Elite 100

Favorite teacher tools:

I love it all! There is such a broad area of content on IXL to help inspire learning and build confidence in every students' academics.

Making it fun:

I use IXL for everything! My students use the skill plans for NWEA Growth. I love how I can specifically put in the details of each category for them to work on. The leaderboards are a great way to inspire students to go above and beyond with each core academic area. My students live to have bragging rights for the weekly leaderboard. The Group Jam is also another part of IXL that my students beg to do every day with our curriculum in class. They love to show that they have mastered new content to their classmates.

Success story:

After using IXL, many of my students who were below grade level or even above grade level have shown mastery on their academic content. When a student would master a sixth grade standard, they would do the same type of content with higher grade levels and you would see their smiles from outer space that they could do higher level content.

Strategies for success:

I look at the scores on each lesson to see if students have done well, along with the amount of time they spend on each lesson. It's also nice to see what skills they are struggling in so I can focus on setting goals with all of my students.

Favorite teacher tools:

I enjoy that students are able to look back at the examples to help figure out what they did wrong. The students learn self discipline and strive to work harder, and that translates into lifelong skills.

Strategies for success:

The Common Core alignment as well as the skill plans help me focus on priority standards and reinforcing the school curriculum. After looking at the priority standards my students will be tested on, I like to assign the IXL skills that are grouped within those standards. With the NWEA skill plans, I can put in the scores students received from the fall assessment and IXL develops a personalized skill plan to help each student improve in the areas they struggled in.

Favorite teacher tools:

I like using the Score Grid to track skill completion and the trouble spots to track who needs additional support on a skill.

Strategies for success:

I use the Score Grid report to keep track of the skills that my students have practiced and mastered, and see who needs extra help in certain areas or concepts.

Favorite teacher tools:

I appreciate the Group Jam feature, because it allows me the opportunity to go over the content whole-group, see which students aren't getting it, see where they may be making mistakes, and do on-the-spot corrections.

Success story:

Students who use IXL have shown improvement after continuous practice of skills. There have been many times that students struggle with a skill, but after practicing with IXL they now understand what they are supposed to do.

Strategies for success:

We start every day with IXL skills. Three days a week we focus on math and two days a week we focus on language arts. Students complete assigned skills daily to either review previously-taught skills or as an introduction to a new concept.

Favorite teacher tools:

I love the Live Classroom feature. I am able to see all students working and catch those right away who need extra help.

Success story:

I see students gain confidence in their skills after using IXL.

Making it fun:

I love that I can create a personalized study plan for our students using our students' NWEA map scores that allow students to work on skills they need based on that data. I also like the new updates that have been added over the last year with the writing tools and the video tutorials. This allows me to more fully use the program when doing whole group instruction. I also love the leaderboards. My students enjoy competing with one another to see who can get to the top and win the prize for that week.

Success story:

IXL is helping us close the gaps we have seen due to Covid over the last few years by allowing us to utilize a differentiated learning pathway and target skills they are lower in.

Favorite teacher tools:

The IXL Diagnostic is great for my intervention groups.

Success story:

IXL has been one of the best resources bought by our school. It has provided so much growth to my students and makes learning fun. As for me, it has given me immediate feedback in regards of student learning and comprehension. Thank you for creating such a great resource for our kids and to facilitate the teacher work.

Strategies for success:

IXL is used in a myriad of ways in our classroom. During the day we use it as a supplement to the skills we are studying, as a whole-class instruction for new skills, and remediation with small groups. Homework is assigned for 15 minutes most evenings. As the assessments dictate, I can work 1:1 with students daily.

Favorite teacher tools:

Student Quickview and Student Usage are awesome. Knowing the time they are taking, the actual work they are accomplishing, and when they are doing their work is important to me.

Making it fun:

IXL helps me teach and the kids learn. More importantly, the students love it!

Success story:

The main improvement that I have seen is their confidence. IXL motivates students to put in the time and work.

Strategies for success:

The data from using IXL in my special education classroom helps me to develop and implement small-group interventions that truly benefit my students.

Favorite teacher tools:

The analytics tools are some of my favorites! The students are taking more responsibility for their learning and check their own analytics which also helps them to be self-motivated. They check their own progress daily.

Making it fun:

Our students actually have become advocates for their own learning after being taught how to use the analytics tools. They enjoy seeing their own progress.

Strategies for success:

I use IXL for remediation purposes. Students spend 30 minutes a day on IXL Language Arts and another 30 minutes a day on IXL Math. They complete the diagnostic once a week so that they are constantly being challenged and building their skills.

Favorite teacher tools:

The IXL feature that I appreciate most is the Analytics. I can see how many minutes each student spends on a specific subject and their grade for each task. I use this feature to show progress toward SPED goals. This data is a godsend when documenting present levels of academic performances as well as stating strengths and weaknesses in IEPs.

Success story:

My students have improved in reading fluency and are filling in the holes in their math knowledge after using IXL.

Strategies for success:

I use the Real-Time Diagnostic daily, as I have seen it work on a level that I could never do on my own given the number of students and limited amount of time. The diagnostic fills in the gaps while the student continues to learn grade level content the rest of the day. As they complete these plans, I go over the progress with each student and even present the plans at parent-teacher conferences.

Favorite teacher tools:

The features I appreciate the most are the Live Classroom, Recommendations wall, Group Jam, and skill plans. The Live Classroom feature allows me to help when help is needed instead of waiting on a student to come to me, I can also provide encouragement and atta-boys along the way. Recommendations keep my students, and me, on the right skills every week while showing them which ones they need to finish or have already completed. It is an interactive to-do list that they love completing! Last, but certainly not least, the Group Jam is perfect for those grade level skills that tend to push my students over the edge. The skill plans allow me to match content to not only the textbook, but also to state standards whether the textbook covers them or not. I use this all year, but rely heavily upon it for prepping for the end-of-year state test.

Making it fun:

The reports in IXL Analytics that I find most useful are all of the score and diagnostic reports. The score reports are perfect for grading and making sure that each student is on track for the week. The diagnostic reports let me see the learning gaps as well as the learning progress for each student. Plus, my students LOVE seeing how far they have come from their very first diagnostic action plan.

Strategies for success:

I see the most improvement in students that complete at least 15 skills in math and language arts each week. These students consistently score well on district assessments and state level assessments.

Favorite teacher tools:

I appreciate the new quizzes and have started to incorporate them into my curriculum. I used to have students complete skills over again but now I don't have to. Yay! I also like the new skills by week and the report page. This makes makes checking on completion and understanding much easier. I also do monthly leaderboards. This helps by having students complete skills below or above grade level that can help to expand if above grade level and reteach/reinforce skills if it is below grade level.

Strategies for success:

I have self-contained students and IXL enables them to work at their functioning level and learning pace. We use IXL as a supplement to their classwork.

Favorite teacher tools:

I use IXL Analytics to see what each student is working on, and if they are struggling then I can pull them in for one-on-one instruction.

Success story:

Some students have made grade-level improvements and this boosts their confidence when they do.

Strategies for success:

I use IXL for whole-class instruction, small-group work, and for homework. I like to teach a mini-lesson and then allow students time to practice the concept using IXL. What they don't finish in class is assigned as homework.

Favorite teacher tools:

I love the many skills IXL offers. I like how the skills gradually become more difficult as students get closer to mastery. Students get instant feedback, and the program shares information with students that helps them learn the concept when they miss a problem. I love the many libraries that come with IXL. This makes differentiation much easier. Finally, I love how I can track student progress in many ways.

Success story:

I use the Real-Time Diagnostic daily. I teach a mini-lesson and then assign the IXL skill. I've learned that many students don't pay too close attention during instruction, but once they try completing the assignment, they suddenly gain a deeper interest in what I am teaching. The Real-Time Diagnostic helps me track their progress and respond in a timely manner.

Favorite teacher tools:

The Score Grid is one of the most useful reports in IXL Analytics. It helps me quickly and easily access students' scores on individual assignments.

Strategies for success:

I use IXL to reinforce the skills that were taught during a lesson. Oftentimes, I assign skills that are on the students' level. For instance, for my 6th graders, I have a student who works at a 3rd grade level, but we are working on learning a 6th grade skill. I find a 3rd or 4th grade skill that relates to or is a prerequisite for what we are learning and assign that to the student. The same thing goes the other way for enriching lessons. If I have a student who has mastered the skill we are working on in class, I find a 7th or 8th grade lesson that uses the skill we learned.

Favorite teacher tools:

I love how IXL gives students automatic feedback. Instead of them not knowing why they missed the question, they can read and see what they did and where they probably messed up in solving the problem.

Making it fun:

In the past, I had students take the Real-Time Diagnostic once every 9 weeks. They then would get a bingo card 5x5. They had to do their IXL recommendations based on their Diagnostic to at least a 90. Then they could write in the skill they completed. Once they got 5 in a row, or a BINGO, they would earn a prize. I shared this with fellow teachers, and they really liked this idea. Last year I taught Language Arts and Math, so I required my students to do some of both subjects to earn their BINGO. I believe this truly helped fill in gaps that students had. Some students were working on grades 2 and 4, while others were working on grades 7 and 8. It was amazing to see them grow. I really think this helped my students be so successful on their end of year state tests.

Strategies for success:

I have seen students gain confidence as they work on IXL, especially after they see the growth they have made after seeing the results from the Real-Time Diagnostic. It encourages them to continue showing grit as they work and improves their work ethic by showing that hard work pays off.

Favorite teacher tools:

I appreciate the Real-Time Diagnostic because it allows me to see the progress my students are making. The recommendations that are given after they complete the diagnostics are very helpful and allow them to work on areas of weakness. I also like the ability to match my state’s standards to what they are learning in the classroom. The standards help me see that my students are prepared to take the state tests at the end of the school year.

Success story:

I love how IXL has encouraged my students to take control of part of their learning. Every day, I assign an IXL standard that matches the standard we are doing in math. I do the same thing for ELA, social studies, and science. My students have the option to stop at a SmartScore of 80, or they can choose to continue working to 100 and receive five Kauffman Bucks, part of our class economy, that they can use to purchase small items or privileges. Many students work ahead to complete standards that I have not assigned yet, but are in their areas of interest. I include their SmartScore as part of their participation grade for each day.

Strategies for success:

I use IXL for whole class instruction and homework. If we start working on a new math topic, we work on a skill or two in IXL together as a class. I use it as homework to reinforce what I taught in class.

Favorite teacher tools:

One of the features I like the most is Live Classroom. I like it because I can see exactly what my students are working on.