Google Classroom vs. Instructure Mastery vs. TestInvite

Google Classroom allows teachers to post for daily lessons and assignments. It also allows teachers to be able to communicate with students easily outside of class. Students are able to stay connected and know where to find all information and resources easily in a streamlined manner for all of their classes.

Incentivized

I love that MasteryConnect already has hundreds of standards built-in, like the ACT readiness and socioemotional learning standards my after-school program uses. I think MasteryConnect would be harder to implement for an educational institution using learning standards not already in MasteryConnect. Also, MasteryConnect does not function as a grade book for someone looking for that kind of solution.

Incentivized

Our needs are really well met by Test Invite. Of particular note is the fact that Test Invite provides contemporary methods to assess the knowledge and skills of the test takers. In our field, it is imperative to understand the oral language skills of potential students. With the use of video and audio recording supported questions, we can gain more insight into our students' needs so that we can tailor our services to them better. For language testing, Test Invite really allows the school to reliably collect, analyze and report on essential data needed from students. There are some usability issues with the platform, however, Test Invite has been working diligently to improve on these areas and add additional functionality.

• Student-teacher communication - I love using Classroom for this because my students can always go back and check what was on Classroom by looking through the stream. This way they don't have to go dig through emails to find what they're looking for.
• Posting to multiple classes - I can post the same announcement or assignment to multiple classes at once without having to repeat the process or send separate emails.
• Streamlining grading - when students turn work in on Classroom, it all goes to one place and then when I'm grading I can open their documents directly from Classroom or my Drive folder. This way, I'm not looking through emails and Google Doc shared files for their assignment.

Incentivized

• Learning standards are already included in the software.
• Allows educators to track students who are near-mastery and at-mastery
• Color-coding system is easy to understand.

Incentivized

• Cognitive aptitude assessments.
• Providing assessment platform.
• Providing support during assessment activities.
• English proficiency testing.

• The content management of the Classroom is not that good. The sub-section for notes, syllabus, or discussion is missing.
• It doesn't have parental control feature.
• It converts the excel output into a normal file. All the formulas and pivots got changed into plain text.

• I don't like that we have to make separate trackers for each sub-strand of math on the ACT.
• Sometimes it is difficult to find the assessments I am trying to score within trackers.
• I wish I had more support on how to use the data in MasteryConnect.

Incentivized

• Some features like Live Proctoring can be included.

Testing is particularly important in online learning, and Google Classroom falls far short of other learning management systems in this regard. Security is also a concern: while account control is reasonable for the account used with Google Classroom, the person controlling a particular account is often able to, for example, forward or download proprietary materials.

Simple design and seamless integration with Google tools and drive, but missing some key features. However, since it is limited in overall functions and ability to truly personalize / customize, it is quite user friendly and easy to set up and get going, other than sending out the code to your course or dropping students in via their gmail account. Users of Google Forms and sites will find the layout similar in design.

Incentivized

It's easy to use.

We have had very little trouble in accessing Google Classroom. Our issues, if any, have risen from our server and not the Google servers.

Incentivized

Since this platform is provided by Google, the technical support is better than any others, and we are not required to bother about the space constraints for adding the contents. If we have a good uninterrupted internet facility we can access Google Classroom without any delay or lag. They have app support in both Android and iPhone.

On-boarding was fine and sufficient, but we haven't really heard from MasteryConnect since then. I haven't reached out to them, either, though.

Incentivized

This is the most appreciated part of working with Test Invite over the last 2 years. Support was always timely, congenial, effective, and never challenging in terms of response rate or quality of reaction. Our counterpart on the Test Invite side has practically become a member of our team, as they are always extremely involved and ready to provide value while becoming very clear on our needs.

It was relatively easy to implement due to the simplicity of the platform. Even our more technology challenged teachers found it easy to get started with Google Classroom.

Incentivized

I haven't tested or evaluated another digital classroom website or application. I feel like Google Classroom is convenient for many reasons such as compatibility to Google docs, slides, etc. I also love the ability to link to YouTube and other sites. I don't know if there would be a site that is easier to maneuver.

Incentivized

MasteryConnect is a more affordable option for our medium-sized nonprofit. MasteryConnect fits our needs without being "too much" software. Illuminate and PowerSchool are more built for large school systems while we are a standalone organization with only about 250 students.

Incentivized

I spend a LOT of time researching alternatives. Many required high upfront payments and did not have the functionality I needed. Test Invite was the first platform I tried and I was very happy with it!

Incentivized

It is very easy to push out this program across our buildings. Teachers are able to use it without much trouble.

Incentivized

• Students are able to continue learning in a remote environment
• Parents have a single, consistent organization structure to make it easy to track assignments and progress for multiple children
• Much better solution than the quickly assembled Zoom-and-gloom of the previous spring when school abruptly went remote with no planning

Incentivized

• MasteryConnect has allowed our organization to track student learning data weekly for the first time.
• We spend less than 10 minutes per week inputting student achievement data.
• We are able to more quickly decide which skills to reteach because of MasteryConnect.

Incentivized

• Students who complete a full placement test before starting their lessons are 80% more likely to continue with lessons after a trial lesson.
• Students and parents have expressed extreme gratitude to our school for providing them with detailed and complete information about their English level.