Edmentum Plato Learning: A Comprehensive Overview

Edmentum Plato Learning, a product of the American online learning provider Edmentum, offers a wide array of online courses and assessment solutions. This article provides a detailed overview of Edmentum Plato Learning, covering its features, navigation, benefits, and some user feedback.

Introduction to Edmentum

Founded in 2000 as Archipelago Learning, Edmentum has evolved into a significant player in the online education sector. Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, the company went public in November 2009. In 2012, PLATO Learning acquired Archipelago Learning, further expanding its reach and offerings. Edmentum also owns Reading Eggs internationally.

Navigating Edmentum Plato Learning

This support guide will walk you through how to navigate to your courses. Below the login, you'll find an announcements section. These are posted by Edmentum/PLATO and will provide you with advanced notification about updates, so you can plan your time accordingly. The image below shows the home screen. Find the course you would like to start and click on the course name. Most courses first have three introductory links or documents which typically include the syllabus, helpful information, and course resources. Then you will see the assignments for the courses which are often in units or folders. Units in many courses will start with a pretest. Below is an example of a unit for an English course. Pretests will determine if any assignments in the unit will be exempt.

Key Features and Tools

Edmentum Courseware offers online curriculum with over 400 engaging courses across a broad range of subjects. We offer core subjects, world languages, career and technical education, and advanced courses. Our courses help students achieve learning objectives through curricula that provides students with skills mastery, practice, real-world application, rigor and complexity, and multimodal learning. Most lessons include a tutorial. Below is a key of the tools you may see. Select each icon to view the specific tool. The “Resources” icon will often include “Guided Notes” for you to complete during the lesson to better help you understand the lesson content. If available, it may be helpful to download the “Guided Notes” to your computer and open from there. You will see that the Guided Notes are fillable forms. Below is an example for a science lesson. The intuitive student dashboard empowers students to track their own progress, and built-in features such as the dictionary, narration, translation, and notes make the content accessible to all learners.

Pretests and Exempt Assignments

Units in many courses will start with a pretest. Pretests will determine if any assignments in the unit will be exempt. Exempt assignments are noted with an e in a blue star and are based on the results of the pretest. The score for an exempt assignment is 100%. Exempt lessons can be skipped. If your course has a pretest, then you will be able to save and exit to continue at a later time.

Tutorials, Practice, and Mastery Tests

Students are not graded on the tutorials, practice, and applications, and can go through those as many times as needed to prepare for the mastery tests. After a mastery test is opened, it will lock. To unlock a mastery test, complete the tutorial again going through all of the slides. Select the assignment name and then “Play.” The cycle of completing the tutorial to unlock the mastery test for another attempt can be repeated as often as needed.

Unit and Semester Tests

Since the unit/post and semester tests can each only be taken once, it is best to wait until all assignments in the unit or course are successfully mastered (green) before taking the unit/post and semester tests. Although all assignments are available throughout the course, it is typically best to work in order except for those drop box assignments which should be started early in the course. (Note that only the Physical Education and purchased English courses have drop box assignments. Students can navigate through the course using the various features of show, hide, play, and close.

Monitoring Progress and Grades

The Current Grade shows only the average of all assignments that the student has completed so far. The Course Grade shows the average of all required assignments and will include a 0% score for each of the assignments not yet completed. The example below shows the assignments in unit 1 for an English course. Assignments that are mastered or exempt will be green and are based on the results of the pretest. The score for an exempt assignment is 100%. Exempt lessons can be skipped. Students can review exempt lessons without it affecting the overall course and current grades.

Addressing Not Mastered Assignments

This student must review and retake the mastery test for Tone and Mood in Fiction which is marked gold since the score was a 40%. A minimum 80% score is required for each mastery test. This student must finish Symbolism in Fiction which is marked blue to show the lesson was started, but the mastery test has not yet been completed. To find mastery tests that have not met the 80% requirement: Select the gold “Not Mastered” icon to see any mastery tests that must be redone. Select the assignment name and then “Play” to complete the tutorial. Mastery tests can be unlocked by reviewing all of the slides in the tutorial. The cycle of completing the tutorial to unlock the mastery test for another attempt can be repeated as often as needed. Students and parents will want to verify that all assignments in all units and folders are green.

Course Completion Requirements

To earn credit for the course, not only must the progress bar for the course show 100% complete, but every assignment in every unit and folder must show as green, and additionally for Physical Education and English courses, the drop box assignment must earn at least a 60% score. Courses that do not meet all requirements will be marked as I (incomplete), 0 credit.

Success Stories and Achievement Gains

This study documents the achievement gains made by some of the nation’s lowest-performing schools that are using Edmentum’s award-winning online curriculum and assessment solutions as part of their school improvement process. The study focuses on schools that have received funding through the School Improvement Grant (SIG) program and have implemented Edmentum’s online solutions as part of their coordinated improvement efforts. Results show that these schools are making dramatic and significant progress in student learning and achievement. Over a two-year period, across all high schools in the study sample that were on improvement and using Edmentum’s online solutions, the graduation rate increased by an average of 24%, a gain of 12 points. This percentage point increase is approximately ten times greater than the national annual average increase in graduation rates between 1998 and 2008. Schools that used Edmentum’s comprehensive online courses solution, Plato Courseware, had even better results. These schools saw an average increase in graduation rates of 53%, a gain of 22 points.

Homeschooling with Plato: A Personal Experience

Plato is an online curriculum created by a company called Edmentum and Plato was my choice when we decided to homeschool our two sixth grade boys for a semester last year. I want to tell you what I liked about Plato but before I do so, I must disclose that I work for a company that distributes Plato licenses. We used Plato for English, math, social studies, and science.

Customized Learning

Our boys focused on what they needed to learn. Each unit of learning began with a pretest to pinpoint what they already knew and what they needed to learn about the concepts and skills of the unit. If they showed in the pretest that they had already mastered something, they were exempt from those lessons. I liked this because they felt like they weren’t “wasting time” on things they already knew.

Engaging and Well-Planned Lessons

The lessons were well planned. There was a comfortable amount of content on each page and the lessons included questions they had to answer and activities they had to complete. This helped to keep them engaged. There were some videos within the lessons as well.

Hands-On Science Activities

I was pleased with the science experiments. They included easy-to-find materials and easy-to-follow instructions. The activities supported the content of the lesson well.

Read also: Understanding PLCs

Emphasis on Writing

There was a lot of writing. Some would see this as a drawback, but I thought it was an important component. They had to write in all subjects which I personally feel makes learning deeper. Any larger writing assignments (essays or research projects) were broken down so it was not overwhelming. (Of course, my boys may have a different opinion about all the writing! But they will be better for it in the long run.

Clear Progress and Grade Indication

Progress and grades were clearly indicated. When they logged in, they could see how much they had completed in each class and what their current grades were. I set progress goals for them each month to keep them on track. I think I used the benchmark of 20% for each class, each month. (We were only doing one semester or five months). Being kids, they quickly figured out that if they needed a little boost toward their goal, they could do a pretest and any exempted lessons would bump their progress. Not ideal and if we were to do it again, I would make it so this wasn’t an option. However, I guess I can chalk it up to a life lesson in being resourceful . . .

Extensive Content and Note-Taking

Content was extensive and they had to take notes. Again, this is probably another in the “They didn’t like it but they’ll thank me someday” category! It wasn’t always “fun” but they did learn . . .

Flexible Grade Levels

I could mix/match grade levels. Although they were both in grade six, one had been taking seventh-grade math. It was no problem to have him take grade seven math and grade six for the other subjects.

Areas for Improvement: Mastery Tests

Now in the spirit of honesty, I will mention the few things I wish were different about our Plato experience. Both involve the mastery tests. Let me back up. Each block of learning contains a tutorial (with activities) and a mastery test to complete after the tutorial. The mastery test, obviously, is to ensure the student learned the material presented in the tutorial. That’s a great set up! However, what I wish was different was the number of questions in the mastery test and that the student could see what they got right and wrong. The mastery tests are five questions. Five! That means if you missed just two you score only a 60%. I wish there were, say, ten questions; that would seem fairer.

Challenges and User Feedback

Feedback from educators highlights significant challenges with the platform's design and reliability. One user commented that it could be "difficult" and "not user friendly" and that "It could be difficult to find material that worked well for our students/program. It did not feel user friendly". Furthermore, an independent outage tracker has recorded at least 29 incidents of service disruption for Edmentum Courseware since 2021, with users frequently reporting login failures and "Bad Gateway" errors that prevent students from accessing their assignments.

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