itsLearning What You Need to Know to Use it Effectively at Little Mill…

Table of Contents Logging on to itsLearning Dashboards My Dashboard Adding Missing Content Blocks The Planner Latest Changes Block The Courses Block Hiding Courses Until Needed Individual Course Layout The Tree Link Setting up Notifications Additional Help

Logging on to itsLearningitsLearning Currently we ask that you log in with your child’s information. This may not be the case in the future or currently at other schools.

Dashboards The default page at log in is My Dashboard. There is an FCS dashboard that the county will post FCS news items among other things to. There is also a Little Mill dashboard. We too will post news and announcements here. But My dashboard is the one that you will want to pay the most attention to.

My Dashboard The My dashboard can be customized. This can be both good and bad. There are two things on the dashboard that we want you to see. They are the The Latest Changes Block and The Courses Block. If they are not there for some reason, you will want to add them back. There may be more than these three items and that’s okay. But you definitely want these three.

Adding Missing Content Blocks If any of the content blocks are missing, click on add a content block. Click on Aggregated. Select the box that is missing. Repeat if needed.

Latest Changes Block The Latest Changes Block is just what it says. Whenever a teacher does something new in their course, this latest action gets updated in the Latest Changes Block. You can see the changes for a particular course by going into it. You can see ALL changes in All courses on My Dashboard. By CourseMy Dashboard

Courses Block The Courses Block shows all of your courses for the year. It also shows indications of updates made to courses since your last visit. The problem is it shows ALL your courses for the year. This can be overwhelming for some. The next slide will show you how to hide them from your view.

Hiding Courses Until Needed Click the courses tab at the top of the screen. You will see all courses you are enrolled in. Then click the orange stars for all of the courses you do not have right now. Connections classes have numbers that indicate which 9 week period your child has it. ( ) means second nine weeks. Refresh your browser and check the Go to…drop down or the Courses Block on My Dashboard to see the changes. Ask your teachers before hiding Homeroom & Literacy Courses. Don’t forget to hide courses when no longer in them and unhide courses at the 9 week change!

Individual Course Layout In an effort to make your navigation easier, we have adopted a common layout for individual courses. You should find the Planner, Latest Changes Block, a Bulletin Block for course announcements, and a Links Block for valuable year-long resources for each course. Teachers may add additional blocks, but they should be added below these four. For example, this teacher also included an events block.

The Planner As a way for you to keep up with what is happening in each course, we have asked our teachers to use the Planner. The planner will include the following information: o Lesson Title o Lesson Summary o Date o Homework o Resources--files, worksheets, etc. o Activities (optional)

The Tree Link (This was the Lesson Tab in ANGEL.) Found on the left side of the screen this is where teachers will upload things needed or used in class. Look for the course name. Teachers might organize things by Units, Subjects, Weeks, etc. Each teacher might be a little different than the next. I recommend getting familiar with what each teacher does. If you are not sure, ask. Some things you might find in the Tree Link… 1.Study Guides 2.Links to websites, games, movies, etc. 3.Assignments that require students to upload their work. 4.Assessments that can be taken on the itsLearning site. 5.Notes 6.Graphic Organizers 7.Copies of HW Assignments 8.Rubrics 9.Project Details

Receiving Notifications Itslearning allows parents to receive notifications via SMS and . To do so, you will need to navigate to the “My Settings” tab. Click “activate” to turn on alerts. Choose what alerts you would like to receive, then click save. You must click Activate to turn the notifications on. New assignments do not mean all documents added, just those that are categorized as such.

Additional Help If you have further questions about itslearning, please do not hesitate to contact Little Mill’s Instructional Technology Specialist, Angela Gula or our Title I Family Engagement Coordinator, Kim DeRose. Angela Gula Ext Kim DeRose Ext