Share an Embed Link
The simplest way to share a lesson/assessment with teachers is to get the Embed Link and paste it in scope and sequence documents, a shared calendar, an email, etc. Teachers can click the link and the activation screen will open, ready to activate for a class. Click the blue "Preview" button on the Activation screen to view the assessment as a student would.
A Convenient Link to Any Activity - Even a Distributed Assessment:
This method can be used with distributed assessments (distribution settings will apply) or daily assessments that have not been set up as a formal distribution.
- For "distributed assessments": To use embed links for a controlled distribution, set up an "official" distribution (see instructions below) to define a testing window, security options, limit the recipients. Then, you can also post the embed link in a convenient location for teachers to click, like a scope and sequence document or shared calendar.
Note: Teachers will not be able to get an embed link from ALL In Learning's "Embed Link" feature to share with other teachers. However, teachers could share the link (from whatever location they receive it) with other teachers who were not part of the distribution. They would be able to use the assessment without the distribution settings and you would see their data collate with the distribution. - To use Embed Links for non-distributed-assessments, like daily quick checks, exit ticket, or weekly quizzes, simply share the embed link without setting up a distribution and teachers will be able to click it and choose their own activation settings. The data will collate automatically in reports for PLCs and admins. We recommend this simplest method to make daily data and progress tracking more convenient for teams.
Distributions (Table of Contents):
Distribute as a Teacher or Campus Administrator
To a PLC
Sharing Options Explained
To an Individual Teacher
The Shared Assessment Dashboard
Sharing to a Teacher Not on Your Campus
Distribute as a District Administrator
Distributing an Assessment as a District Administrator
FAQs and Other Issues
Login As Someone Else to Complete a Task in Their Account
Accidentally Duplicated Distributed Assessments
Edit a Shared Assessment
Delete an Assessment Shared with Me?
Extend Distributed Assessment's End Date for a Specific Teacher
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Sharing as a Teacher or Campus Administrator
(If you aren't yet in a PLC/Data Team, or if you would like more information on how PLCs work in ALL In Learning, please see our article for an overview of this great feature.)
Once you've created an assessment that you would like to distribute to your PLC, go to the assessment in your Lessons / Assessment tab and click Actions > Distribute.
In the new screen that opens, select the PLC to which you would like to share the assessment.
Once you've selected the PLC, now you need to choose the appropriate parameters for sharing your Assessment.
Note: You can add individual teachers to the distribution list after sending the distribution by going to Lessons / Assessments > Distributed Assessments button > and clicking "Add/Remove" under "Distribution List." See the "Sharing to an Individual Teacher" section below for more details.
Anytime you share an assessment, you can select from the parameters listed below. (Some of these options are not available to teachers sharing an assessment.)
1. Assessment Settings
Start/End Date - Set a window during which the assessment can be graded. Recipients will see the Start Date and End Date, and if they try to start the Assessment before or after the window, they will see a message informing them that the assessment is not yet/no longer available.
Allow Copying - Once an assessment is distributed, it cannot be edited either by the distributor or a recipient. "Allow Copying" will allow teachers who receive your assessment to copy it, creating a new copy with a different ID that can be used for other purposes outside the distribution. Any edits made to the copy will not affect the original and the copy's grades will not aggregate with the original distributed assessment's grades.
Allow Sharing - This option allows recipients to further share your assessment to additional teachers. This is useful for when, for example, an instructional coach creates an assessment and shares it with PLC Team Leaders, who then share it with the teachers in their PLC. All data from assessments shared this way will aggregate for administrator reports.
Note 1: People who share the assessment can set up their own distribution settings, like the Start/End dates, which could leave you waiting for data.
Note 2: Even if you prohibit copying but allow sharing, anyone who shares the assessment may allow copying.
Note 3. You won't be able to delete an assessment as long as it is shared by another users if their shared assessment window is open (start end date or lack thereof).
Email Personal Note - You can enter text that will be emailed to the email address (that are on the ALL In Learning accounts) of all the recipients in your chosen PLCs/Data Teams.
2. Restriction Settings
Locked-Down Browser - For students using devices to take the assessment, this setting will log the student out of the test if they click anywhere outside the assessment screen (browser tab/window). This prevents them from searching for answers, using a calculator, etc. They'll see a prompt on screen notifying them and providing a place where a teacher or test proctor can enter credentials to allow them back into the test.
Note: Teachers can also restore a student's access via the manual grading screen in the teacher's account.
3. Report Settings
Campus and District Admin users can set cut scores for this specific assessment which will override any other cut scores selected by admins or PLCs for this assessment.
4. Review and Remediation Settings
By default, all three of these options are checked and there are no date parameters.
Remediation and the Student Portal are great ways for students to review and correct assessments. For more information on how these features work, please look here for our articles on the Student Portal and Remediation.
Review and Remediation Start/End Date - Set a time limit for remediation.
Send
Once you have set up all of these parameters, you're ready to hit Send. You can make adjustments to most settings in your Lessons/Assessments tab under the "Distributions" button (upper right).
III. Sharing to an Individual Teacher
Distribution of assessments is primarily designed to be used with PLC/Data Teams, so there is not a specific option for sharing to one individual teacher. However, by adjusting the recipients, you can include or exclude any of the available teachers on campus and in this way share to one individual teacher.
Follow the steps for sharing to a PLC/Data Team, including selecting your specific parameters, as outlined above. Then, click on the Distributed Assessment button at the top of your Lessons / Assessments tab.
This opens up your Distributed Assessments portal.
On the left are listed the assessments you have already shared. Click on the assessment you would like to share to more teachers and on the right, click the Distribution List "Add/Remove" button. Scroll to the bottom to see the distribution list editing window.
IV. Shared Assessment Dashboard
The Distributed Assessments dashboard is your way to adjust the settings for any of your shared assessments.
Select a distributed assessment on the left to adjust these settings on the right:
Distributed By - Shows the user that distributed the assessment.
Distribution List - Shows to whom the assessment has been shared and provides options to invite new teachers or remove teachers from the distribution list.
Assessment Start Date / End Date - Designates the date for when the shared assessment is available for activation. As soon as an assessment is shared, it is viewable for those in the distribution list, but they will not be able to activate it until the start date. Once the end date is expired, it will remain on the recipients' Lessons / Assessment list, but they will no longer be able to activate it. Even if a teacher has an unfinished assessment, you can end the assessment and the teacher will no longer be able to add any more grades for the assessment.
Remediation Start/End Date - Designated a window of time during which teachers can use the Remediation feature and that students can access the remediation activity in their student portal.
Use Locked Browser - If students will be using a device for this test, you may not want them to be able to leave the assessment screen (by clicking a different browser tab, calculator, etc.). This setting will notify them of this limitation when they start the assessment and then if they click outside of the assessment's browser tab they will see a window notifying them they have been locked out and containing a place for a teacher or test proctor to enter credentials, restoring their access.
Cut Scores - Campus and Distric Admin users can set cut scores for this specific assessment and lock them so that they will override any other cut score settings.
Email Recipients - You can send an email to each of the recipients to inform them of changes, remind them of impending deadlines, or any other message you would like. The email is sent to teachers currently in your distribution list and is sent to the email they use to log in to ALL In Learning.
Unfinished Assessments - If a teacher has a paused session and is listed as unfinished, a message will show in the Info/Actions view for that assessment. You can check which teachers have unfinished assessments by clicking the "View" button for Unfinished Assessments. The list of teachers with unfinished assessments will show below, and these teachers can be contacted and reminded to finish their assessments. An assessment cannot be deleted until all unfinished sessions are ended.
Delete Distribution - This isn't a button to delete the assessment but to delete the distribution of this assessment. Click this button to stop sharing the assessment. Remember that if an assessment is unfinished and pending, you will not be able to delete the distribution.
V. Sharing to a Teacher Not on Your Campus
Sharing to a teacher who is not on your campus is different than distributing in any other way in that it is not really sharing but rather sending a copy of the assessment. The recipient's grades will not aggregate with those on your campus.
Go to the lesson and click Actions > Edit.
(If the assessment you wish to send has already been graded or shared, then you won't be able to edit it. You'll first have to make a copy and apply these steps to the copy.)
Once the Assessment Editor is open, click Slideshow > Email Presentation. From here, you can enter any email address you wish, and the recipient will receive an email and link directing them to receive the assessment.
Distributing as a District Administrator
District Administrators have the ability to distribute specific assessments to teachers, grade levels, or specific subject tags as Common Assessments and to have these assessments, once graded, to aggregate automatically in the District Administrator's Reports Common Assessment sub-tab.
Distributing by tags aligns with the tags selected by teachers when forming their classes. Make sure that before you distribute the assessment by tags that your teachers have accurately tagged their classes. These tags can be the normal grade level and subject matter tags, or even custom tags!
So, teachers will need tags assigned to their classes in order for distributing to work. For your convenience, here are instructions for teachers to follow in order to assign tags:
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How Teachers can Assign Tags to Classes Click on your Classes tab in your ALL In Learning account, then click on the class name for which you would like to assign tags, and click on Class Info. |
To distribute the assessment as a district admin, select the Distribute Assessment option from the Actions menu.
On the next page, you can select the grade level, subject category, or enter custom tags. These tags must be set up by teachers in their classes tab prior to assessment distribution.
On the next page, complete the distribution parameters. From here, you can add additional teachers that might not have the appropriate tags, or you can remove teachers that don't need the assessment.
About the settings on the above screen:
Assessment Settings: Sets the start date and end date for the assessment. These are required, though they can be changed at any time.
Restriction Settings: Allow you to choose to require the lock-down browser and whether you would like to restrict administrator editing.
Lock-Down Browser: Will log students out if they try to click out of the testing screen. On the notification screen students see, any teacher or admin can restore their access by typing login credentials.
Restrict Administrator Editing: Allows you to prohibit fellow District Administrators and Campus Administrators from editing the assessment. Currently, they have that option, but this restriction will turn that option off. Teachers can never edit the assessment.
Remediation Settings: Learn about our remediation feature here.
Send: Sends the assessment to all the teachers with the parameters set up directly to their Lesson / Assessment tab. You can view the reports as they are completed by clicking on your Reports tab and clicking on the Common Assessment sub-tab.
Changing Distribution Settings
If you would like to adjust who the assessment has been distributed to, the start or end date, or any of the settings, click Distributed Assessments on your Lessons / Assessment tab. This will open up the Distributed Assessment Portal. Look here for the various features included in this portal.
FAQs and Other Issues
I. Login As Someone Else to Complete a Task in Their Account
District and Campus Admins have the ability to login as users under their authority. This can be useful if, for example, a teacher hasn't clicked "End Session" on a shared assessment and you're waiting on their data. There are three places you can access this feature:
- In your “Teachers & Admins” tab, find the user, and click "Login As" next to their name.
- In your "Manage Distributions" page (in the Lessons/Assessments tab) under "Unfinished Assessments."
- In your "Manage Distributions" page (in the Lessons/Assessments tab) under "Distributed To."
II. Accidentally Duplicating Distributed Assessments
A common problem is when a teacher has two of the exact same assessments in their account, like in the picture below:
This has happened because the original sharer of the assessment has shared the assessment twice. The original sharer's Shared Assessment Portal matches the recipient's Lesson / Assessment tab.
This usually happens because a new team member has joined a PLC/Data Team and needs to be sent the assessment. The original sharer hovers over the Actions button, then clicks on Share again, and each time this happens the assessment is shared with each team member. The new team member will only see one assessment, while all the original team members will see duplicate assessments.
To solve this issue, the original sharer will need to end both assessments and then re-share the assessment a third time for all team members. You will need to end both in order to make sure that when shared again, all team members have only one assessment.
To keep this issue from happening in the future, and to share to a new team member, or to re-share if someone didn't receive it the first time, see this section above.
All reports and data, no matter which assessment from the two a teacher has Activated, will aggregate and combine into one Report.
In other words, there are no data problems from duplicate assessments, and so this problem can also be ignored. Most teachers find it confusing and distracting, and it might be best to solve it for those reasons, but duplicate assessments will not affect grades, reports or scores.
III. How to Edit a Shared Assessment
Once an assessment has been shared, it cannot be edited from the Lessons / Assessment tab. If the assessment is discovered to contain an error, it can be adjusted from the sharer's Reports tab and Edit Key & Standards.
Please check our article here for how to do this.
IV. How to Delete an Assessment Distributed to Me
Many teachers want to know how to delete a shared assessment from their Lesson / Assessment tab once they have completed the assessment.
A Shared Assessment can only be removed by the sharer of that assessment. In other words, if it is shared with you, you won't be able to delete it on your own. You can contact the sharer of the assessment ask them to end the distribution, as explained above.
In order to clean up your Lessons / Assessment tab with older shared assessments, many teachers also create a folder, labeling it "Shared with Me," and moving these assessments to that folder. That way they are out of the way and off your Lessons / Assessments list.
V. How to Extend a Distributed Assessment's End Date for a Specific User
If you've shared an assessment with your team and designated an end date, and a teacher has begun grading it but left it unfinished (or paused), and has not clicked "End Session" to generate a report before the end date passed, then they will still be able to see the assessment in their list, but when they try to activate it or finish it, they will receive a message notifying them that it cannot be activated because it is expired.
They will also be given a link to automatically send an email request to the person who shared it to ask them to extend the end date for them and allow them to finish grading it.
Whether or not you received the email request, you can always extend a lesson's end date for a specified user.
Here are steps to extend an end date for a specific user:
- In your Lessons/Assessments tab, click the "Shared Assessments" button.
- Select the assessment.
- Select the View button to see the teachers.
- Remove all teachers except those for which you want to extend the date.
- Change the end date and then click Save.
How Cut Scores (Performance Categories) Work
Most reports will display color-coded performance level categories (cut scores). These cut score levels can be customized.
- You can adjust cut scores temporarily by dragging the sliders below the report (unless the scores are locked).
- You can set cut scores for an assessment you distribute or share (in the distribution options) or manage those settings after the fact in the Lessons/Assessments tab's "Distributed Assessments" menu.
- You can adjust cut scores for an assessment (if not locked) in any "Actions" menu next to a report in the Reports tab.
- You can see what cut scores are applied (and set them up, if not overridden) by clicking "View Cut Scores" in the Legend section under any report that uses cut scores.
Cut Score Settings Hierarchy
Because cut scores can be customized by multiple parties, a hierarchy determines what cut scores will be used for different assessments and for different users' view (Admins, teachers, etc.) or for a given assessment.
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Cut Score Hierarchy Distribution with “Lock Cut Scores” Setting “Closest stakeholder” Cut Scores
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additional keywords: DCA distributed common assessment benchmark bench mark