Edgenuity or Membean: A Change in the EHHS English Department

Edgenuity, an online tutor course database, offers SAT prep lessons that are now weekly assignments for EHHS sophomores and juniors.

With new college and career readiness requirements, Edgenuity was introduced by Mrs. Veleas and the grade 11 English teachers at EHHS to support students in meeting graduation requirements. However, the program provides support in many areas of reading. “It really addresses one key aspect of reading, which is vocabulary development,” says Mrs. Veleas, English Instructional Leader.

Due to the fact that there is not enough time to teach these skills, Edgenuity acts as a way to give students more practice in these areas. As the Edgenuity course was only introduced to students a few weeks ago, the potential of Edgenuity was not anticipated to be apparent this school year. Despite this thought, Mrs. Veleas stated, “These lessons are definitely hitting skills that we needed to hit.” Edgenuity lessons may even be offered to seniors if they still must meet a benchmark, or use it as a tool in the college and career readiness course.

Before Edgenuity, students were provided with weekly 45 minute lessons on Membean, a vocabulary memorization website. The juniors and sophomores have helped the English department in providing some feedback as to how Membean and Edgenuity differ. One detail students noticed is that Edgenuity seems to take much longer in comparison to the usual 45 minute membean lessons, seeming to average around an hour and a half a week. In response to this, after the SAT, the lessons were adjusted to be taken every two weeks rather than every week, and this is planned to be taken into account when planning the program for the fall.

In terms of grading, the lessons are graded in a three week interval. Edgenuity quizzes are autoscored every three quizzes and are given as a 20 point summative assessment. This allows students to receive credit for their weekly work in practicing and completing the lessons provided to them in the course.

The English department currently plans to continue having the junior class complete weekly lessons in order to help students improve their English skills and have these abilities be reflected in tests such as the SAT’s, aid in meeting graduation requirements, and creating powerful and effective communicators in the classroom and beyond.