How Do I Create an Activity?
Kiddom is designed with customization and personalization in mind. As educators, we know that it is sometimes better to use something from outside the box rather than in it. That’s why we’ve made it easy for teachers to create activities that can be tied directly to standards. You can also create or add other types of materials, such as new presentations, student notebooks, or articles for students to review.
First, Let's Make a Box
Before you can start creating new assignments for students, you will need a place to put those assignments. In Kiddom, you can create new courses with units and lesson plans where you can organize and contain all of your custom assignments.
To create a new course in Kiddom, navigate to your Curriculum page (flowchart icon) and click the blue Create Content button in the top right corner. Select the Course option from the pop-up menu to create a place to store your new materials.
Within the course, you will need to give the course a name and create at least one unit. Note: If you would like to house various types of materials, it is recommended to create different units for each type. For example, an Assessments unit, a Presentations unit, and an Activities unit.
Within your new unit, you will find a default lesson plan as well as a button to add more lesson plans later on.
You will need to give the plan a name (such as “Unit 1 Activities”). In the lesson plan, you will find a default assessment and a default activity that you can edit, as well as buttons to create more of each. Other materials, such as presentations and student notebooks, can be added using the gray plus (+) in the lesson plan.
Now, Let's Start Building!
Clicking on the default assessment or activity will open a blank version that is ready to be edited.
Once in Editor Mode, add a title for the assignment. You can change the assignment’s settings by clicking on the Settings pillbox button above the title, including which grade levels and subjects the assignment applies to. You can also add a description of the assignment below the title. This will only be visible to teachers or administrators accessing the assignment, not to students. If you want this description visible to students, click on the Student-Facing checkbox.
Adding Questions
By default, in a new assessment, a blank written response question is added as a starting place. New activities do not contain a default question. To add questions, click on the gray plus (+) symbol and select Questions. The drop-down menu also includes other materials that you can add to the assignment, such as multipart questions, student-facing text for reading analysis, and attachments including videos.
Once a question is created, you can select or change the type of question. Kiddom has 15 different question types available, many of which can be graded automatically. Auto-graded questions will have our robot icon next to the question.
Question Settings
Each question can be customized in many ways other than just the type of question presented.
Point Values
By default, Kiddom uses a 4-point grading system for each question, but you can adjust the question’s point value by clicking on the Points box and clicking the up or down arrows or typing in a point value.
Standards and Skills
Kiddom prides itself on being able to create standards-based data for teachers to be able to quickly identify which students are showing mastery on particular skills. Aligning questions to standards when creating them allows for our system to help teachers track students' understanding. Questions can be tied to standards by clicking the Align to Standard button. This will open a searchable menu to select which standards/skills the question should be aligned with.
Student Tools
The Show Work toggle allows teachers to require students to explain their answers using various tools available within Kiddom. Students can add images, video responses, audio responses, or drawings using the Student Tools. K-5 Students can also show their mathematical understanding using the Math Manipulative tools.
Evaluation Notes and Rubrics
Teachers can add evaluation notes, including an answer rubric, to ensure consistent grading practices across classes and classrooms. To add evaluation notes, click on the Note for Evaluating Responses button to open a text box. Beyond text, teachers can add images to this box, such as sample responses, correct graphs, or handwritten problems.
Audio and Video Recording for Differentiation
Teachers also have the option to record audio or video for a question using the Camera and Microphone tools. This allows teachers to create read-aloud versions of questions to support differentiated instruction.
Previewing, Publishing and Reaccessing a Created Assignment
The Preview button (eyeball icon) allows teachers to see what the students will see when they open the assignment, allowing the teachers to make adjustments before students begin to interact with the assignment.
Once the assignment is complete, click on the Done button. This will bring you to your assignment view, where you can assign the activity using either the Assign or Classwork feature.
If you want to return to the assignment at a later time to assign to students or to make adjustments to the assignment:
- Navigate to your Curriculum page and scroll down to the My Curriculum section to find the created course.
- Navigate within that by clicking on the associated unit and lesson plan tiles.
- Once within the lesson plan, you will find the created content. Clicking on the assignment will reopen it.
- Once opened, you have the option to assign the assignment, edit it, or delete it. If you edit the assignment, be sure to click Done when you are finished in order to ensure that the document updates.
School and District Editors: Click here to learn more about how to share created content with your colleagues.
If you want to add more assignments to this course, navigate to the lesson plan as described above and toggle the Edit feature to edit the lesson plan. Once open, you can add new assignments using the New Assessment, New Activity, or gray plus (+) buttons.
Want to delete a course, unit, or assignment?
To delete created content, click on the Edit button within the content, then click on the three dots in the right corner. Please note that you cannot recover a resource once it's deleted.
