IXL Math

This teacher review concentrates on the math part of IXL. IXL has over 7,000 skills covering to support public school or homeschooled learners with a range of needs, abilities, and grade levels. 'Smartscore' system promotes working through the questions, not guessing and the variety of question types is also admirable.  Both parents and teachers can make good use of its contents to support their children’s mathematical development.  

To review the IXL Math app, its context within the IXL Math platform must be understood, as it is very much embedded within the platform as a whole. IXL is designed to facilitate maths practice across the entire school age range. As part of this, it aims to motivate students, keep parents informed and ease the record-keeping burden of teachers. This app is a means of accessing the IXL Math exercises alongside the longer-established computer-based option. IXL Math app covers hundreds of math topics including numbers, equations, time, measuring, money, geometry, and graphing & statistics.

One of the interesting ways that IXL app works are in how it decides when a maths skill has been mastered. It is determined by a ‘SmartScore’. Based on the quite reasonable assumption that completing several questions or reaching a certain score is not an indication of mastery, this SmartScore is determined by other factors. It is based on many different measures to more accurately determine to understand. Wrong answers can bring the score down and the points awarded for correct answers are weighted by the program to represent the skills used.

It is an excellent system. It feels right and prevents students from just guessing because the effort involved in choosing the correct one is too much for them. The more incorrect answers, the longer the exercise will take, so the greater the incentive to choose wisely. It does mean that teachers should be careful with weaker students as they could find them stuck in an exercise for a long time if they just can’t grasp it. Not that the app leaves students unsupported in their learning. Incorrect answers are met with a detailed explanation to help students understand where they went wrong.

The questions comprehensively cover all years, from reception to year 13, and are useful for all of these years. It is, perhaps, weaker towards the earlier years due to the dependency on reading skills of the explanations. Where appropriate the questions do have a button that will speak the key information, such as the arithmetical operation, but not everything can be spoken.

An additional strength of the app is that it does not rely entirely on multiple-choice questions as so many others do. Depending on the subject, students could be moving vertices of shapes, entering numbers, or some other method appropriate to the area of maths. This makes it more intuitive, more interesting and more appropriate to exam revision.

Both teachers and students can track performance easily and in ways appropriate to their needs. Students can see their awards and accomplishments in the app. Teachers can get a variety of reports, although, at the moment, this needs to be done using a computer rather than the app, but this functionality is coming. This highlights that this app is part of a platform. With their accounts, students and teachers can access their content across many devices. The experience is broadly the same but, occasionally, new content may lag slightly behind on some of the devices. 

With the huge amount of questions and associated explanations, either the app had to be enormous in size or it would require internet connectivity. It has chosen the latter so you must be aware that a Wi-Fi network will be required. The other implication of this is that there can be a slight loading time occasionally. This is particularly noticeable when an explanation to a wrong answer needs to be displayed and you may see a buffering symbol for a couple of seconds.

Maths practice is an essential aspect of maths education and this app tightly focuses on making this as productive and efficient as possible. Parents and teachers alike can utilise it to ensure that their children master and remember the maths skills they are taught at school.

IXL for English Language Learners

IXL’s personalized learning platform provides the tools needed to help English language learners build confidence and reach new heights. Each English language learner has a unique profile of strengths and weaknesses. Users will have access to the various sections according to the needs whether it is kindergarten or preschool or from first grade to 12th grade.

And, with IXL Analytics, parents stay in the loop on their kids' practice, and teachers get actionable data that makes it a breeze to track student progress, pinpoint trouble spots, and more. IXL's nine reports are more than just numbers, offering real-time insights that let teachers know when students need help and how they can help. Intuitive and visual, IXL Analytics brings relevant data into focus so teachers can concentrate on what they do best: teach. From subjects, to activities, and grades, IXL is the most comprehensive classroom product that makes learning fun and engaging for kids of all ages.

IXL Subscription

IXL.com delivers an adaptive learning experience for all students in all grades, in math, English language arts, science, and social studies. IXL is available online and as an app for iPad, iPhone, Android tablets, and Kindle Fire.

IXL for Families

IXL's family memberships are perfect for homeschooling families that provides unlimited access to IXL's practice problems personalised to your child's level.

IXL Free Trial for Families

You can practise ten free questions in each subject per day, and that’s a great way to get familiar with the skills and types of practice questions available on IXL. For the full experience with access to IXL Analytics, awards and certificates and unlimited practice, signing up for a membership is the best option. IXL offers a 30-day satisfaction guarantee.

Pricing

Maths - £7.99 per month

English - £7.99 per month

Maths and English - £12.99 per month

IXL for Schools

Purchase a classroom licence to get immediate access to thousands of interactive skills, real-time analytics and valuable teacher insights.

IXL Free Trial for Schools

Explore IXL with a free 30-day classroom trial. Your free trial includes unlimited access to adaptive practive in thousands of skills and IXL Analytics.

Pricing

Maths - £7.99 per month

Maths - £179 per annum - 25 students

English - £179 per annum - 25 students

Maths and English - £249 per annum - 25 students