Teachers can assign individual articles or groups of articles (Text Sets) and videos. When teachers assign Newsela content, students see the assignments on their Newsela homepage.
When assigning Newsela content without customization (i.e. when teachers either use Quick Assign or simply assign without making any adjustments within the Article's page and Activities Builder), when students go to an assigned Newsela content at app.newsela.com or on the Newsela mobile app they can complete the following actions where available:
Read the article at all reading levels or Watch the video
Take the quiz at all reading levels
Highlight and annotate at all reading levels
Submit a writing response to the Newsela authored Write Prompt
Complete Power Words activities (Newsela ELA only, on articles supporting Power Words)
Complete Checks for Understanding activities (News & Informational texts)
Teachers can customize Newsela assignments from within the content item's page with adding/adjusting Class Instructions, Annotations, and Write Prompts, as well as enabling article actions (for example, Read Aloud or Translations), adding graphic organizers and/or Guided Highlighting, disabling Checks for Understanding, and more.
In the rest of this section, you can find instructions for assigning Newsela content and managing assignment settings and activities.
Quick Assign
Available on individual content items such as articles and videos, the Quick Assign function allows teachers to create an assignment faster, with the short-list of default instructional choices (as listed above).
When using Quick Assign, teachers can only customize the following:
Select class
Select Lexile Level
Toggle for students to change level
Assignment Date
Teachers aiming to customize the following must use the standard Assignment Builder and Advanced Settings from within the content item's full page:
Add/Remove/Edit activities from the assignment builder
Digital scaffolds (ie: Listen mode, in-paragraph translations, etc)
To use Quick Assign
Find an article you want to assign and click "Quick Assign" on the content item's card
Note: If "Quick Assign" is not appearing on the card, you might be looking at a collection, text set, instructional set, novel study, or topic - which are bundles of content items. The "Quick Assign" button will appear on the individual content items within that bundle
Check mark the class(es) for assignment
Select the preferred Lexile Level from the dropdown menu (you can select a specific level, or 'Newsela recommended Lexile Level' for Newsela to present each student with their own recommended article level)
Toggle 'Students can change level' ON/OFF to allow or prevent (respectively) students from selecting to read the article and take the assignment at a different Lexile Level than the one you chose for them
If you'd like the assignment to become available to you students in the future - schedule an assignment date. Otherwise, leave the field as is and the assignment will become available to students immediately upon the completion of this process.
The default activities included in the assignment will be listed. Check if these are suitable for your needs
Note: If you need to edit activities or set advanced settings, open the content card to see the full Assignment Builder and complete the assignment process from there
To complete the Quick Assign process, click "Assign Now"
Full Assignment Builder
Find an article you want to assign and click on the content card to open the article or video full page
At the top left corner of your screen you can adjust the Lexile Level
If the article is available in Spanish, you can also select the language from the top left corner of the page (for other languages, check our AI-supported text translator)
The Assignment Builder panel is displayed on the right side of your screen
Adjust the title of the assignment to your preference, add instructions and select which activities to include
Check the AI-supports below the article's title to generate an accompanying Lesson and/or a Before reading activity, and review the suggested Discussion questions, Main idea and Key terms.
Once ready, click 'Assign'
Proceed to select the preferred Lexile Level from the dropdown menu (you can select a specific level, or 'Newsela recommended Lexile Level' for Newsela to present each student with their own recommended article level)
Toggle 'Students can change level' ON/OFF to allow or prevent (respectively) students from selecting to read the article and take the assignment at a different Lexile Level than the one you chose for them
If you selected to prevent students from changing the level, you have the option of also hiding the selected level from the students by check-marking the box next to this setting
Checkmark the class(es) for assignment. If you want to assign to a small group - check the radio button and proceed to select the individual students (click here to learn more about small group assignments)
If you'd like the assignment to become available to you students in the future - schedule an assignment date. Otherwise, leave the field as is and the assignment will become available to students immediately upon the completion of this process.
Proceed to check / un-check the advanced settings:
- Students can listen to the article: Enable/Disable the Read Aloud feature on the assignment
- Students can change the entire article's language: Allow/Prevent students from switching the article's language between English and Spanish (where supported)
- Students can translate each paragraph using AI: Allow/Prevent students from using our AI-supported Text Translator to translate paragraphs in the article to a language of their choice
- Reveal quiz answers to students after submission: Allow/Prevent students from revealing the correct answers to quiz question after they submit their work
- Disable AI-generated vocabulary supports: Allow/Prevent students from accessing AI-generated definitions of subject-specific vocabulary underlined throughout the text
Click 'Create assignment' to finalize the assignment or 'Save Draft' to save it for future use
Assign Multiple Articles
From an Existing Text Set, Instructional Set or Novel Study
Find a Text Set, Instructional Set, or Novel Study you want to assign and click 'Assign' at the bottom of the card
Note: If you don't see an 'Assign' button, you are most likely looking at either a Topic or a Collection - both include multiple Text Sets, Instructional Sets, and/or Novel Studies within them. Click on the card to access those sets within.
This will take you to the assignment page, where you have the option to edit the title, student instructions, locked level and select the Assignees for the assignment (individual students or classes)
Click 'Assign' to finalize the assignment or 'Save Draft' to save it for future use
From an Individual Article page or Article Card
Begin by assigning one article using either Quick Assign or the Assignment Builder (as listed above)
Find an additional article you'd like to add to your existing assignment
Click 'Add' on the article's card
Note: If you don't see an 'Add' button, you are most likely looking at bundled content (i.e. Text set, Novel Study, Collection, etc.). Click into the set to locate individual articles to add to your assignment
Checkmark the assignment(s) you'd like to add the article to in the popup window
Click 'Add to assignment'
You can proceed to add more articles following these steps.
View the updated assignment in your Assignments tab
Save an Assignment as a Draft
Started to create an assignment but not ready to assign yet? Save it as draft, and return to it later.
Find an article or video you want to assign
Adjust the Assignment Builder and click the “Assign” button when ready.
Adjust the assignment settings to your preference and click “Save Draft”.
You can view your drafts in the Assignments tab
They will have a blue Draft tag at the top of the assignment bar.
You can also select the Draft button at the top to filter your assignments list and display all your drafts
To assign a draft, click on it's title from the Assignments page
Next, select “Assign”
Make sure at least one assignee is selected (whole class or individual student(s) in a Small Group)
Adjust any settings to your preference
Proceed to select "Create Assignment"
Assign Articles with Multiple Quizzes
When you have access to Newsela STEM, Newsela Science, Newsela Social Studies, or any combination of our subscriptions, you'll have access to some articles with multiple activities of the same type, that align to subject skills and reading skills.
To assign an article that contains multiple activities of the same type:
Find an article and click into it to access the Assignment Builder
If you'd like to have students complete only specific activities (i.e. only the Social Studies quiz and not the ELA quiz) - include these directions in the editable Instructions field.
Then, proceed to customize and complete the assignment process as listed above.
Update or Delete Assignments
On the assignment page, teachers can update or delete assignments.
Update Assignments
To update the class instructions, lexile levels, or article(s) in an assignment, follow these steps:
At the top of the page, click Assignments.
Click on the assignment you want to edit. This will take you to the assignment page.
On the assignment page, click Edit.
You'll be redirected to the article's page where you can edit your assignment's title, instructions and the selected activities within the Assignment Builder. Don't forget to click "Save Changes" before navigating away from this page.
If you need to make edits to the lexile level settings, the list of assignees, the assignment date, or the additional assignment settings - click the drop down next to save changes. Select "Assignment settings" and proceed to adjust as needed. Once you're done, make sure to click "Save Changes" at the bottom of the Assignment settings window.
Delete Assignments
To delete an assignment, follow these steps:
At the top of the page, click Assignments.
On each assignment bar, you can click on the little trash can icon above the article title to delete it.
You can also click on the assignment title. This will take you to the assignment page.
On the assignment page, click the Delete button on the top-right.
Finally, from the actual article itself, you can click on the drop down next to Save changes, and select delete assignment.
Share Assignments
Share to Students or Caregivers
To share an assignment, click the share icon on an assignment
Proceed to select the method to share the assignment link with your students:
Post in Google Classroom
Use the Remind app
Send an Email
Share to Students in your LMS or Google
Assignments can also be shared with students directly via Google or Canvas.
For Schoology and other LMSs, you'll need to create an assignment in Newsela, then share the assignment link in your LMS. Newsela will not automatically share an assignment.
Share with Colleagues
Newsela allows sharing an assignment with other educators. To share assignments with your colleagues click the Share icon on the assignment.
Click the "Off" icon to allow sharing with other teachers.
Copy the link and send it to your colleagues via email, social media, or direct message.
Scheduling Assignments for a Later Date
Teachers can create assignments and select a date for when they become available to their students. All features of assigning articles, like using small groups are still available when doing so.
To assign an article to go live at a later date, follow the instructions above, and enter your desired date in the "Scheduled for" field:
Click the calendar icon
Select a date from the calendar and type in the time (hour, minutes and AM or PM). Once set, these will be the date and the time the assignment will become available to your students.
Note: the time zone presented will match the time zone defined on the device you're using.
Finalize your assignment creation
Small Group Assignment
For more information on assigning to individual students or groups of students, see this article