirements for your students is to take care that your instructions and rubric also do not overshadow the content; prescribing too rigidly each element of an assignment can limit students' freedom to explore and discover. According to Beth Finch Hedengren, “A good assignment provides the purpose and guidelines… without dictating exactly what to say” (2004, p. 27).  If you decide to utilize a grading rubric, be sure to provide that to the students along with the assignment description, prior to their completion of the assignment.

A great way to get students engaged with an assignment and build buy-in is to encourage their collaboration on its design and/or on the grading criteria (Hudd, 2003). In his article “Conducting Writing Assignments,” Richard Leahy (2002) offers a few ideas for building in said collaboration:

• Ask the students to develop the grading scale themselves from scratch, starting with choosing the categories.

• Set the grading categories yourself, but ask the students to help write the descriptions.

• Draft the complete grading scale yourself, then give it to your students for review and suggestions.

A Few Do's and Don'ts…

Determining your goals for the assignment and its essential logistics is a good start to creating an effective assignment. However, there are a few more simple factors to consider in your final design. First, here are a few things you should do :

• Do provide detail in your assignment description . Research has shown that students frequently prefer some guiding constraints when completing assignments (Bean, 1996), and that more detail (within reason) can lead to more successful student responses.  One idea is to provide students with physical assignment handouts , in addition to or instead of a simple description in a syllabus.  This can meet the needs of concrete learners and give them something tangible to refer to.  Likewise, it is often beneficial to make explicit for students the process or steps necessary to complete an assignment, given that students – especially younger ones – might need guidance in planning and time management (MIT, 1999).
• Do use open-ended questions.  The most effective and challenging assignments focus on questions that lead students to thinking and explaining, rather than simple yes or no answers, whether explicitly part of the assignment description or in the  brainstorming heuristics (Gardner, 2005).
• Do direct students to appropriate available resources . Giving students pointers about other venues for assistance can help them get started on the right track independently. These kinds of suggestions might include information about campus resources such as the University Writing Center or discipline-specific librarians, suggesting specific journals or books, or even sections of their textbook, or providing them with lists of research ideas or links to acceptable websites.
• Do consider providing models – both successful and unsuccessful models (Miller, 2007). These models could be provided by past students, or models you have created yourself.  You could even ask students to evaluate the models themselves using the determined evaluation criteria, helping them to visualize the final product, think critically about how to complete the assignment, and ideally, recognize success in their own work.
• Do consider including a way for students to make the assignment their own. In their study, Hass and Osborn (2007) confirmed the importance of personal engagement for students when completing an assignment.  Indeed, students will be more engaged in an assignment if it is personally meaningful, practical, or purposeful beyond the classroom.  You might think of ways to encourage students to tap into their own experiences or curiosities, to solve or explore a real problem, or connect to the larger community.  Offering variety in assignment selection can also help students feel more individualized, creative, and in control.
• If your assignment is substantial or long, do consider sequencing it. Far too often, assignments are given as one-shot final products that receive grades at the end of the semester, eternally abandoned by the student.  By sequencing a large assignment, or essentially breaking it down into a systematic approach consisting of interconnected smaller elements (such as a project proposal, an annotated bibliography, or a rough draft, or a series of mini-assignments related to the longer assignment), you can encourage thoughtfulness, complexity, and thoroughness in your students, as well as emphasize process over final product.

Next are a few elements to avoid in your assignments:

• Do not ask too many questions in your assignment.  In an effort to challenge students, instructors often err in the other direction, asking more questions than students can reasonably address in a single assignment without losing focus. Offering an overly specific “checklist” prompt often leads to externally organized papers, in which inexperienced students “slavishly follow the checklist instead of integrating their ideas into more organically-discovered structure” (Flaxman, 2005).
• Do not expect or suggest that there is an “ideal” response to the assignment. A common error for instructors is to dictate content of an assignment too rigidly, or to imply that there is a single correct response or a specific conclusion to reach, either explicitly or implicitly (Flaxman, 2005). Undoubtedly, students do not appreciate feeling as if they must read an instructor's mind to complete an assignment successfully, or that their own ideas have nowhere to go, and can lose motivation as a result. Similarly, avoid assignments that simply ask for regurgitation (Miller, 2007). Again, the best assignments invite students to engage in critical thinking, not just reproduce lectures or readings.
• Do not provide vague or confusing commands . Do students know what you mean when they are asked to “examine” or “discuss” a topic? Return to what you determined about your students' experiences and levels to help you decide what directions will make the most sense to them and what will require more explanation or guidance, and avoid verbiage that might confound them.
• Do not impose impossible time restraints or require the use of insufficient resources for completion of the assignment.  For instance, if you are asking all of your students to use the same resource, ensure that there are enough copies available for all students to access – or at least put one copy on reserve in the library. Likewise, make sure that you are providing your students with ample time to locate resources and effectively complete the assignment (Fitzpatrick, 1989).

The assignments we give to students don't simply have to be research papers or reports. There are many options for effective yet creative ways to assess your students' learning! Here are just a few:

Journals, Posters, Portfolios, Letters, Brochures, Management plans, Editorials, Instruction Manuals, Imitations of a text, Case studies, Debates, News release, Dialogues, Videos, Collages, Plays, Power Point presentations

Ultimately, the success of student responses to an assignment often rests on the instructor's deliberate design of the assignment. By being purposeful and thoughtful from the beginning, you can ensure that your assignments will not only serve as effective assessment methods, but also engage and delight your students. If you would like further help in constructing or revising an assignment, the Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development Center is glad to offer individual consultations. In addition, look into some of the resources provided below.

Online Resources

“Creating Effective Assignments” http://www.unh.edu/teaching-excellence/resources/Assignments.htm This site, from the University of New Hampshire's Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning,  provides a brief overview of effective assignment design, with a focus on determining and communicating goals and expectations.

Gardner, T.  (2005, June 12). Ten Tips for Designing Writing Assignments. Traci's Lists of Ten. http://www.tengrrl.com/tens/034.shtml This is a brief yet useful list of tips for assignment design, prepared by a writing teacher and curriculum developer for the National Council of Teachers of English .  The website will also link you to several other lists of “ten tips” related to literacy pedagogy.

“How to Create Effective Assignments for College Students.”  http:// tilt.colostate.edu/retreat/2011/zimmerman.pdf     This PDF is a simplified bulleted list, prepared by Dr. Toni Zimmerman from Colorado State University, offering some helpful ideas for coming up with creative assignments.

“Learner-Centered Assessment” http://cte.uwaterloo.ca/teaching_resources/tips/learner_centered_assessment.html From the Centre for Teaching Excellence at the University of Waterloo, this is a short list of suggestions for the process of designing an assessment with your students' interests in mind. “Matching Learning Goals to Assignment Types.” http://teachingcommons.depaul.edu/How_to/design_assignments/assignments_learning_goals.html This is a great page from DePaul University's Teaching Commons, providing a chart that helps instructors match assignments with learning goals.

Additional References Bean, J.C. (1996). Engaging ideas: The professor's guide to integrating writing, critical thinking, and active learning in the classroom . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Fitzpatrick, R. (1989). Research and writing assignments that reduce fear lead to better papers and more confident students. Writing Across the Curriculum , 3.2, pp. 15 – 24.

Flaxman, R. (2005). Creating meaningful writing assignments. The Teaching Exchange .  Retrieved Jan. 9, 2008 from http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Sheridan_Center/pubs/teachingExchange/jan2005/01_flaxman.pdf

Hass, M. & Osborn, J. (2007, August 13). An emic view of student writing and the writing process. Across the Disciplines, 4. 

Hedengren, B.F. (2004). A TA's guide to teaching writing in all disciplines . Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's.

Hudd, S. S. (2003, April). Syllabus under construction: Involving students in the creation of class assignments.  Teaching Sociology , 31, pp. 195 – 202.

Leahy, R. (2002). Conducting writing assignments. College Teaching , 50.2, pp. 50 – 54.

Miller, H. (2007). Designing effective writing assignments.  Teaching with writing .  University of Minnesota Center for Writing. Retrieved Jan. 9, 2008, from http://writing.umn.edu/tww/assignments/designing.html

MIT Online Writing and Communication Center (1999). Creating Writing Assignments. Retrieved January 9, 2008 from http://web.mit.edu/writing/Faculty/createeffective.html .

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Along with instruction and assessment, assignments form the foundation of the teaching and learning process. They provide opportunities for students to practice the skills and apply the knowledge that they have been taught in a supportive environment. It also helps the teacher gauge how well students are learning the material and how close they are to mastery.

Because of the nature of assignments, managing them can get hectic. That’s why its best to use a platform like Google Classroom to help you manage assignments digitally. In today’s tip, we will discuss 48 ways that you can use Classroom to manage student assignments.

• Assignment Status – Easily check how many students turned in an assignment as well as how many assignments have been graded by going to the Classwork tab and clicking on the title of the assignment.
• Assign to Multiple Classes – Post an assignment to multiple classes by using the “for” drop-down menu when creating an assignment.
• Brainstorm – Use Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, or Drawings to brainstorm for class assignments.
• Calendar of Due Dates – Link a Google Calendar with due dates for assignments, tests, and other important dates into Classroom.
• Check Homework – Classroom makes checking homework easy with a quick glance at the assignment page. If more detailed grading is needed, just access the grading interface for the assignment.
• Choice Boards – Give students a choice in how they demonstrate what they know by creating a choice board and uploading it as an assignment. Choice boards allow students to choose between several assignments and can be created directly in Classroom, using Google Docs, or with third-party apps.
• Co-Teach Classes – Invite others to co-teach in your Classroom. Each teacher is able to create assignments and post announcements for students.
• Create Questions Before a Socratic Seminar – Create an assignment for students to develop questions before a Socratic seminar. During the collaborative process, students can eliminate duplicate questions.
• Detention Assignment Sheet – Create a detention assignment sheet using Google Docs. The assignment sheet can then be shared with the detention teacher and individual students privately through Classroom.
• Differentiate Assignments – Assign work to individual students or groups of students in Classroom.
• Differentiate by Product – Differentiate by product in Classroom by providing a challenge, variety, or choice or by using a continuum with assignments.
• Digital Portfolios – Students can create digital portfolios of their work by uploading documents, pictures, artifacts, etc. to Classroom assignments.
• Directions Document – Use Google Docs to create instruction documents for assignments in Classroom.
• Distribute Student Work/Homework – Use Classroom to distribute student assignments or homework to all students, groups of students, or individual students.
• Diversify Student Submissions – Create alternative submission options for students through the assignment tool. For example, one group of students may be required to submit a Google Doc while another group is required to submit a Slides presentation.
• Do-Now Activities – Use Classroom to post Do-Now Activities.
• Draft Assignments – Save posts as drafts until they are ready for publishing.
• Feedback Before Student Submits – Provide feedback to students while their assignment is still a work in progress instead of waiting until submission. This will help the student better understand assignment expectations.
• Get Notified of Late Assignments – Select notification settings to get notified each time an assignment is turned in late.
• Global Classroom – Partner with international teachers to create a co-teaching classroom without borders where students can work on collaborative assignments.
• Graphic Organizers – Upload graphic organizers for students to collaborate on assignments and projects.
• Group Collaboration – Assign multiple students to an assignment to create a collaborative group. Give students editing rights to allow them access to the same document.
• HyperDocs – Create and upload a hyperdoc as an assignment.
• Link to Assignments – Create links to assignments not created in Classroom.
• Link to Class Blog – Provide the link to a class blog in Classroom.
• Link to Next Activity – Provide a link to the next activity students must complete after finishing an assignment.
• Make a Copy for Each Student – Chose “make a copy for each student” when uploading assignment documents to avoid students having to share one copy of the document. When a copy for each student is made, Classroom automatically adds each student’s name to the document and saves it to the Classroom folder in Google Drive.
• Move to Top/Bottom – Move recent assignments to the top of the Classwork feed so students can find new tasks more quickly.
• Multiple File Upload – Upload multiple files for an assignment in one post.
• Naming Conventions for Assignments – Create a unique naming system for assignments so they can be easily found in the Classroom folder in Google Drive.
• Offline Mode – Change settings to allow students to work in offline mode if internet connections are weak. Once an internet connection is established, students can upload assignments to Classroom.
• One Student One Sheet – In Google Sheets, assign one tab (sheet) per student for the student to complete the assignment.
• One Student One Slide – In Google Slides, assign one slide to each student to present findings on a topic or to complete an assignment.
• Organize Student Work – Google Classroom automatically creates calendars and folders in Drive to keep assignments organized.
• Peer Tutors – Assign peer tutors to help struggling students with assignments.
• Protect Privacy – Google Classroom only allows class members to access assignments. Also, it eliminates the need to use email, which may be less private than Classroom.
• Provide Accommodations – Provide accommodations to students with disabilities in Google Classroom by allowing extra time to turn in assignments, using text to speech functions, and third-party extensions for colored overlays.
• Reorder Assignments by Status – Instead of organizing assignments by student first or last name, organize them by status to see which students have or have not turned in work.
• Reuse Posts – Reuse post from prior assignments or from other Classrooms.
• See the Process – Students don’t have to submit their assignments for you to see their work. When you chose “make a copy for each student” for assignments, each student’s work can be seen in the grading tool, even if it’s not submitted. Teachers can make comments and suggestions along the way.
• Share Materials – Upload required materials such as the class syllabus, rules, procedures, etc. to a Class Resources Module, or upload assignment materials within the assignment.
• Share Resources – Create a resource list or a resource module for students.
• Share Solutions to an Assignment – Share solutions to an assignment with a collaborator or students after all assignments have been turned in.
• Stop Repeating Directions – By posting a directions document to assignments, the need to continually repeat directions is lessened, if not eliminated altogether. Keep in mind that some students will still need directions to read orally or clarified.
• Student Work Collection – Use Classroom to collect student work from assignments.
• Summer Assignments – Create summer assignments for students through Classroom.
• Templates – Create templates for projects, essays, and other student assignments.
• Track Assignments Turned In – Keep track of which students turned in assignments by going to the grading tool.

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6 Apps and Tools That Integrate With Google Classroom

Dynamic Learning Assignment - Create

The dynamic learning assignment type allows you to choose one or more learning objects (LOs) and select the users who will be assigned the training on their transcript. Dynamic learning assignments process every day and allow you to assign training on an ongoing basis to users who meet specific criteria. For example, you can create a dynamic learning assignment which checks every day to see if any new users were hired, then assigns those users new hire orientation training.

Note: Prior to creating a dynamic learning assignment for new hires, it would be necessary to first create a dynamic group which was configured to search the system for newly hired users each day and add them to the group. For more information about creating a dynamic new hire group, See Use Case - Create a Dynamic New Hire Group.

To create a new dynamic learning assignment, go to Admin > Tools > Learning and click the Learning Assignment Tool link. Then, click the Create Assignment button.

The first step for creating a dynamic learning assignment is providing some basic information about the assignment and selecting the training that will be assigned. In this example, an administrator is assigning newly hired employees a course called "New Hire Orientation."

• Begin by selecting the assignment type. To create a dynamic learning assignment, select the Dynamic assignment type.
• Enter a descriptive title for the dynamic learning assignment. In this example, the assignment title will be "New Hire Orientation 2017."
• Enter a description for the assignment which will help other administrators understand the purpose of the assignment.
• Click the Select Training button to add training to the assignment.
• In the flyout, search for and select the course, and then click the Select button at the bottom of the flyout. The training is added to the assignment.
• Click the Next button to advance to the Options step of the learning assignment creation process.

For more details about all the options available on the Setup page, See Create Learning Assignment - Setup.

On the Options step, configure the assignment workflow and email options. For a dynamic assignment:

• Decide whether or not to enable Dynamic Removal. If enabled, users will be automatically removed from the assignment when they no longer meet the user criteria. For this example, Dynamic Removal will not be enabled, because the assignment will be assigned to new hires, and there is no reason a new employee would be removed from a new hire group.
• Assigned Only - This option places the learning objects onto the user's transcript, but will still require the dynamic approvals. Once approved, the user must still click the Register link on their transcript.
• Assigned and Approved - This option places the learning objects in an Approved status on the user's transcript, bypassing the normal approval process. The user must still click the Register link on their Transcript.

If the user has already paid for a previous version of the training, the user will not pay for the newly assigned version.

If Assign New Occurrence is enabled, it does not override the registration workflow for previous versions of the same training; it only applies to the current version of the training. If a user already paid for training and is assigned the same version of that training with this setting, they will need to pay for the training again if Bypass User Payment is not checked.

• Set prerequisite options for the assignment, if applicable.
• Select email options for the learning assignment. You can choose to use the default training-specific email templates configured in the Course Catalog, create a custom set of emails for the assignment, send a one-time email, or use no emails at all.
• Once all options have been configured for the dynamic learning assignment, click the Next button to advance to the Schedule step.

For more details about all the options available on the Options page, See Create Learning Assignment - Options.

On the Schedule page, determine when the dynamic learning assignment will process, and when training will be due for users who are assigned the training. For dynamic assignments:

• Select a Processing Frequency. Dynamic assignments can either process daily or annually. In this example, the assignment will process daily so any new employees will receive the new hire training as soon as they are added to the system.
• Select a Processing Start Date. You can decide whether the dynamic assignment will process immediately upon submission, on a relative date, or on a specific date. This assignment is set to process immediately.
• If needed, select a Processing End Date. The dynamic assignment will stop processing automatically on the chosen date, and no more users will be assigned the training after that time.
• Specify a Training Due Date, if applicable. For dynamic assignments which process daily, it is recommended to either select no due date or configure a relative date. The Annual Date option is usually only applicable to dynamic assignments which process annually.
• Leave the Recurrence setting in the Off position. For a use case for dynamic recurring learning assignments, See Dynamic Recurring Learning Assignment - Create.
• Click the Next button at the bottom of the page to advance to the Users step.

For more details about all the options available on the Schedule page, See Create Learning Assignment - Schedule.

On the Users step, set user criteria for the assignment. In this example, the administrator previously created a group called "New Hires," which is configured to include users with a hire date on or after January 1, 2017. For information about how to create a dynamic new hire group, See Use Case - Create a Dynamic New Hire Group.

• To add users to the assignment, you can select user criteria (such as a division, location, etc.), you can add all system users to the assignment, or you can upload a .csv file of usernames or user IDs. For dynamic assignments, it is recommended that you choose dynamic criteria (such as a division, location, group, etc). Selecting specific users by name is not recommended for dynamic assignments. In this example, the administrator has selected the group, "New Hires."
• Decide whether or not to enable the Assign New Occurrence feature. Switching the Enable Assign New Occurrence toggle to the On position will include users who meet the defined user criteria and already have the training selected for the assignment on their transcript. When enabled, users who have already completed the training will receive a new occurrence of the training and need to take it again. For this example, the Assign New Occurrence option is not enabled, as employees should not receive new hire training more than once.
• Click the Generate Initial User List button to view a list of users who will be assigned the training, based on your user criteria selections. Using the check boxes in each user's tile, you can opt to not include certain users or certain training items for users if needed.
• After configuring the correct user criteria, click the Next button at the bottom of the page to advance to the Confirm step.

For more details about all the options available on the Users page, See Create Learning Assignment - Users.

On the Confirm page, review your learning assignment selections by expanding the tiles for each section of the process. You can return to previous pages by clicking the name of a section in the navigation panel on the left side of the page.

After reviewing all your learning assignment configurations and ensuring all selections are correct, you can click the Submit button to submit the new learning assignment. The learning assignment will process and assign training according to your scheduling selections. Note: Once submitted, the learning assignment cannot be stopped or reversed. It is only possible to stop a dynamic learning assignment from continuing to process in the future.

For more details about all the options available on the Confirm page, See Create Learning Assignment - Confirm.

What’s New

Get the latest on new products and enhancements.

We’re innovating year-round to improve the lives of educators and the students they serve. Visit this page—and check back often—to stay current on exciting new solutions and program features you can implement right away.

Drive Growth with Helpful Resources and New Courses

New courses plus time-saving updates and resources.

As promised, we continue to add courses to Unique Learning System (ULS) and Inspire! ULS has a new foundational phonics course aligned to the Science of Reading and two new math courses. Inspire’s new math course addresses what can be a challenging topic: fractions. Plus, Positivity and SymbolStix PRIME get new time-saving resources and Polaris gets new functionality to support writing high-quality, high-impact IEPs.

Boost Student Growth with Empowering, Time‑Saving Updates

Would you like students to have more instructional time? How about new ways to ensure teachers are effective? You get all of this with our latest updates, which include almost every n2y solution! As requested, SymbolStix PRIME offers quick and easy ways to create multiple‑page boards. Unique Learning System (ULS) and Inspire have added new math courses, and ULS also provides new math instructional guides. Polaris now has deeper integration with ULS, Positivity, and L 3  Skills. Positivity allows access to strategies, profiles, and tracking without a visual schedule. Finally, News2you’s holiday articles have been updated and expanded, and L 3  Skills has a fun new shopping game.

Updates that Are Perfect for Back to School

We’re excited to help you start the new school year successfully with new and updated instructional materials, assessments, tools, and resources. Unique Learning System offers more new and improved Benchmarks and two new foundational math courses. If you need to add science and social studies goals to IEPs for compliance in your state, you can do that with Polaris now. New Positivity decision trees guide students as they sign into their n2y account, and 18 new boards in SymbolStix PRIME can be customized to address engagement, academics, and classroom structure. Plus, students use deductive reasoning to identify a messy culprit in our new L 3 Skills game.

Updates to Boost Teacher Effectiveness and Save Them Time

We love empowering teachers and saving them time, and the latest updates to our solutions do exactly that! Address literacy skills with our new foundational phonics course that extends support for the Science of Reading in Unique Learning System. District and state compliance will be easier to achieve with the added flexibility and assessment summaries Polaris now provides. Our handy resource for choosing back-to-school Positivity strategies is a big time-saver. And a new L 3 Skills game gives returning students a fun activity for building life skills.

Improve Instruction and Engagement

Unique Learning System gets most of the updates this month, including new and improved lesson plans in Leveled Book and Number Sense lessons, engaging math visuals, a second foundational phonics course, and more new and improved Benchmarks. Plus, we’ve added some L 3 Skills games that strengthen sound recognition with Symbolsaurus.

New Ways and More Data to Foster Growth

Recent updates to our solutions bring more support to help teachers reach every student and foster meaningful growth. In Unique Learning System, new and improved Benchmarks offer greater insight into individual needs and new math courses offer evidence-based practices to develop students’ foundational skills. Inspire has new ELA courses that present reading comprehension strategies to students who need intervention. Positivity adds premade behavior strategies and SymbolStix PRIME adds premade communication boards—all easily customizable. And students get to pilot a drone through an obstacle course in a new L 3 Skills game.

Science of Reading course and end-of-year strategies

See what we’ve added to n2y solutions to support teachers and unique learners! Educators can foster lifelong readers with a new Science of Reading course in Unique Learning System, assign Benchmarks in GPS, provide transition career resources, customize math boards for abstract skills practice in SymbolStix PRIME, and assign premade, end-of-year strategies to provide students the consistency they need to thrive.

New Courses, Letter-Tracing Boards, and Games

Check out exciting new additions to n2y solutions that boost instruction and learning! Educators can target skills with two new, differentiated math courses in Unique Learning System, provide intervention instruction with an ELA course in Inspire, customize letter-tracing boards for writing practice in SymbolStix PRIME, and give students a fun, engaging game to practice forming compound words.

Engaging Updates, 2023 Summer Unit, and New Games

Get ready to spring forward! Explore the latest updates that support instruction and learning. Teachers can target skills with brand-new, differentiated math courses in Unique Learning System and Inspire, learn about this year’s Summer Unit, and engage students with new games.

Updates that Increase Efficiency and Effectiveness

We’re listening to your requests as we constantly update our solutions! Administrators will love using a new report for Unique Learning System and Inspire to ensure compliance, implementation with fidelity, and support for teachers. Inspire has three new courses to give teachers more ways to reach struggling students. Finding the right behavior strategies and reviewing specific data in Positivity is more efficient than ever. And students will enjoy completing patterns in our new L 3  Skills game.

Empowering Updates for Teachers and Students

Welcome back from winter break! Check out the latest updates that will improve teaching and learning as classes start back up. You can quickly make assignments that same way in multiple solutions now, capture student attention better than ever with a vibrant new design in News2you, start teaching new math courses in Inspire and Unique Learning System, and much more.

Multiple Updates Boost Compliance and Flexibility

Improved compliance, greater flexibility, better student support, a new math course, and fun games—our latest updates offer all this and more! Check out how you can improve teaching and learning with Polaris, Positivity, Unique Learning System, and L 3  Skills.

Students Create Some Fun in Two New Games

Students have two exciting new games in L 3  Skills, one where they make a delicious snack for game day and one where they build a birdhouse. Reading Recipes: Game Day incorporates fractions as part of number and object identification. Workshop: Birdhouse develops fine motor skills through pre‑writing and tracing.

Inspire Launches and Total Solution Extends Flexibility

Inspire is here! We’re so excited to announce the launch of our new intervention curriculum that guides struggling and at-risk students to achieve general education standards! What else is new? You get expanded flexibility in planning and assignments and the option to share students with other educators across our total solution. The Present Level of Performance section in Polaris has been reorganized to ease IEP development and compliance. And L 3  Skills has lots of new games.

Amazing Back-to-School Solution Updates

Our newest Polaris updates include Preschool and Transition Areas of Focus and communication-building Parent Surveys. Plus, L 3  Skills now includes Super Derby Superlatives, an accessible new language arts game for kids ages 7–12!

Put Summer Knowledge to Work in a New Game

Build object identification, reading, and word‑to‑symbol matching skills in a new game that puts some fun into a “summer job” for students. With summer‑themed vocabulary and images, this L 3  Skills game’s a great choice to boost engagement.

Summertime Learning and a New Tool and Game

Summer will flow more smoothly than ever with the latest updates to your solutions. In Unique Learning System’s Summer Unit, students will learn about camping, hiking, and the importance of trying new things—plus, we’ve added guides to adapting the unit’s leveled books. Everyone will love the new marker tool in SymbolStix PRIME. And an L 3 Skills game offers a pleasant way to beat the heat while working on fractions and identifying numbers and objects.

New Ways to Improve Collaboration and Learning

We have so many exciting updates to all the solutions that educators, students, and families love! The latest ones include new tools in Polaris that make collaboration among IEP teams better than ever and much‑needed Transition resources. We have also added a Professional Learning webinar for end‑of‑year success and the expertly assembled n2y Math Manipulatives Kit. Plus, there are lots of new pre‑made strategies in Positivity and templates in SymbolStix PRIME as well as an L 3  Skills game focused on letter sequencing.

Now choose from over 170 L 3  Skills games!

Two great new games now bring the total to over 170 L 3  Skills games! Ben’s Big Choices and Reading Recipes: Sweet Treats are great examples of how L 3  Skills supports lifelong learning as students learn to make good decisions and sharpen their math skills.

Enhance Communication Opportunities with New Templates!

Connect with unique learners better than ever using 15 new templates in SymbolStix PRIME! Teachers and service providers can spark rewarding conversations at school and at home with much‑requested templates that are easily customized for individual needs. Also, two new L 3  Skills games build letter and word recognition.

New Admin Report Tools and Positivity Templates

Enjoy expanded support for teachers and students thanks to recent updates to the Total Solution and Positivity! Admins will gain greater insight into solution usage and student progress while teachers will find time‑saving resources for building essential SEL skills. Plus, a new L 3  Skills game lets players discover fun facts about animals at an aquarium.

New Polaris Content

We’ve added an Adaptive/Functional Area of Focus to Polaris, including a new profile, assessments, and aligned goals and resources to provide a comprehensive view of a student’s adaptive functional skills.

Strengthen Life and Math Skills in a New Cooking Game

Students get to make a fall favorite in our new L 3  Skills game: pumpkin pie! They must follow the directions carefully, picking out ingredients in the right amounts—practicing object, number, and fraction recognition.

New Courses Page and Admin Tools

We’ve refreshed the Unique Learning System Courses page with a clean design. Updates to student rostering include the option to add students in bulk, as well as the ability to create single records.

Build Math Skills with a Mysterious New L 3  Skills Game

When students visit the Mystery Mansion in our new L 3  Skills game, they need to use their math skills to figure out who has taken a book from the library. Can they eliminate suspects one by one to unravel the mystery?

New Time‑Saving Positivity Strategies and an L 3  Skills Game

Twenty new premade Positivity strategies with timely topics expand your options for supporting social‑emotional learning, helping everyone to start the new school year right! Plus, our latest L 3  Skills game builds math and life skills as students check out a variety of carnival games.

Easily Monitor District Performance with New Reports!

Four new reports in Unique Learning System give administrators a high‑level view of district performance, ensuring better visibility of n2y solution usage and what everyone values the most: positive student outcomes!

Build Math and Life Skills in a New Cooking Game

It’s time for a fun breakfast in our new L 3  Skills game! Students will develop their ability to follow directions and their math skills (including number recognition and fractions) while completing a recipe for some delicious waffles, one ingredient at a time.

Expanded Assignments and Data Access in My Students

Just in time for Back to School, it’s even easier to manage assignments and monitor student progress across multiple n2y solutions—My Students is where the action is!

Quickly Assign News2you Articles in My Students!

Now News2you gives teachers and service providers a more streamlined and powerful way to manage assignments in My Students! Plus, when previewing Student View through My Students, you’ll see News2you along with Unique Learning System for those seated in both solutions.

Powerful, Time-Saving Updates to Monthly Lessons and My Students

They’re here! We’ve made big changes to Unique Learning System that empower educators more than ever! From a complete redesign of Monthly Lessons to an enhanced My Students page, these updates give you more time to focus on your students, easy access to important actions and data, and much more flexibility.

Keep your roster current with student bulk removal

It’s a good time of year for subscription maintenance, and we’ve just made it easier to clean up your student rosters. Bulk removal of dropped students can now be done from your dashboard—at your convenience!

Build Life Skills with Two New L 3  Skills Games

Students can experience the thrill of game show participation in two new L 3  Skills games! They’ll develop their sorting and categorizing skills as they decide whether or not items belong in a wide variety of categories.

Create More Meaningful IEPs with Polaris, Save Time with Classroom Codes

After years of thoughtful development work at n2y, and incredibly helpful feedback from our subscribers, Polaris is here to revolutionize the IEP process! There’s also a helpful new Classroom Code on the My Students page that will save you a lot of time.

New Checkpoints Delivery in Student View, L 3  Skills Game and Polaris Guided Tour

This month’s updates span multiple solutions! Using Unique Learning System you can now assign Checkpoint Assessments in Student View for improved remote progress monitoring. A new game in L 3  Skills offers a fun way for students to hone their time‑telling and matching skills. And our revolutionary IEP solution, Polaris, is ready for prime time—watch the guided tour to see this life‑changing system in action!

Resources to Prepare You for Summer

Our much‑anticipated Summer Unit is available now through August 31, 2021! This year’s engaging theme, By the Sea , will keep your students motivated, participating, and advancing toward their learning goals with evidence‑based lessons, hands‑on activities, and more.

New Task Completion Guidance in Student View and a New Spelling Game

We’re all about task completion this month! Build students’ ability to persevere and finish work with new completion prompts in Student View. When they attempt to turn in an assignment that is incomplete, students will see a visual prompt highlighting what part of an activity needs to be completed before they can submit it. And a new game in L 3  Skills provides practice in completing spelling words.

New L 3  Skills Game Fundraiser Sale

It’s time for everyone’s favorite: a bake sale! Students fill orders for yummy desserts at a high school’s annual fundraiser in our new L 3  Skills game, improving their object recognition, number identification, and counting skills.

Student View has an engaging new look

With a simplified design to Student View, students will find it easier to navigate between their n2y solutions when they first sign in. And once in a solution, they’ll easily locate the activities you’ve assigned.

New At-a-Glance Lesson Status in Unique Learning System

The new Turn In capability in Unique Learning System is a fantastic addition that lets students, caregivers, and teachers easily see progress on activities and improves data collection, too—especially helpful during remote learning! Also, two new Feed Symbolsaurus games in L 3  Skills build letter and word recognition with the help of a hungry dinosaur.

View, Print, and Download Student Answers in Unique Learning System

Student data in Unique Learning System just got more informative than ever. Now teachers can see the work behind the data and easily print or download student answers!

Build a Snowman to Solve a Puzzle!

Do your students know how to make a snowman? Our new Monster Moves L 3  Skills game includes snowman-making steps as a guide for correctly sorting puzzle pieces—perfect for winter learning and fun!

Additional Student Login Options

Students have better access to learning now that it’s easier than ever to sign into n2y solutions! We’ve added login options that include single sign‑on (SSO), which can simplify password management.

Organize and Collaborate Like Never Before with SymbolStix PRIME

A big update brings improved versatility and reach to SymbolStix PRIME! New organizational options help you manage your interactive boards, and you can send them to colleagues who subscribe, wherever they may be. Students can be assigned custom boards, enhancing their access to learning, language, and self‑expression in any setting throughout their day.

Participate in a “Hands-on” Art Show!

Visit an art museum where vibrant works of art need a little help to look their best. Students will experience discovery and accomplishment as they clean up various paintings on display.

An Accessible Basketball Game

Unique learners get to shoot some hoops in a number of outdoor and indoor settings, including a public park, school playground, and gym, in a new L 3  Skills single-switch game.

Feed Some Friendly Dogs in a New Game

“Woof!” We’ve got some hungry dogs eager for a snack in the new L 3  Skills game Follow the Path: Dogs. Students will develop their fine motor skills as they carefully trace different paths from start to finish, bringing a biscuit to a variety of dogs.

Key Improvements to Usability and Setup for n2y Solutions

We’ve listened to feedback from teachers and administrators to guide changes to search in L 3  Skills and the implementation of a new sample classroom in Unique Learning System. We also clarified accessibility settings for students and now support single sign-on (SSO) through an LMS for all n2y solutions.

A Skatepark Accessible to All

Head to the skatepark for some fun in a new L 3  Skills single-switch game! Unique learners will love having an accessible way to initiate skateboarding tricks on different ramps.

New Flexibility and Improved Communication for Teachers and Students

Teachers and students can work more efficiently and communicate better than ever with the new marker tool in Unique Learning System and News2you. Draw, annotate, or highlight anywhere on interactive documents, which is especially useful for remote learning!

New On-Demand Scheduling and Ways to Change Symbol Skin Tones

Designed to accommodate and enhance remote learning, Positivity’s Schedule On Demand is a major new feature that educators and students will love! Plus, we have a simple but powerful update to SymbolStix PRIME that brings universal access to changing symbol skin tones.

Immersive Classic Literature for Unique Learners

Classic literature is now accessible to all learners through adapted and symbol-supported versions plus full teaching support.

See Lesson Activity Data for All Students at a Glance

Unique Learning System now gives you a quick way to tell whether your students have completed an assigned lesson activity. You can see data for the current unit as well as any previous units within the school year.

Positivity Behavior Management: From Start to Finish

Already a powerful resource for behavior management, Positivity now encompasses a Core Behavior Profile, behavior tracking, and additional reporting to support teachers and administrators throughout the behavior intervention process.

Updated Group Skill Tracking Standards and New Toggle Switch in Reports

We’ve got two updates to Unique Learning System that will be helpful to many teachers. Group Skill Tracking now includes location-based standards instead of Common Core standards to better align with IEP compliance and progress monitoring for students in reading, math, or writing small groups. Also, a new toggle switch in My Reports gives educators an easy way to show or hide sample student data in the results.

New Courses, More Data, and Google Single Sign‑On

We’ve got three exciting updates to Unique Learning System! There are new social studies courses you can assign, and once they’ve been assigned, you’ll see data on student progress (and for science courses, too). Also, now you can review data for multiple courses at once within the Course Performance Report. For those who would like one fewer login to keep track of, use Google Single Sign‑On (SSO) to access your n2y account.

Plan Your Month in Minutes

We’ve updated My Schedule and My Plan in Unique Learning System to make planning your month so easy you can do it in a few minutes.

News2you Gets Student View! Plus, More Student Performance Data at a Glance

A major update to News2you adds Student View, giving educators more resources to work with and allowing anytime, anywhere access to students! Also, now Student Performance Reports in Unique Learning System can show data across multiple lessons and/or standards.

Do More With Less Effort

Recent updates to Unique Learning System not only streamline the process of planning, but they also reduce the time and effort needed to review student progress versus grade-level general education and extended standards.

Tag, Filter and Sort

Would you like to be able to find exactly the right template, right when you need it? This update to Positivity gives you the ability to quickly organize, find and filter your templates.

More Efficient Scheduling and a New Golf Game

Creating student schedules in Unique Learning System is more efficient than ever: Now My Plan allows copying of activities from block to block into more than one day. And students who have mastered the first Type Golf: Core Vocabulary game in L 3  Skills have a new challenge!

Teachers and Students Save Time With More‑Efficient Ways to Work

We’ve got an update to Unique Learning System that many teachers have requested: Student Performance Reports now include homework by default! Also, students and teachers can now navigate from solution to solution without having to log out each time.

Improved Navigation and List Ordering

n2y has updated Unique Learning System so you can work more efficiently. Whether you want to view different students’ Instructional Task data or you need to change reading level priority for a student, you have a new way to do it quickly.

Golf for Everyone!

Golf games are eternally popular with gamers so we’re following up last month’s Type Golf: Core Vocabulary Set 1—and hoping to engage even more unique learners—with this week’s addition to L 3  Skills, Golf Single Switch.

We Love Giving You Back Valuable Time for Teaching

We’re constantly updating our solutions to help educators focus on teaching. Recent changes to SymbolStix PRIME and Positivity add new, time-saving capabilities for customizing activities and behavior strategies. In addition, Positivity users can now symbolize text and take advantage of robust tracking and reporting. Finally, we’ve added another fun, standards-aligned game to L 3  Skills that incorporates a sport that’s recognizable and played worldwide: golf.

Expanded Superpowers!

We’re constantly adding new standards-aligned games to L 3  Skills, and for this month we’ve expanded on an existing favorite—and given players even more superpowers—by creating More Super Slice !

Search, Link and Report

We have some time-saving improvements to share, plus a major update to one of our solutions! News2you users will find the new search functionality for Breaking News articles to be an easy way to return to those articles and use them anytime you’d like. Unique Learning System users will appreciate the new simplicity of moving linked events. And Positivity users now have many new reports to draw from in order to make data-driven decisions—and improve student outcomes.

You Asked, We Answered: Homework!

So many educators have asked us for the ability to assign homework in Unique Learning System, and we are thrilled to announce that the homework feature is now live!

Encourage Greater Independence with New Positivity Alarm Options

We’ve updated the alarm options in Positivity. Why? Research has shown that alarms are a great way to promote independence, and these new features provide even more options for personalization.

More Great Content for Unique Learning System

Unique Learning System is known for its robust, accessible content—and now there’s more! The new Suggested Content feature links you to additional targeted resources for supporting your unique learners.

Monitor Student Progress More Precisely with Student Daily Performance

Unique Learning System has always been a great resource for tracking student progress. Now, users can see daily student performance data through the monthly activities.

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