Summary: This article explores how IXL can add a collaborative feature to its product.
The Concept
IXL Learning Spaces is an external interactive platform that allows students to work together on projects, group assignments, and problem-solving exercises. This feature emphasizes peer learning, teamwork, and critical thinking, all while teachers can monitor and guide these collaborations.
Ideation & Research
IXL's Mission
"At IXL Learning, we are passionate about improving learning for all. We apply technology in thoughtful and innovative ways to unlock learners' innate curiosity, creativity, and desire for knowledge."
IXL achieves this by providing a comprehensive curriculum, real-time diagnostics, personalized guidance, and actionable analytics.
Current Users
School Districts & Teachers
The top 100 U.S. school districts use IXL learning. Teachers can use IXL's resources to supplement their curriculum and help students reach their full learning potential.
Students
Around 15 million students currently use IXL Learning. IXL has created a friendly and personalized learning environment that helps students excel in their unique ways.
Here are some real testimonials:
"I find the Analytics section extremely helpful, especially the Real-Time data that I can stream while my students are working. The reports show me a very detailed picture of each student as well as class averages. It allows me to tailor my instruction based on performance on certain skills so that I can create effective learning targets for my students. I believe IXL is one of the top contributors to improved student performance on MAP assessments. It helped build student confidence and bring a challenge to my students that was both engaging and fun!"
"IXL has helped me understand the problems I get wrong. I feel that it is not important to get the work done quickly, but to understand the problem. Whenever I get something wrong, IXL gives me a full detailed explanation. That helps me do better on tests and quizzes."
Parents
Parents are indirect users, often using the platform to monitor their children's learning progress. Some even sign up their children to accelerate their learning in school or homeschool.
Market Research & Validation
Like any platform, there will always be both praise and criticism. After all, we aim to provide the resources that users want. So, what are some things people still want from IXL?
Some individuals are looking for more personalization, whether that means extra support or fewer repetitive assignments. Users also want more feedback to help them learn from their mistakes, especially when starting a new topic. Lastly, some users feel there is limited engagement because there is too much repetitive practice instead of fostering a deep understanding of topics. This often causes students to become disengaged.
User Reviews:
I have seen that many of my students get questions wrong on ixl and ask me "why did I get this wrong" and I tell them "try reading the explanation first" an they say "I have but I don't get my mistake"."
"students may struggle with concepts they find challenging or become bored with material they have already mastered"
I want to focus more on limited engagement and feedback. In schools and universities, collaborative work and peer feedback are valuable to many students. Many students learn best through discussion and real-world applications of topics. IXL Learning Spaces allow students to receive peer feedback and learn from each other.
Current Competitors
There are several ed-tech platforms on the market. Some you may have heard of or even used, such as Khan Academy, Atom Learning, Matific, Stride, and more. IXL has direct, potential, and substitute competitors. Most learning platforms aim to make learning digital and interactive, but each one has a slightly different focus, as shown in the examples below.
Stride, Inc is an ed-tech company offering online learning programs for students from K-12. They provide several career learning programs, cater to public and private schools, and offer other educational services. Stride serves over 100,000 users across the United States and partners with school districts to support teachers and provide students with an effective learning curriculum.
Atom Learning is an ed-tech platform providing AI-powered online learning tools for primary school students. The platform offers personalized practice, interactive lessons, and self-paced learning to improve skills in subjects like math, english, and more. It is particularly known for its test prep tools. Atom Learning has over 250,000 students using the platform and is also used by teachers and parents as a supplemental learning tool.
Khan Academy is a nonprofit educational platform that provides free learning resources for several subjects including math, science, history, and more. The platform is primarily known for its video lessons, and practice exercises. Khan Academy also partners with several organizations, such as College Board, to offer test prep resources. Currently, Khan Academy has over 145 million registered users.
Matific is an educational platform focused on providing interactive math programs. The platform offers engaging activities to build foundational math skills through problem-solving and exploration. Matific is used in several countries with over a million users.
Google Classroom is a bit different from the other platforms but executes virtual collaboration features well. Google Classroom is a free online learning management system for educators and students. It streamlines the process of distributing, creating, and grading assignments. It's integrated with other Google products such as Google Docs, Drive, and Meet. Google has a large user base with over 150 million users worldwide.
Key Features Ideas
Virtual Whiteboarding
A virtual whiteboard allows students to brainstorm ideas, draw diagrams, and map ideas collectively. This encourages students to get creative with showcasing their understanding of topics while learning from one another.
Live Collaboration
Live collab sessions will allow students to join a shared workspace to solve problems or work on assignments together. The platform can support real-time text, voice, and video communications while being monitored for cheating or plagiarism.
Discussion Boards & Feedback Loops
Teachers can set up discussion boards personalized to their curriculum so students can post explanations in their own words, or ask questions in the space. This would also allow for real-time feedback and answers within the workspace, in the form of comments, annotations, and suggestions.
Task Assignments
Teachers can divide project or homework tasks into smaller tasks, assign them to individuals or a group of students, and monitor the work and discussions within the collaborative space.
Progress Tracking
Teachers and students/parents can track their progress for group or individual activities. This includes time spent on tasks, activity status, and contributions to discussions and projects.
Gamification
There can be multi-player games for students to learn subjects more engagingly. It will also incorporate rewards and badges for collaborative participation or for reaching specific milestones.
Artificial Intelligence
Incorporating AI can significantly improve user experience. Students can utilize AI prompts to ask questions, get recommendations, improve writing and brainstorming capabilities, and more.
Planning and Design (PRD)
Objectives
The primary goal is to create a collaborative workspace within the IXL platform to foster teamwork and engagement.
IXL Learning Spaces will also provide teacher tools to manage and monitor group projects to encourage peer learning effectively.
User Personas
Students will collaborate with peers on group tasks and provide peer feedback
Educators will assign tasks, monitor activity and progress, provide feedback
Admin (School Districts/Schools/Institutions) manage several classes, manage access, and analyze data.
Features Scope
Virtual Whiteboarding
Includes whiteboard drawing tools such as pens, erasers, shapes, colors, highlighters, and more
Support text input, sticky notes/note cards, image or file uploads
Real-time updates so all users can view edits and edit the board
Option to save whiteboard sessions and even download them as images of PDFs
Live Collaboration
Supports real-time texts, video, and voice communication
No lag in the platform if several users are interacting simultaneously
Will be integrated with existing IXL profiles
Secure and safe communication channels
Discussion Boards & Feedback Loops
Ability to make shareable posts within a virtual classroom
Supports commenting and annotation capabilities on shared documents or discussion boards
Supports educators to make corrections and provide grades directly on the workspace
Implement threaded discussion with feedback loops to encourage deeper conversations
Task Assignments & Roles
Teachers can define and assign tasks to specific students (users) or groups of students
Students can view their assigned tasks and deadlines
Automated alerts for upcoming deadlines and task updates
Progress Tracking
Dashboard to track tasks, prioritize tasks, view deadlines, grades, participation percentage, and more
Detailed logs of individual contributions such as edits, feedback, messages, task completion, etc
Milestone trackers for larger projects or assignments
Progress charts provide insights for both the student and teacher
Gamification
Progress bars or achievement levels to keep students motivated
Rewards for participation, completing tasks or group activities, etc.
Leaderboards to show top contributors within classes (customizable)
Options to customize gamified rewards for certain learning goals
Create fun and engaging games for multi-users
Artificial Intelligence
Incorporate AI on virtual whiteboarding to review grammar, get brainstorming workflows, creative images/drawings, etc
Incorporate AI for discussion boards to get suggestions on writing topics, ask questions, and review grammar
Teachers can utilize AI to give feedback to their students
Students & teachers can use AI to prioritize their tasks, and make to-do lists
User Stories
Student User Stories
I want to utilize the shared whiteboard to visualize what I learn and organize my thoughts with creative freedom
I want to join Learning Spaces with my classmates to work together and learn from one another
I want to communicate with my peers to work together in real-time
I want to track assigned tasks and gain insight into my progress over the school year
Teacher User Stories
I want to assign group activities and monitor progress
I want to provide feedback and guidance in real-time within the collaboration space
I want students to work together and reward them for their participation and teamwork
Functional Requirements
Highlights the priority and dependencies...
Whiteboard Sharing (High): Whiteboard plugin or custom-built module
Live Collaboration (High): Integrate with existing IXL communication modules
Task Assignment (High): Task management and notifications
Progress Tracking (Medium): Analytics and reporting
Discussions Boards (High): Existing IXL feedback and grading systems
Gamification (Medium): Customizable
Artificial Intelligence (Medium): Based on data accuracy and reliability
Non-Functional Requirements
Security & Privacy: Ensure that the platform meets compliance standards such as GDPR, FERPA, COPPA, etc. Implement data encryption and data loss prevention standards. Aim to improve the organization's security posture.
Accessibility: Ensure that features are accessible to all students including those with disabilities.
Performance: Minimize latency for virtual communication and whiteboard updates.
Scalability: There shouldn't be any performance issues while supporting several users at once.
Reliability: Ensure the collaboration tool is always available for students and teachers through 99.9% uptime SLA
Technical Considerations
There would be further conversations with engineering teams to finalize the architecture and tech stack.
Architecture: Ensure scalability and modularity through microservices-based architecture.
APIs & Integration: Utilize current APIs for user management, communication, and progress tracking.
Data Storage: Cloud storage solutions will effectively store collaborative session data, whiteboard outputs, and progress reports.
Third-Party Tools: Evaluate external tools for effectively integrating feature requirements.
Wireframes & Prototypes
Below are example wireframes of the virtual whiteboards. Similarly, there will be low-fidelity and high-fidelity wireframes for the other features and user flows.
Sample Low-Fidelity Wireframes (eg. virtual whiteboards)
Sample High-Fidelity Diagrams Wireframes (eg. virtual whiteboards)
Success Metrics
Adoption rates, engagement, learning outcomes, and user satisfaction all measure success. IXL can measure how many teachers and students use the Learning Spaces. The org can also track how many sessions are open per day, the average duration, and tasks completed. Finally, it can track the correlation between using Learning Spaces and the improvement in students' grades. Users will also give feedback on usability, and satisfaction allowing us to gauge what changes, if any, need to be made.
Risks and Mitigations
Several risks can come with implementing a new feature. Here are a few to consider:
Students may misuse communication tools for off-topic conversations. However, we can implement content filters and store logs for teachers to monitor. This will minimize distractions and even academic dishonesty.
There could be a feature overload leading to poor user experience. However, IXL can release the MVP with high-priority features and gather feedback before expanding.
There could be latency issues for real-time collaborations. IXL engineers can optimize the backend performance to ensure low latency.
Project Roadmap
The project roadmap entails timelines and key milestones to take the project from conception to production.
Phase 1: Ideation & Research (~ 2 Months)
Milestone 1: User Research and Feedback (1-3 Weeks)
Conduct surveys, interviews, and focus groups with teachers, students, and current IXL users
Gather these insights into needs and pain points for the existing product and this additional feature
Create a research report with user personas and key feature needs
Milestone 2: Competitive Analysis (2-4 Weeks)
Research current ed-tech platforms and collaboration tools
Compare and contrast those to each other and to IXL to find opportunities for differentiation
Create a feature gap report and SWOT analysis report
Milestone 3: Concept Validations (3-8 Weeks)
Validate the concept with other stakeholders and internal reviews
Refine the feature list and get approval to proceed to the next phase
Phase 2 : Design & Prototyping (~ 2-3 Months)
Milestone 1: Wireframing & User Flows (1-3 Weeks)
Create wireframes for core features such as collaboration space, whiteboarding, task assignment, and progress tracking.
Create user flow diagrams
Milestone 2: High-Fidelity Prototypes (3-4 Weeks)
Create high-fidelity prototypes focusing on UI/UX design
Lead usability testing for teachers and students
Milestone 3: Technical Planning (3-4 Weeks)
Set up meetings with engineering teams to create technical architecture and plan the tech stack for backend systems, APIs, and third-party integrations
Create technical design documents and begin sprint planning
Phase 3: Development (~ 4-6 Months)
Milestone 1: MVP Development (Sprint 1-3)
- Develop core functionalities: real-time communication options, shared whiteboarding with tools, task assignments, and discussion boards.
Milestone 2: Gamification & Enhancements (Sprint 4-5)
Develop a dashboard for personalized progress tracking and implement gamification features such as a leaderboard
Develop multiplayer games
Improve user experience based on the feedback from the MVP
Milestone 3: Security & Compliance Testing (Sprint 6)
- Conduct security assessments to ensure it meets compliance standards such as COPPA, FERPA, and GDPR.
Milestone 4: Alpha Testing & Bug Fixing (Sprint 7-8)
Run tests internally to identify bugs and UX issues
Fix critical issues before moving to external testing
Phase 4: Internal Testing (~ 1 Months)
Milestone 1: Internal Beta Test (Sprint 9)
Conduct extensive testing with internal teams and work with QA teams
Focus on edge cases, performance under load, and multiuser scenarios
Milestone 2: Final Enhancements (Sprint 10)
Implement changes based on feedback from the internal launch
Ensure the feature is fully functional for the external release
Phase 5: Beta Launch (~ 1-2 Months)
Milestone 1: Select Beta Schools & Rollout (Sprint 11)
Partner with select schools to test the new features
Provide training and resources to effectively guide on using the features
Milestone 2: Monitor Usage & Gather Feedback (Sprint 12-13)
Track usage metrics and engagement levels, and gather feedback from beta users
Identify performance or usability issues
Milestone 3: Final Improvmenets (Sprint 14)
Finalize all features and its UI/UX
Address critical feedback and resolve remaining issues
Phase 6: Full Launch (~ 1 Months)
Milestone 1: Launch Prep & Marketing (Sprint 15)
Work with the marketing team to develop a marketing campaign targeted at teachers, schools, and school districts
Create promotional content and case studies
Milestone 2: Full Feature Launch (Sprint 16)
Rollout Learning Spaces feature for all IXL users
Ensure customer support is prepared for possible user inquiries
Milestone 3: Post Launch Monitoring and continuous improvement
Monitor user adoption, collect feedback, and address possible issues
Utilize the HEART or AARRR framework to monitor growth, engagements, retention, user satisfaction, and revenue.
Stakeholders
Product Management: Define features and develop go-to-market strategy
Engineering: responsible for determining architecture, development testing, and release
UX/UI Design: Design the user interface and experience for Learning Spaces
Sales & Marketing: Develop creative and strategic campaigns to promote this new feature
Customer Support: Provide training for support staff to assist users in navigating the new feature
Development and Testing
Agile Development
Break down the development process into sprints to focus on building the core functionalities. Determine which project-tracking software works best for the team. Hold standups and sprint retrospectives to track progress and address any issues.
Here is an example of a sprint breakdown:
Sprint Overview:
Goal: The goal is to develop shared whiteboard features
Duration: 2 weeks
Members: Product Manager, Frontend Engineer, Backend Engineer, Teach Lead, UX/UI Designer, QA Tester
Epic 1: Shared Whiteboard
User Story: As a student, I want to utilize the virtual whiteboarding feature for creative freedom for note-taking, brainstorming, and group work.
Task 1: Develop the core whiteboard module
Develop basic whiteboard sessions with drawing tools like pens, erasers, colors, shapes, etc
Develop text input, sticky notes, and an option to upload images
Implement real-time syncing for whiteboard updates for multiple users
Task 2: Develop the option to save or export whiteboard sessions
Whiteboard states can be saved as images
Whiteboard sessions can be exported as PDFs
Task 3: Test whiteboard performance and scalability
Conduct tests with multiple simulated user interactions
Improve user experience by optimizing data syncing
Iterative Testing
Focus on user experience, performance, and accessibility for internal and external testing. Gather feedback from usability testing with students and teachers and make continuous improvements.
Quality Assurance
Conduct QA testing, including functional testing, security testing, and stress testing to ensure the feature can handle multiple users.
Beta Launch & Feedback
Select a controlled environment with a few schools or classrooms and launch the features. Continue to monitor usage and engagements, identify any issues, and gather feedback. Document these insights and make necessary improvements to the functionality, experience, and performance of the product.
Full Launch & Marketing
As part of the PRD, plan a full rollout to all IXL Learning users. Ensure the platform is fully functional and all bugs from the beta tests are resolved. Ensure that the customer support team is ready to address any questions or issues that may occur on the platform. Provide training resources, or webinars so teachers and students can easily navigate the platform.
Work with the marketing team to develop a marketing strategy so more schools, teachers, students, and parents are aware of the feature and its functionality. Work with the sales team on GTM (go-to-market_ strategy). Highlight the benefits of Learning Spaces for the users and how it will significantly improve their experience on the platform.
Post-Launch Monitoring & Maintenance
There are a couple of frameworks product managers can use to monitor feature metrics. Two popular ones are HEART and AARRR, which track growth, engagement, retention, user satisfaction, and revenue. Using data analytics to gain insights on engagement and retention can help determine if the product feature is worth a long-term investment. Collecting user feedback helps improve the feature or introduce new enhancements that will increase user satisfaction. Finally, based on revenue and user satisfaction, decide if planning new enhancements for the product will be a good future investment (the final stage of the product lifecycle).