What’s new for MyLab Math, MyLab Statistics, MathXL, and MyMathTest
The December 2016 Pearson MyLab™ Release delivers a more streamlined user experience that is mobile-friendly, improves compliance with accessibility standards, and provides enhanced instructor reporting that highlights key insight into student and class performance. Please note that updated functionality courses will flow to all existing courses.
Have a question about the features? Join us on the Math Instructor Exchange and post a discussion question.
Lab Administrator Notification
New LockDown Browsers
For security reasons, please download and install a NEW LockDown Browser for MyLab Math, MyLab Statistics, MathXL and MyMathTest on your campus. The current version of the Respondus LockDown Browser will no longer be supported.
An all-new version of LockDown Browser for Windows is now available. This version is based on Chromium, rather than Internet Explorer.
The user experience is no longer different for each version of Internet Explorer that is installed on the student’s computer. Because the Chromium browser engine is bundled with the LockDown Browser, every student has the same user experience.
The MyLab Study Plan has a new design for learners, based on feedback from users and best practices from learning science. Previously the MyLab study plan landing page showed recommended and mastery items with a link to view student progress. The new Student Study Plan has been redesigned to improve accessibility, and now features three different tabs: Recommendations, Progress and All Chapters.
Recommended View
Recommended is the default landing page view, although faculty can still elect the landing page view for their courses. Students can easily see recently mastered activities clearly delineated.
Progress View
The Progress View provides a more visual presentation of how students are progressing towards completion and attaining mastery points. Recommended activities are still clearly delineated via the pushpin icon.
All Chapters View
The All Chapters View allows students to see all available MyLab activities and the number of mastery points awarded while still clearly specifying recommended activities via the pushpin icon.
Instructor Gradebook Updates
The MyLab Gradebook has been updated to improve navigation among frequently used Gradebook features, make student performance insights more readily accessible, and provide even more flexibility in grading and assignment settings.
Updated Gradebook Landing Page
The interface now aligns with previous stylistic updates and improves navigation among frequently used Gradebook features. Frequently used actions, such as the addition of offline items, have moved from the “More Tools” dropdown menu, to the main toolbar at the top of the page. (1) A visible link to the Reporting Dashboard improves visibility of advanced reporting capabilities. (2)
Updated Gradebook Interface
This update includes a new performance graph (1) that highlights student and class performance. A new, dynamic search box (2) allows faculty to easily search for specific student’s results. The new landing page enables instructors to quickly see class performance by grade categories. The landing page also includes last student logins. (3)
New Performance Graph
Additional Gradebook Updates
Searching for and emailing students based on specific criteria has been streamlined. “Email Selected” and “Export Selected” buttons are now on the search results page. A pop-up window allows for entry of the email text. Search results can also be accessed from the Gradebook Landing Page, by clicking the bar in the chart that represents the score range of interest, e.g., 40-50%.
Streamlined Searching for and Emailing Students
Filtering of Change Weights: New filtering functionality by assignments and chapters makes selecting individual assignments or chapters easy. A customized version of this page is shown in campus third-party LMS (Blackboard, Canvas, etc.) integrated courses.
Filtering of Change Weights
Roster Editing Update: The menu item for Add/Edit Student ID was removed from the toolbar header and added as an option in the “More Tools” dropdown menu. The new Edit Roster menu has been updated to present Add/Edit and Upload Student IDs with the same treatment on the page, to clearly delineate between students and section instructors, and make edits to section instructor access, (3) as well as select custom settings for section instructors.
Roster Editing Update
The Manage Incomplete menu now has improved visibility of options to filter by assignment types and chapters, and aligns with the layout and workflow on the student Assignment and Results. Instructors can now easily see options to select all past due and clear all selections.
Manage Incomplete Menu
The Manage Offline Items menu has been moved to the main toolbar on the Instructor Gradebook Landing Page (from its previous placement in the More Tools dropdown menu) to improve accessibility of this important gradebook function. The Manage Offline Items Menu now has enhanced filtering capabilities and a more direct process of adding and managing offline items, including the ability to easily change delimiters for uploading a spreadsheet of scores.
Manage Offline Items
The Refresh of the Gradebook All Assignments View aligns this page’s interface with previous stylistic updates and improves filtering by assignment types and chapters (or modules, if applicable). Assignment category weights are now visible in their own row and the Change Score function is now clearly visible.
Gradebook All Assignments View
The Item Analysis functionality has been updated to provide a clearer view of assignment data, including the class average. Columns are now sortable, and viewing results by best or most recent score or all attempts is done using the same tabbed treatment as on other pages (1). Assignment due dates, the number of student submissions, and total attempts are more boldly visible on the page. Items in quizzes can be scored as correct, giving students full credit for a selected item.
Item Analysis Updated
Exporting Data
In Standard instructor MyLab courses, the Quick, Advanced and Retrieve Advanced Export Data Menu options are now presented on one page, using tabs like other pages which makes these frequently utilized functionalities equally accessible for instructors.
Export Data Menu
In Retrieve Advanced Exports, the “Remove Now” link has been replaced with a delete column and trash bin icon.
Retrieve Advanced Exports
As with standard instructor courses, in coordinator courses the Quick, Advanced, and Retrieve Advanced Export Data Menu options are now presented on one page, using tabs like other pages in the new UI, which makes these frequently utilized functionalities equally accessible for instructors. The functionality on each of these pages is consistent with the new functionality for standard courses. Coordinators have the ability to select data for export either from the coordinator course or any of its member courses.
Exporting Data: Coordinator Course
Skill Builder Gradebook Enhancements
(Available with select math titles)
What is Skill Builder? When students are struggling with their assigned homework, additional adaptive Skill Builder exercises are provided that help each student improve their skills until they are able to complete the assignment. The adaptive engine tracks each student’s performance and delivers questions to each individual that adapt to his or her level of understanding. Instructors who assign Skill Builder will now be able to see data for their students’ completed Skill Builder activities including, time spent per question, recommendations per question, and students' level of preparedness.
Skill Builder Item Analysis: Instructors who turn on Skill Builder for homework assignments will now be able to view detailed item analysis by the class and student to identify what objectives students are struggling with the most.
Skill Builder Gradebook Alerts: Instructors who assign Skill Builder will now see alerts within the MyLab gradebook to indicate that students’ performance on Skill Builder activities are now available.
My Courses Portal Updates
Access to courses and course creation within the My Courses Portal are easier than ever. Based on feedback from instructors after the Fall 2016 My Courses Portal redesign, updates have been made to steer instructors quickly to the correct course and streamline the process for copied courses as well as coordinator/member courses
The My Courses Homepage has been updated to provide a better user experience for faculty. The clickable area to access a course has been expanded so that now faculty can now easily click into their courses on the course tile to access their course(s). Also, the Course ID is now able to be copied from Tile and Course views. The Details button that takes instructors to a menu where they can edit course settings has been replaced with an icon of a gear, but “Details” will appear when the mouse hovers over the icon for clearer identification.
Updated My Courses Homepage
Accessing and managing Coordinator and Member courses is now even easier. Instructors with Coordinator and Member courses can now directly access their Coordinator Courses on the Portal Homepage by clicking on the course tile for the course.(1) In order to access Member courses associated with a Coordinator course, instructor can click on the Active Member section links. (2)
Direct Access to Coordinator Courses
The ability to drag and drop courses in tile and list views are more obvious with the double rows of dots placed in the upper left-hand corner of the tile or course list. Upon hovering over the double rows of dots, the pointer arrow will be replaced with a four-way arrow that is a common indicator of the ability of an item to be moved or rearranged on the page.
Drag and Drop Ability
The Catalog Search Homepage has been updated with a more visible search button (1) and more specific naming on the “View My Courses” button (2) so that faculty will receive clearer differentiation between searching their own course list versus the catalog course list.
Updated Catalog Search Homepage
Creating and Copying a Course
Instructor-only vs member course: The Copy a Course process has been updated to better delineate Instructor-use Courses from Coordinator-use Courses. Additional informational text has been added for further clarification on course characteristics between Instructor-use Courses and Member-use Courses.
Instructor-only vs student course: The Copy a Course process has been updated to better delineate Instructor-use Courses from Student-use Courses. Additional informational text has been added for further clarification on course characteristics between Instructor-use Courses and Student-use Courses.
LMS Integration Updates
Change Weights and Grade Sync Settings: Our Learning Management System (LMS) integration services give you easy access to MyLab & Mastering from your existing LMS. Access to change weight and other grade sync settings are now more easily accessible for instructors using third-party LMS integrated courses. On the Gradebook Landing Page toolbar, third-party LMS Integration courses will displaysee “Change Weights & Grade Sync Settings” rather than “Change Weights” as in standard MyLab courses. This menu option will allow instructors to select grade sync settings for both overall scores and specific assignment scores.
LMS Access to Change Weights and Grade Sync Settings
