Discovery Education Streaming Feature Review - Bulk Upload Tool

Last year, I wrote about some of the more underutilized features of Discovery Education Streaming. Part of the reason for teachers (understandably) deciding to not use the classroom manager and assignment builder tools was the cumbersome task of entering all of their student rosters. For this school year, Discovery made it convenient for schools to upload bulk users and automatically have them sorted into classes for each teacher account. For a quick look and review, follow me after the jump.

I was quite excited when I saw the DEN Blog Post about the new Bulk Import feature.  After meeting with our Technology Coordinator and Data Specialist, we got the ball rolling on setting up the required spreadsheet with the matching fields from our Student Information System.  The updating of existing users and importing of new users did not take long at all (24 hours is the recommended wait period), and I was able to view several teachers with their classes setup correctly shortly after. For those interested in learning more about the Bulk Upload feature or have specific technical questions, DES provides some FAQs and additional links and guides for support.

Teachers likely won't notice the changes until they create an assignment or if they click on Classroom Manager. I am hoping that this immediate access to class roster lists will encourage more teachers to use the powerful features that come with Discovery Education Streaming.

Specifically, teachers can create assignments centered around media, either already created content or student/teacher uploaded items. They can design and assign quizzes, have feedback given to students, and offer these resources to students whenever they have online access. Saving teachers the time it would take to upload student rosters offers them more opportunities to explore additional resources and consider using the individualized instruction that these tools can ultimately provide.

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