Learn more about the My School Year Homeschool Record Keeping release that occurred on July 21, 2016.
The Need for Speed
A comment we get from homeschoolers is the need for speed. It has got to be easy, and it has got be quick. We listened and responded…quickly of course.
This latest release focuses in on being QUICK. Quick to access a record and quick to mark complete when finished. These updates show the real value of a My School Year membership and how we continually strive to improve your experience. We reduce time to maintain records and use technology in new and creative ways – something you will not find in other record-keeping systems.
Without further ado, here is the latest updates.
“Quick Record” QR Codes
What is it? Taking advantage of QR Codes, we created our own “Quick Record” QR code for lesson plan reports. These QR Codes link directly to the lesson in order to let you quickly access and maintain the lesson.
How it works. Grab any device with a QR Code reader (available for download Android, Apple, and Microsoft stores – usually free) and scan the QR Code located on the Lesson Plan report. You will be able to directly access that assignment and make changes including marking it complete, assigning a grade, changing the lesson, or deleting it altogether.
Options. The QR Code is automatically turned on for your account when you elect to receive PDF emails either for the teacher or the student. If you do not wish to display the QR Code on the automated lesson plan email, then go to My Homeschool > My Account > Settings, and change the “Show QR Code” setting to “No”.
Quick Complete Mode
What is it? For Planbook and the Lesson Plan view, a new mode button called “done” has been created.
How it works. When this mode is selected, each lesson record displays a “done” button. By clicking this button, the lesson will be marked completed in one click. Please note, that other lesson fields like grade and time spent are not set in this mode. Please use “edit” mode to change those values.
Options. When scrolling, the “mode” selector will lock itself to the top of the screen thereby making it easier to toggle modes when viewing a long list of lessons.
Lesson Plan Report Options
What is it? The Lesson Plan Report streamlined some options and provided more configuration options. There are 3 new display options: Materials, QR Code, and Grade/Weight/Time.
How it works. The “Materials” option allows you to show or hide the materials used in a lesson. For example, a Math class might always use the same textbook. So instead of using space and paper to repeat the same textbook again and again, you can now turn off the materials display.
The “QR Code”, as previously explained, can be displayed (or not) when you manually run the report.
The previous “Standard” and “Extended” report type settings has been removed. Since the “Extended” type displayed the Grade, Weight, and Time Spent, we just moved that option to the “Display” setting for convenience.
Non-Dated Lessons & Planbook
What is it? When Planbook searches for non-dated lessons, it has to use the school term of that lesson in order to get a valid “date” range. However, when you are in between school terms, non-dated lessons are not able to appear.
How it works. To help eliminate some confusion on why these lessons do not appear, even though other past and future dated lessons do appear, the Planbook factors in a date range of plus/minus 14 days from “today” in order to pick up any old lessons from a previous term or view some lessons in an upcoming term.
Reschedule Cycles
What is it? The Reschedule Lessons Tool allows you to schedule lessons for either a 1 week or 2 week cycle.
How it works. Just like in Create-A-Plan, you are able to schedule your classes to occur on certain days each week. By enabling this feature on the Reschedule Tool, your original lessons scheduled with a 2 week cycle can be maintained.
FAQs
The Frequently Asked Questions Help page was updated to include some of the information listed on this release.
System Adjustments
In every software system in the world, the need to make tweaks will always exist. Since some of you may have encountered these “un-documented features” (e.g. bugs), here is a list of items corrected.
- When accessing a single lesson, e.g. Planbook lesson link or email lesson link, the delete button now correctly functions.
- When deleting lessons while re-ordering them on the lesson plan page, the re-order will now continue to work.
- The Reading Log page will now display the “Search” tool even if only a single term exists.
- Daily/Weekly emails no longer include or are sent to archived students.
- Teacher’s Aid will no longer create alerts for archived students.
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