News & Events: Features Released for January 2007 Classes

Features Released in December 2006

New MathXL� Player (recommended upgrade)
In addition to supporting Internet Explorer® 7, the new MathXL Player includes several enhancements for test-taking and answer evaluation. Students whose network connectivity is disrupted while they are taking a test will not be able to continue working until connectivity is restored. (Answers for completed questions are stored.)

Individual Student Settings
You can now modify assignment settings for individual students, without other students seeing the changes or being affected by them. From either the Homework and Test Manager or a student’s results page in the Gradebook, you can change any of the following assignment settings for individual students:

• due dates and times
• number of attempts
• time limit
• whether to show remaining time during a test
• whether a password is required (and what that password is)
• whether a homework assignment is available to be worked on past its due date
• assigned/unassigned status

New Gradebook Export Options
You have three new export options: (1) export the assignment results of a specific chapter; (2) select decimal or percentage formatting for exported scores; (3) include date and time worked when exporting scores from all attempts at a test, quiz, or homework.

Manage Course List
Using a new "Manage Course List" page, you can specify which courses will appear in the course dropdown at the top of most pages by marking them as "Current Courses."

Show/Hide My Assignments Dashboard
You now have the option of showing or hiding the My Assignments Dashboard via a setting in the Announcement Manager. In addition, assignments that are due today will appear in the dashboard regardless of whether students have worked on the assignment. A "See all assignments" link has also been added to the dashboard.

Importable Edited Custom Exercises
If you import assignments that contain edited custom exercises, and the custom exercises already existed in your account, those custom exercises will be updated with the edits.

More Questions on Assignments
You can now create tests, quizzes, and homework assignments that contain up to 150 questions. (Older courses that use the InterAct Math plug-in have the previous limits of eighty questions for homework and fifty-nine for tests.)

Improved Gradebook Usability
You can see two additional columns of assignment results by hiding the left navigation bar on the Gradebook front page and then clicking to the All Assignments view.

Course Life Cycle
As soon as a course has ended, you will be prompted to export your gradebook data or other results, copy the course for use in a new semester, or delete the course if it is no longer needed. For a year following the course end date, you will receive two more email notices to export, copy, or delete the course. Then, 14 days before the course is removed from our database, pop-up messages appear upon log in to remind you to take action.