Education Technology, News, Features, e-Learning Management System

Site Updates 1/12/2012

By Tim ⋅ January 13, 2012 ⋅ New Features ⋅

Less than a week after our last release, we have a number of new features and exciting improvements for you.

Edit Update Attachments

Users can delete or add attachments to existing updates, in addition to editing the update text. To remove attachments, click on the “x” next to the attachment you would like to delete. Adding attachments can be done from the edit popup.

Create Templates in Resources

Teachers now have the ability to create course content directly from the resources area. Discussions, tests, pages, and assignments can be created and edited without having to first import from or save to a course.

Test/Quiz Attachments

Attachments can be added to assessments in the same way they can be added to assignments. This can be useful for equation sheets or other reference materials that students need to see throughout the exam.

Published vs. Unpublished Grades

Courses that have unpublished materials will show a different grade to students than to teachers. The two grades can now be seen side-by-side directly from the gradebook. If a final or grading period grade is affected by unpublished assignments, the corner of the grading period…

Site Updates 1/7/2012

By Tim ⋅ January 7, 2012 ⋅ New Features ⋅

2 comments

Hide Numerical Value for Grading Scales

Teachers now have the ability to hide the numerical value associated with specific grading scales, which could be helpful with smaller scales like “check+/check-”, where the exact percentage value is not as important. To hide the numerical value from students click on the “Hide numerical value” checkbox when editing or creating a grading scale.

Copy Subfolders into Other Course Folders

When maintaining multiple sections of the same course, teachers often need to copy certain subfolders into other courses. Teachers can now copy subfolders directly into existing folders, rather than having to copy directly into the top level of the course.

Inline Pages to Replace Text Blocks

In order to simply course organization and content creation, we are phasing out support for text blocks in course folders. Instead, teachers can create an “inline” page, which will display all content of the created page in the course folder without having to navigate away. The option to make a page “inline” will only be available for pages created within course folders.

SMS Notifications for Canadian Customers

Canadian mobile subscribers can now choose to receive text message notifications from Schoology. Support for…

Site Updates 11/14/2011

By Jeremy ⋅ November 14, 2011 ⋅ Major Site Updates ⋅

9 comments

The Like Button

Over the past year, one of the most requested features has been to add a “Like” button. Whether it’s an update message or a comment throughout Schoology, often you want to express your approval without having to write a note. Today, we are allowing you to do just that. Now, whenever you see an update or a comment you will have the opportunity to “Like” it. You can see how many people have liked a particular update/comment, and you can see who those people actually were by clicking on the number next to the thumbs up icon. The screenshot below should help illustrate the like button and how it works.

Event Profiles

In addition to the like button, we have made other improvements that have come from user feedback, requests, and analysis. Events are one of the more popular features on Schoology. Previously, an event was a simple calendar reminder. It could have attachments, but overall the event was something static. Today, we are making events more useful and interactive by giving them unique profiles.

Event profiles change the experience of events by allowing attachments, comments, and even RSVP capabilities. This means…

Site Updates 10/21/2011

By Tim ⋅ October 21, 2011 ⋅ Major Site Updates ⋅

6 comments

Preview Course as Student

As a teacher, it is sometimes helpful to see how your course might appear to your students. With this new feature, you can! To view your course as a student, click on the “Members” block on the left sidebar of the course profile (or if you have chosen to hide the student roster, you can also access by clicking on “Edit Members”). You can then choose to preview the course as a specific student:

While you are viewing previewing your course, you will see a yellow box at the top of every page showing the student you are currently previewing the course as.

You can end preview mode by either clicking on the “Back to Course” button or by navigating away from your course to another part of the site.

Discussion Comment Attachments

Students and teachers can now attach files and links or embed content along with their discussion comments. If the permission is enabled, users should see “File” and “Link/Embed” buttons under the comment entry box.

Questions / Further Information

As always, if you have questions about the new features, you can ask them on our support forum at http://community.schoology.com.

Site Update: Video Transcoding

By Tim ⋅ October 14, 2011 ⋅ Major Site Updates ⋅

5 comments

We are proud to announce our newest major feature, Video Transcoding! Much like YouTube, Vimeo, or other popular video sites, you can upload audio and media files that can be played in browser regardless of format and without having to include HTML embed codes. As soon as you upload a file, we will take care of converting it into a playable, in-browser format. Our player supports both Flash and HTML5 (allowing playback in iOS devices).

Supported File Formats

The following files are supported by our video transcoder:

ram
rpm
rv
smi
smil
mp3

Keep in mind that certain codecs may prevent the file from successfully being converted regardless of file format.

Conversion Process

As soon as you uploaded and save a media file, you will see an icon next to the file name or a placeholder for the player, along with a status message outlining the status of the conversion. If for any reason the conversion fails, it will let you know…

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