MobyMax’s Amy Weiss was thrilled to see Florida elementary school teacher Trisha Quattrocchi tweeting to celebrate her students’ impressive achievement: 100% mastery of 5^th grade math. What could be the secret to her class’s success? Here’s how Trisha explained it herself:

Trisha:

I am a 5^th grade math teacher at Lake Magdalene Elementary School. None of my students are in AGP, but they are a seriously dedicated group of learners. Our focus is on mastering 5^th grade standards, and boy, do we celebrate when we do!

We start out the year with a pretty classic testing process: in September, the students took their county formative tests and a MobyMax placement test. I used the formative test results to assign specific lessons in MobyMax.

Every six weeks since then, I have had students take another MobyMax placement test to see where they’d improved and if they’d mastered standards they previously missed. I also use the test results to create mini groups and assign leveled “exit tickets” using both Kahoot and paper quizzes.

We just released a brand new ELA module: Foundational Reading! Foundational Reading teaches fundamental reading skills using cognitive skill manipulatives that will jumpstart students’ reading ability. Aligned with CCSS Foundational Reading standards, the module focuses on key skills such as phonological and phonemic awareness, decoding, segmenting, blending, syllabication, and more. Click the "Foundational Reading" button to explore this great new module!

Every student deserves to have curriculum customized to meet their specific needs. And every teacher needs easy-to-use tools to customize curriculum. To help teachers tailor MobyMax to their students, we've made some changes to the Curriculum Settings menu. When you click the "Curriculum Settings" button on the teacher dashboard, you'll now be taken to the "Default Settings" screen. Here, you can set default settings for your entire class for each individual subject, adjust settings for non-curricular modules, and hide subjects and modules from students. 

Testing season is upon us. How do you prepare students in a way that ignites their internal fire to learn, accelerates their learning rate… and makes you so happy, you could burst?

Moby contests!

Recently, we helped teachers prepare students for state achievement tests by challenging them to compete in a MobyMax Math and Language classroom contest. In Moby Math, students master key topics like place value, operations, proportional relationships, expressions and equations, and probability. In the Moby Language Module, students conquer parts of speech, verb tenses, punctuation, new vocabulary, and more. Both modules align with Common Core standards, so they fit seamlessly into most schools’ educational objectives and requirements.

There’s nothing we love more than a tweet from a principal about her teachers’ success using MobyMax! 

Recently, Rebecca Norwood, principal of Decker Elementary in Pomona, CA, tweeted her praise for special education teacher Kristi Brewer. Ms. Brewer is using MobyMax bulletin boards to help boost her students’ success in building fact fluency and mastering operations.

We checked in with Ms. Brewer to find out how she’s used MobyMax bulletin boards so successfully with her students. 

“Let me start by saying how much I love MobyMax!!!,” she said. “It has been such a great addition to my classroom.”

Ms. Brewer also loves the way her classroom MobyMax board inspires her students to achieve.

The Wall just got a new upgrade: it is now called Announcements and Tasks! Use this feature like a classroom bulletin board to send out announcements, post assignments, schedule events, or poll your students with just a few clicks. 

We've also spruced up the screens that report lessons. These changes make it easier to view and print student lesson scores. On the Snapshot screen, you can now print or export scores by each individual lesson.

Good things come to those who wait! MobyMax has revamped the Sweepstakes module based on user feedback (thanks, by the way!). The module is better than ever; students no longer have to match numbers in the exact order in which they appear on the ticket. They can also earn game time or even new games, depending on the number of matches they get.

To make sure students stay focused on learning, they must answer 30 questions correctly to earn a sweepstakes ticket. Don't worry - because we've made Sweepstakes easier to win, those extra questions will be worth it!

We just released new, spiffy reports and a really cool way for young students to sign in without even typing!

New Reports
 
In the release today, we've moved Real Time and Alerts into their own modules. Even though this looks a little different, the features are the same.

 
There's also a new section on the teacher dashboard called Data and Reporting, which includes options for Classroom Dashboards, Student Dashboards, Monthly Reports, and Time Summary. Again, most of these reports show the same information they did previously; they've just moved to a new place!

Monica Contreras loves teaching math to her third graders. 

But do her McKitrick Elementary third graders love learning math?

A few years ago, Mrs. Contreras wasn’t so sure. But today, thanks to the MobyMax tools she’s using, she can confidently say that her students love learning math—though they may actually love MobyMax contests more!

Mrs. Contreras started using MobyMax several years ago to help her students prepare for the annual Florida Standards Assessment tests. She created a MobyMax Science Challenge that resulted in a 20 percent grade level increase in science among participating students.

When it came time to focus on math, Mrs. Contreras decided to run a MobyMax contest. Why are contests such a great way to motivate students to participate? Because “They love watching their stats go up!” she says.

What inspires kids to come in early, work without complaining, and exceed both your expectations and theirs?

Contests!!

Last week, we challenged teachers and students to compete in a MobyMax classroom contest featuring the MobyMax Language module. This comprehensive module teaches students key skills tied to the Common Core language standards. By working in the module, students learn to master parts of speech, verb tenses, punctuation, and new vocabulary, all of which improve their writing.

Though teachers customized their contests to fit their classrooms, they all had one thing in common: they made practicing grammar
fun, competitive, and cool. Some kids were motivated by the opportunity to win a prize. Others wanted to win just for glory. Still others were driven by the chance to rank among the top 3 on their classroom leaderboard. Students who normally don’t participate or do their homework were coming in before school hoping to work on Moby before class even started.