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One of the best systems for helping your students learn material rather than just testing them
March 16, 2022

One of the best systems for helping your students learn material rather than just testing them

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with alta from Knewton, a Wiley brand

Knewton Alta is a fairly transformative homework system. Because it is mastery-based rather than problem-based, students really get much more out of using Knewton than other similar homework systems I have used over the years. Those students that need more help get more help. Those students who are quick and on top of things can get done quickly. The system is well supported, and it is usually easy to get help and support both from a student and instructor perspective. The main challenge with Knewton is that your students will sometimes get questions that are not aligned with the content in your class, and there is no way to stop it. Because the questions are not pre-set, then sometimes your students will just get stumped, so you have to provide instructions for your students as to what to do in those situations (I tell them to feel free to Google an answer or two here and there if they need to.) But overall I have been very happy with the system.
  • Mastery based teaching and homework.
  • Lots of statistics.
  • Relatively straightforward problems.
  • Most "advanced" problems are too generic.
  • Some review questions can be confusing to students if not aligned with your curriculum.
  • Rapid deployment.
  • Student-centered design.
  • Not really applicable to education.
Compared to competitors, the Knewton system is much more adaptive and designed for mastery and learning rather than assessment. If those are your goals, then this is a good system to use. The complexity of the problems is generally lacking, so you will need to supplement with more difficult problems for your students to tackle, whereas many other systems have these more difficult problems built-in.

Do you think Alta from Knewton, a Wiley brand delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Alta from Knewton, a Wiley brand's feature set?

Yes

Did Alta from Knewton, a Wiley brand live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Alta from Knewton, a Wiley brand go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Alta from Knewton, a Wiley brand again?

Yes

It is appropriate as a learning system and helps your students gain mastery. I would not use it as much for an assessment system, although they have been slowly building up those capabilities.