web-based gradebook
for K12 school districts
for K12 school districts
There's not a Web-based gradebook available anywhere that offers the range and depth of features found in eSembler. Here we've listed just a few of those features and reports. If you'd like to view some of these features in action, simply take a moment and view the gradebook demonstrations found on this site. Or if you'd prefer a more detailed look each one of the features described here, just give us a call or complete this form to schedule a comprehensive live demonstration. You'll be glad you did!
Throughout the history of public education, the contents of teacher gradebooks have been considered off limits to parents and students. The exceptions might include a few times during the year, usually at the end of a grading period, when students and parents became particularly concerned about assignment grades and attendance information. It is therefore only natural that some teachers express reluctance when their district asks them to make this information available on an anytime / anywhere basis for both parents and students. Through eSembler's ePortal, districts can now allow parents or guardians to log in to eSembler to view their own students' grades—as long as the parent or guardian has a Web browser and Internet access. And with this feature comes the ability for students to access their own grade, attendance, and associated classroom information.
When any user initially accesses eSembler, in addition to a login information area, the user may also be presented with announcements presenting administratively entered information. When initially accessing the login screen, the default district announcement (if available) is displayed. Subsequent to the initial login, teachers, administrators, parents, and students are shown dynamic information in the Announcements area based on the schools associated with their user and the user’s security role in the district. For example, parents will see only parent specific announcements while teachers may see only teacher-specific announcements. There are an infinite number of variations based on the types of Announcements created by an administrator. Some examples include the ability to provide district branding, customized navigation providing access to tools and information within and outside the district, links to school calendars, specialized training documentation, tips and tricks, or even general announcements for teachers. On the Login screen and throughout the gradebook, eSembler is branded with the district logo linking to the district Web site.
All users access eSembler from a single location allowing teachers, parents, students, and administrators immediate access to all relevant gradebook features. These users are provided access to the appropriate information after entering the correct username and password. eSembler automatically recognizes individual account permissions and then displays the appropriate tools and reports, based on each user's account type. To guarantee security, usernames and passwords are most often validated through real-time access to Active Directory or LDAP information stored on the district authentication servers. Districts may also select other authentication options including self-serve Parent Portal access. In addition to the simple login form, users are also presented with a series of district and school managed Announcements. Based on district preferences, these areas may display customizable navigation, links to school calendars, specialized training documentation, tips and tricks, or even general announcements for teachers. On this Login screen and throughout the eSembler gradebook, the software is branded with the district logo which provides a link to the district Web site.
After logging into eSembler, a list of all classes assigned a teacher is automatically displayed. This is made possible through eSembler's seamless integration with the district Student Information System. Each class name is preceded by the course and section number. Period information follows the class name. Classes that are team taught by one or more teachers will feature a “[Team]” designation following the class period indicator. And in classes where grade information has been submitted to the district Student Information System, a “[Submitted]” or “[Locked]” designation follows the class information. eSembler also supports schedules where a teacher is responsible for classes at two or more schools. Using robust integration methods developed for our most demanding districts, classes can also be combined allowing teachers to manage multiple courses and sections within the same class period. For those districts that elect to use eSembler’s Attendance tool, teachers also have the option of submitting their attendance with a single click by clicking on the “All Present” link located next to each class. Finally, next to each class name, teachers will find a wide range of dynamic mini-buttons providing one click access to virtually every tool and report within eSembler.
eSembler’s Attendance tool provides an integrated electronic method to track and monitor daily, period, a.m./p.m., and/or class-based attendance. Teacher reported attendance information on the class level is automatically distributed to the district Student Information System. To make sure teachers stay informed, official attendance information is periodically transferred from the district Student Information System to eSembler. And in cases where the district elects to use eSembler’s Attendance Clerk Interface, official attendance information is made available on a real-time basis. These methods allow teachers to validate the information they submit against the student’s official attendance record, as recorded by school administrators. To allow for maximum flexibility, if district policy permits, teachers can even be allowed to mange both past and future attendance dates. eSembler uses the district calendar as well as district-defined policies to determine valid attendance dates; submitting attendance information outside of those dates is not permitted. With district attendance settings, teachers can even be prevented from submitting attendance outside of particular time periods during the day. For example, first period attendance could be restricted so that it might only be submitted between 8:15a.m. and 9:15a.m., on a school-by-school basis. And to meet state reporting requirements, every attendance submission and modification is logged by user and by time and is viewable at any time, by teachers or administrators. If desired, teachers are also able to take attendance using a dynamic seating chart view, activated by simply clicking on any applicable student seat.
The Assignments tool allows teachers to manage all aspects of their assignments. Besides being able to add, edit, and delete assignments, teachers can also grade assignments, create weighted and color coded categories, drop assignment scores based on user defined settings, and associate state or district standards with assignments. Teachers can access current assignment information as well as assignments from past or future grading periods based on the grading period they select. eSembler supports a wide range of calculated grading methods including averaging, summation, summation percentage, raw score conversion to percentage, extra credit grades, retakes, overrides, and bonus points. eSembler accommodates both alpha and numeric grades including plus and minus and non-conforming grades like symbols. Weighting schemes may be applied to grades, groupings (categories), and standards-based outcomes. An unlimited number of grades, categories, grading periods, or grading intervals can be managed through this tool. Additionally, assignments details can be modified even after assignment scores have already been entered.
The Standards tool allows teachers to associate state and district standards with individual assignments. In one of the options eSembler provides, teachers have the ability to subjectively associate weights with each standard, indicating how much of a standard’s requirements have been met on a particular assignment. These weights are then used in conjunction with student assignment scores to determine a percentage score that reflects a subjective view of the student's comprehension of the standard. These state and districts standards may be entered manually through an eSembler interface or imported directly from a file of a predefined format. In either case, these standards are automatically made available to all teachers. This tool is available by district mandate only and may not be available for all districts. The textual elements of the standards present within this tool can be defined by districts or may be provided at additional cost.
The Categories tool is used to organize assignments and manage special characteristics like dropped scores and assignment weighting. These characteristics dictate how student grades are averaged. In addition to dropped scores and weights, teachers may also color code categories so assignments are easily recognized on reports and grading screens. Management of assignment category information is teacher driven, unless certain characteristics have been restricted or defined based on district grading policies. The behavior of this tool may be closely defined through templates if enforced teacher compliance with district grading policy is required. To allow teachers the best flexibility, these weights and rules can be modified at any time, even after assignment scores have been entered.
The Grade Assignment tool allows teachers to manage scores for individual assignments, one at a time. In addition to managing the primary assignment score, teachers can also manage up to two retake scores. Override scores are also supported; these scores are most often used when a teacher wishes to track an earned score, but also wishes to record an adjusted score that is based on a student's special needs. Teachers can also manipulate other score properties by indicating that an assignment is exempt for purposes of grade calculation or designating that certain scores should be presented in a bold font on reports and grading screens. From this tool, teachers can also indicate that certain assignment scores are late, incomplete, and/or missing.
This Grade tool allows teachers to simultaneously manage all scores for an individual student. In addition to managing the primary assignment score, teachers can also manage up to two retake scores for each assignment. Override scores are also supported; these scores are most often used when a teacher wishes to track an earned score, but also needs to record an adjusted score that is based on a student's special needs. Teachers can also manipulate other score properties by indicating that an assignment is exempt for purposes of grade calculation or designating that certain scores should be presented in a bold font on reports and grading screens. From this tool, teachers can also indicate that certain assignment scores are late, incomplete, and/or missing.
The Grade All tool allows teachers to manage all assignment scores for all assignments on a single screen—much like one would expect from a spreadsheet application. However, unlike other Web-based gradebooks, eSembler displays updates to each student's average in real time! Column headings display the assignment name, category, points possible, and due date. And real-time category averages may also be displayed allowing teachers modifying student scores to see immediate results. Teachers can also manipulate other score properties by indicating that an assignment is exempt for purposes of grade calculation or designating that certain scores should be presented in a bold font on reports and grading screens. From this tool, teachers can also indicate that certain assignment scores are late, incomplete, and/or missing.
The Submit Grades tool allows teachers to review, enter, and submit progress report and report card related information for use by the district Student Information System or third-party reporting tools. Districts define what information must be gathered at the end of a reporting period on a class-by-class basis. For example, a first grade teacher might be asked to submit letter grades and skills assessments—perhaps documenting a student's ability to write neatly the student’s ability to meet a district or state standard. These elementary teachers may also be expected to enter free-form comments in a memo field. High school teachers might be offered the ability to submit only numeric scores and associate only district-defined comments—perhaps indicating a student's class participation level. Through the Submit Grades tool, teachers can submit not only score-based numeric or alphanumeric progress but also details related mastery of the subject matter.
When a teacher uses the Submit Grades tool to submit grades at the end of a grading period, no further changes to assignments, scores, or categories may be made for the selected grading period. However, if the information has not yet been exported to the district Student Information System, teachers may still select the Retrieve option to remove the restriction and again modify information. Once this information has been exported to the Student Information System, further retrieval of grade related information is restricted. That restriction may be lifted at the discretion of district or school administrators using the administrative Change Status tool. Once lifted, teachers may once again modify this information using the Retrieve function. Submitting progress period information through the Submit Grades tool will not restrict access to assignments, scores, or categories. This powerful workflow, unique to the eSembler gradebook, affords districts the assurance that past grade information will only be modified when explicitly allowed by school or district administrators.
The Access Log report enhances gradebook security by providing teachers with the ability to monitor each time their login has been used to access eSembler. In addition to tracking the specific date and time of each login, the Access Log report also tracks the originating IP address for each user session. Through this report, teachers can quickly determine if their username or password has been compromised, simply by evaluating whether or not the reported access dates, times, and locations correspond to their actual successful login attempts.
The Assignments (Audit) report provides teachers with a detailed audit trail of all changes to assignment grades. To ensure maximum usability, this report also shows teachers grade modifications for deleted assignments. This means that assignment grade information can never be accidentally deleted or lost within the eSembler gradebook software. Each grade entry is date and time stamped. Every grade change is also logged with the appropriate date and time information. From a district perspective, this report can be used by administrators to perform forensic analysis of grade entry to provide user support or for evidentiary purposes.
The Assignments (Detailed) report allows teachers to quickly and easily review a wide range of details related to specific assignments. In addition to providing analysis tools for individual assignments, teachers can also evaluate class performance as a whole by viewing the class average, helping teachers gauge the validity of assignments within the context of the class. In addition to extensive sorting capabilities, students with the highest and lowest assignment scores may also be displayed through a special legend at the bottom of the screen. Using this report, assignment information for any grading period may be viewed, whether the assignment occurs in the past, present, or future.
The Assignments (Missing and Zero) report provides teachers visibility into which students have missing assignments or assignments with a grade of zero. In addition to this basic assignment-related information, using eSembler's powerful Preferences tool, teachers are also able to display student average information and filter student grades by grade ranges, allowing for insight into student achievement and failings in relation to their missing assignments. In addition to extensive sorting capabilities, students with the highest and lowest assignment scores may be also displayed in a legend at the bottom of the report, answering those persistent questions often asked by many students. This report has the same capabilities and Preference options as the Assignments (Missing) and Assignments (Zero) reports; however, the Assignments (Missing and Zero) report has many of the more common display Preference options selected by default.
The Attendance (All Classes) report allows teachers to review real-time attendance statistics for students in their class across all periods of any day, regardless of who might be teaching any particular student during the day. This allows teachers to determine if there is any unusual discrepancy in a student’s attendance pattern. For example, a student might skip one class, but be present in anther. Even if a district elects to gather attendance information outside the eSembler interface, this report is still available to teachers through integration with the district Student Information System. Teacher submitted information as well as official attendance information from the Student Information System is used to give teachers insight into classroom attendance statistics. In other words, if official attendance values are not available, then teacher-submitted values are displayed.
The Attendance (Class) report allows teachers to review a summary of attendance statistics for an entire class, within a teacher-defined grading period. Even if a district is gathering attendance information via a mechanism outside the eSembler interface, this report can be made available to teachers by importing attendance information from the district Student Information System. If eSembler is being used to gather this attendance information through the Attendance tool, teacher submitted information as well as official attendance information from the Student Information System is provided giving teachers real-time insight into classroom attendance statistics. The total number of school days within the selected grading period is also displayed in the heading area of this report.
The Attendance (Daily) report allows teachers to review weekly snapshots of submitted and official attendance statistics within a teacher-defined grading period, over the course of a particular week. Even if a district is gathering attendance information via a mechanism outside the eSembler interface, this report can be made available to teachers by importing attendance information from the district Student Information System. If eSembler is being used to gather this attendance information through the Attendance tool, teacher submitted information as well as official attendance information from the Student Information System is provided giving teachers real-time insight into classroom attendance statistics.
The Averages (All Students) report provides visibility into overall student performance in a class. Using eSembler's powerful Preferences tool, teachers are able to filter student grades by grade ranges, allowing for a comprehensive overview student achievement and failings. In addition, this report can serve as a Missing Assignments report, displaying how many assignments are missing as well as the names of those assignments. In addition to extensive sorting capabilities, students with the highest and lowest assignment scores may be also displayed in a legend at the bottom of the report, answering those persistent questions often asked by many students. Category averages may also be displayed as well as other grade information may also be displayed.
The Averages (All Classes) report is designed to provide teachers high-level visibility into student grade averages in all classes where rosters are shared. Most often used by elementary school instructors, this report is useful when teachers have matching rosters across multiple classes. For example, if an elementary teacher is assigned a course schedule that includes Reading, Science, and Mathematics, they would have the ability to view student averages across all three classes from a single report. To ensure student privacy, only averages from the classes associated with the appropriate teacher are displayed.
The Checklists report allows teachers to view and print reports detailing any items they are tracking through eSembler’s powerful Checklists tool. These checklists provide teachers the ability to document physical property, events, and counted items. These items might include equipment, fees, forms, instruments, participation, uniforms, or textbooks. Any Checklist may be selected whereupon a detailed and well-formatted report is presented. These reports allow teachers to fully harness the power of the Checklists tool. eSembler is the only gradebook to offer this unique style of asset tracking capability.
The Comments (All) report provides teachers just one of many mechanisms whereby they may review comments entered using the Comments tool. In short, this report allows teachers to display a detailed electronic journal of assignment, student, or class-related information. Teachers have the option of viewing this report for a single student, all students, select students only, and failing students (teacher defined). This information is often found useful for parent-teacher conferences and as supplemental records documenting a student’s challenges or successes throughout the school year.
Within this report, these comments may be displayed according to their relevance to all students, a single student, or multiple students in a class. To aid in categorization of these comments, the comment categories are also displayed. These categories include General, Attendance, Discipline, Assignments, Parent Contact., and Personal. In some cases, to allow for even greater levels of student accountability, assignment comments may have been associated with a specific assignment. In those instances, all relevant assignment information is also displayed.
Text for comments marked Priority is displayed in a red font while Private comment text is displayed in a gray font. Within various Comments reports, just as filtering of comment categories is allowed, Private comments as well as each of the different comment categories may be hidden or displayed according to teacher-defined Preferences selections. For teachers that want to have fast access to reports detailing specific comment types only, then subsets of this report are also available.
The Lesson Plans report allows teachers to review and print the lesson plans associated with any grading period or class. The format can be modified using eSembler’s powerful Preferences tool allowing for grid or list views. Additionally, since district-defined security can allow access to teacher reports, principals and administrators can view teacher Lesson Plans at any time. By allowing teachers to create electronic records of class planning information, developing lessons plans for future school years is a snap—especially with eSembler’s powerful reporting tools. Finally, with template policy enforcement, teachers are presented with information options relevant to their school or district lesson plan policies.
The Roster report allows teachers to view a current roster of students augmented with a grid of fifteen columns. This report is often printed and used to manually record student scores and attendance information. Since the order of the student roster on the printed report is the same as found throughout the gradebook, the information recorded on a printed version of the Roster report can be quickly transcribed to eSembler. Using eSembler’s built-in photo support and teacher defined Preferences, this report can even be printed for use by substitute teachers who may require a visual key to students enrolled in the class. Column heading information can include numbers, days of the week, and/or blanks based on teacher preferences.
The Schedules (Class) report helps teachers by providing student schedule information for all students enrolled in their class, for all schools and classes across the district. Teachers have the option of viewing this report for a single student, all students, or select students only. This report displays the student roster information and detailed course schedule information including the course number, section number, course name, period identifier, teacher name, and room number. Using this report, teachers are able to quickly locate a student at any given time. No longer are teachers dependent on gathering this information manually from students or through reports provided by the district Student Information System.
The Schedules (School) report helps teachers by providing student schedule information for all students enrolled in a specific school. Teachers have the option of viewing this report for a single student, all students, or select students only. This report displays the student roster information and detailed course schedule information including the course number, section number, course name, period identifier, teacher name, and room number. Using this report, teachers are able to quickly locate a student at any given time. No longer are teachers dependent on gathering this information manually from students or through reports provided by the district Student Information System.
The Spreadsheet report provides an at-a-glance view of student performance on all assignments and across multiple categories. Designed to display grades in a manner similar to a conventional gradebook or spreadsheet, this electronic version provides student and category averages in addition to individual assignment scores. The report also provides teachers with grading period and interval grade information. In addition to the standard report view, teachers can also export the information shown on the report to a comma delimited text file (.CSV) for use in applications like Microsoft Excel or Access.
The Standards report allows teachers to evaluate the mastery level of students on individual standards. Through this report, these standards, also sometimes referred to as objectives, skills, or outcomes, can be used to assess each student’s individual assignment scores and the relationship of those scores to the related standard. eSembler can calculate a percentage value of mastery for each student for each standard. Districts can associate and then track multiple levels of performance on each standard using a rubric of their choosing. In other words, these percentage values are converted to the district rubric indicating mastery of a particular standard. The informational statistics displayed are cumulative, including standards associated with assignments across all grading periods relevant to the class.
The Summary (Detailed) report is the most powerful and comprehensive report found in eSembler. Teachers have the option of viewing this report for a single student, all students, select students only, failing students (teacher defined), and those students without district defined parental e-mail addresses. This report is often used as a “progress report” by many teachers and displays a wealth class information including course number, section number, class name, period, grading period name, grading period date range, and teacher name; student profile information including name, gender, ethnicity, e-mail, address, date of birth, birthplace, grade level, advisor code, vaccination, bus rider, bus route, and locker number; parent profile information including all parent and/or guardian information and relationships, e-mail addresses, home phone numbers, work phone numbers, mobile phone numbers, education level, and pickup rights; and student assignment related information including student averages, assignment scores, class averages, and category information and formulas as well as averages.
The report also displays student attendance statistics and dates for each event, as reported by both the teacher and the district Student Information System. Teacher comments are also included allowing teachers to issue impromptu textual progress notice to parents. In addition to all of the information listed above, eSembler also supports an unlimited number of district-defined student attributes. For example, districts can provide teachers with a wide range of additional student information including standardized test score information, discipline information, medical information, and even additional trivial information like hair and eye color.
Based on eSembler's powerful Preferences tool, all data presented on this report is displayed or hidden based on selections made by each individual teacher. For example, if a report containing only basic attendance and comment information is desired, the teacher may simply select just those report options within the Preferences tool. Upon confirming the selection, a report customized to suit the teacher's needs is displayed. Many districts have found this report particularly useful for transfer students. When teachers send or e-mail this report to the teacher accepting the transfer student, the new teacher is able to grasp every element of the student’s progress to date.
For teachers that want to have fast access to reports detailing specific data elements found within this report, then subsets of this report are also available. These subset reports include Summary (Assignments), Summary (Attendance), Summary (Averages), Summary (Categories), Summary (Comments), Summary (Grading Scales), Summary (Lesson Plan), Summary (Linked Accounts), Summary (Performance Details), Summary (Performance Graph), Summary (Profiles), Summary (Student Profile), Summary (Teacher Profile), and Summary (Parent Profile). The main differences between the Summary (Detailed) report and the subset reports are the default Preference selections. Links to each of these subset reports are provided within the Summary report menu system.
The UIL Eligibility report can be useful in helping teachers determine if students are eligible to participate in extracurricular activities. The report is generally made available to teachers of courses where University Interscholastic League (UIL) rules may apply. However, depending on district privacy policies, this report can also be made available to all teachers in a district. In addition to student grade information from the previous grading period and previous progress report period, teachers can also view the student’s current average in all classes. As an additional benefit, some districts may elect to use this report as a means whereby school counselors or principals can have quick access to student averages.
The Verification report displays student grades recorded by eSembler as well as grades reported by the district Student Information System. Grade information is presented from three distinct perspectives. The computed grade represents the student’s average as currently calculated by eSembler. The submitted grade represents the grade submitted by the teacher to the district Student Information System during a grade reporting period. In addition to the submitted and computed grade, the official grade is also displayed and represents the official student grade recorded within the district Student Information System.
In some cases, the submitted grades may reflect a different score than the computed grades since district-defined grading policies may exist that enforce certain behaviors. For example, in some districts, a grading policy may exist that states that a student cannot be awarded a grade higher than 100. Since eSembler supports bonus points, it's possible that the student’s calculated grade could be 104 while the submitted grade would reflect 100. Likewise, other district policies may exist that prevent the submission of grades below a certain score. For example, a policy might be in place that states that a student will receive no grade lower than 50 for any grading period other than the last grading period of a grading interval. In this case, if a student received a calculated grade of 42, the submitted grade would reflect a 50.
The Checklists tool provides teachers the ability to document physical property, events, and counted items. These items might include equipment, fees, forms, instruments, participation, uniforms, or textbooks. Using the Checklists tool, teachers can maintain an electronic record tied to student accountability. For example, a textbook checklist can be created that allows teachers to document which students have been issued a textbooks and the identification number associated with that item. Another teacher-defined checklist might be used to track the submission of class materials fees or the receipt of permission slips from parents. The checklists can even be copied to other classes automatically. The possibilities are unlimited.
The Copy Assignments tool copies assignments, categories, weights, category dropping rules, and color coding information from one class to another. Using this tool, teachers can configure basic class information in one class and then copy those settings to one or more other classes in their schedule. For example, if a teacher is responsible for multiple typing classes that are scheduled throughout a school year, each spanning only a single semester, the teacher may enter assignment and category information in one of the classes and then copy that information to all the other classes they teach—including those scheduled in future grading intervals. This tool does not copy assignment grades or other class details to the destination classes. If teachers wish to copy assignment grades, they may elect to use the eSembler tool Copy Grades.
The Copy Grades tool allows teachers to copy assignments and grades from one class to another. This tool is especially useful in cases where a student transfers within a teacher’s schedule from one section or to another. In some elementary classes or team teaching environments, teachers may also use this tool when a single assignment grade applies to more than one course within a teacher’s schedule. Using a complex rule-based algorithm, if one or more students are present in rosters across multiple classes, the Copy Grades tool will copy the selected assignment and associated scores from one class to one or more other classes.
eSembler’s versatile Comments tool provides a mechanism whereby teachers can create a detailed electronic journal of assignment, student, or class-related information. More than the simple note taking tools provided by many other gradebooks, eSembler’s Comments tool provides expanded tracking and reporting capabilities often found useful for parent-teacher conferences and as supplemental records documenting a student’s challenges or successes throughout the school year. Comments can be associated with all students, a single student, or multiple students in a class. To aid in categorization of these comments, the categories of comments include General, Attendance, Discipline, Assignments, Parent Contact, and Personal. To allow for even greater levels of student accountability, assignment comments can be associated with a specific assignment. When this association occurs, teachers and parents alike can gain greater understanding of a student’s academic progress. Additionally, teachers have the capability of indicating that a comment should be considered Private or Priority. Text for comments marked Priority is displayed in a red font while Private comment text is displayed in a gray font. Within various Comments reports, just as filtering of comment categories is allowed, Private comments may be hidden or displayed according to teacher-defined Preferences selections.
The Lesson Plans tool allows teachers to create their own lesson plans simply and easily. Since the lesson plans are available electronically, school principals and administrators with appropriate security permissions can quickly review teacher classroom teaching strategies at any time. And since the Lesson Plan tool is highly customizable, districts can define what characteristics are appropriate for teachers on a school-by-school basis allowing for optimal use according to the dictates of a district curriculum committee or department.
The Notifications tool allows teachers to create automated e-mail alerts for parents, guardians, and students based a wide range of criteria including the presence of unexcused absences or discipline comments as well as allowing for the designation of student average notification thresholds. Based on teacher-defined settings, all parent and guardian contacts will receive an automatic e-mail if any criteria specified within the tool are met. The frequency of the e-mails is dictated by the teacher. Options include: Every Weekday; Every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and every Sunday. Information presented through e-mails delivered by the Notifications tool is intended to provide parents with rapid and convenient notification about a student's progress. Although this tool can be used independently of the ePortal, when combined with the detailed information presented via that tool, parents can remain extremely well-informed about a particular student's performance. The Notifications tool is also available to parents and students through the ePortal interface. Through the ePortal interface, those users may to set their own notification preferences independently of preferences set forth by the teacher.
The Combine tool allows teachers to combine two or more class sections to create a new single section. This tool is particularly useful for teachers who are responsible for art, band, chorus, and other classes where students from multiple grade levels are often scheduled into simultaneous periods but under different course or section numbers. Additionally, many districts may create additional course sections throughout the year and those courses them to existing teacher schedules to either accommodate new students or even manage honors students that may be taught simultaneously in classrooms with non-honors students. Even though classes are combined, during reporting timeframes grade and attendance information is exported to the district Student Information System with the course and section numbers of the original classes. Certain conditions must be met in order for a class to be combined. If a class is unavailable because of those conditions, the reasons why it may not be combined are detailed for the teacher. An unlimited number of students in an unlimited number of classes across an unlimited number of schools may be combined into a single class allowing for maximum teacher flexibility.
The Split tool allows teachers to split a single class into two or more class sections. Even though these classes are split, the grade and attendance information is sent to the district Student Information System with the appropriate original course and section numbers. There are two types of classes referenced when discussing this tool—original class and new classes. The original class refers to the originating class from which all classes are split. The new classes refer to all classes that are split from the original class. Certain conditions must be met in order for a class to be split.
The Seating Chart tool helps teachers manage classroom seating assignments. There three basic types of seating charts are traditional, semicircle, and circle. In eSembler, the traditional seating chart is made up of linear rows and columns. The semicircle and circle configurations position the seats in semicircle and circle configurations. However, regardless of the configuration initially selected, teachers can manually move individual student seats to any location within each of these configuration types allowing for customized seating arrangements that can suit any classroom environment. And unlike the limitations found in other gradebooks, these seats can even overlapped allowing for an infinite number of seating chart configurations. Since photo support is also provided, teachers may print seating charts for substitute teacher use, allowing for additional levels of accountability. And since eSembler provides network administrators with the ability to populate eSembler with student photos, teachers are automatically presented with that information.
The Student Desktop tool provides teachers with visibility into grade, category, comment, and attendance information for all classes for any selected student. The presentation of this access is the same as found by users of eSembler's ePortal which is designed to provide parent and student access to gradebooks. In addition to being provided with a snapshot view of student grades across all grading periods, the Student Desktop tool also provides teachers with cumulative absence totals, information related to the number of missing assignments (by class), in addition to full access to the Summary report available for each of the student's classes. By providing teachers access to this tool, teachers are provided with insight into overall student achievement across all of their classes rather than being simply limited to those classes which they teach.
The Team Teaching tool allows teachers to invite an unlimited number of other
educators to share in the responsibilities for a single class. These teams
are often made up of teachers from different academic fields or backgrounds
and who can bring a variety of perspectives to the classroom. This tool also
allows teachers the ability to invite other individuals like school counselors
or special education instructors. These educators are thereby jointly responsible
for all gradebook activities including attendance, assignment management,
and grading. The Team Teaching tool also offers teachers the ability to restrict
access to certain gradebook functionality for team taught classes. For example,
in addition to providing unlimited access to certain classes for invited teachers,
the scheduled teachers can also restrict write access to an entire class or
limit that write access to the Submit Grades tool only. To ensure that this
feature always operates as expected, eSembler has a wide range of collision
control mechanisms in place to ensure that teachers never unexpectedly overwrite
each other’s work. Unlike other gradebook software vendors that require
scheduling modifications in order combine classes for team teaching, eSembler
is the only software that allows for complete teacher control of Team Teaching
without any adjustment to district data or scheduling.
