IXL Learning / JUN 2025
Giving teachers the ability to create bundled assignments
TIMELINE
June 2025
SKILLS
Product Design, UX Research
COMPANY
IXL Learning
TEAM
1x Product Designer (Me)
Interested in reading my submitted design proposal? Click here!
CONTEXT
Fast-paced design sprint to implement a new feature
For this design challenge, the goal was to create a new flexible homework assignment feature for IXL, enabling teachers to combine skills, lessons, and videos within a single assignment to better support student learning.
↳ My overarching design process for this project
PRODUCT & PROBLEM OVERVIEW
IXL Teachers cannot create homework assignments
Currently, teachers are only able to assign skills via one of three ways: 1) telling students the skill code (e.g., A.1), 2) sharing the URL, or 3) “starring” the skill in IXL. These methods lack a centralized, traditional assignment system, making it difficult to manage, track, and assign content in one cohesive place.
↳ Process in which teachers star "Skills"
↳ Overview of the IXL teacher dashboard & quiz interface
There is no centralized way for assigning content
Cannot assign Lessons and Videos
Currently no functionality to assign these additional content types
Skills must be individually starred
Skills must be individually starred by the teacher to assign them manually
Recommendations
IXL also assigns work to students through its recommendation system, requiring no effort from the teacher
Food for thought: Why has IXL not already implemented this feature?
It's certainly possible that there exists a pedagogical preference for individualized assignments, or perhaps IXL's product strategy simply encourages deliberate teacher engagement.
IXL's model is also rather unique amongst other educational learning platforms. Thus, it may be more of a business decision that keeps their product separate from the rest.
Introducing IXL assignment bundles
How might we enable teachers to assign bundles of IXL content through a centralized & flexible homework assignment system to improve instructional efficiency?
USER GOALS
Core needs driving this feature: flexibility for teachers to assign mixed content & clarity for students to understand & manage their work
The goals of this project are multifaceted, but at its core, the need for this feature stems from the inconvenience and inefficiencies teachers may face when trying to assign multiple types of content on IXL.
↳ The main Goals Of the two primary user groups: teachers & students
FEATURE PLACEMENT
Where does placing this new feature make sense?
Understanding IXL’s Information Architecture (IA) was essential to determining where the new assignment feature should live. In order to inform this decision, I first created a basic site map and brainstormed all plausible access points for both teachers and students.
↳ The teacher and Student iA, demonstrating where features could possibly be placed
I explored several approaches to determine the best placement for the feature
Information architecture
Teachers interact with content and assignments in two ways: via the "My IXL" and "Learning" tabs
User survey
Surveyed peers and family pointed to “My IXL” as the natural home for task-based actions
Empathy mapping
The thought process while navigating the internal goal "I want to assign homework" best matches with the "Assign Quiz" path
Structural logic
Quizzes and HW are both assigned tasks. Grouping them under “Assignments” keeps the structure and matches teachers’ mental models
DATA & NESTING
What data is necessary for IXL to support this feature?
To support the new homework feature, the IXL platform would need to collect, store, and manage several types of information related to assignments, content items, and student progress. I began by creating an Entity-Relationship diagram to model how IXL could structure and store data for the new feature.
↳ Each individual content item in an assignment will have its own row in the content table
Backend Thoughts
While this system could be modeled as a single array of resource links within the Assignments record (particularly in a NoSQL context), a normalized structure provides more flexibility for tracking metadata and ensuring scalability as features expand.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
Maintaining consistency with current IXL interface
Consistency
The current interface for quiz creation provides a clear and guided flow, making it a solid model for this V1 of Homework Assignments
Clarity & Organization
Assigning multiple types of content must be done in an organized way to minimize confusion and reduce the chance of error
FINAL PRODUCT
To support the new homework feature, the IXL platform would need to collect, store, and manage several types of information related to assignments, content items, and student progress. I began by creating an Entity-Relationship diagram to model how IXL could structure and store data for the new feature.
TAKEAWAYS
Integrating into the current design system & iteration is key
I genuinely had a great experience working through this design challenge. It gave me the opportunity to become very familiar with the IXL interface while also exploring new tools, such as the diagram mapping technique.
One key takeaway from this experience was the importance of iteration and context. I frequently revisited and refined earlier work as new ideas emerged, ensuring that each decision was grounded in the UX principles and consistent with the existing product.